How to create a lego mosaic effect in photoshop

March 10th, 2025
Photoshop

Welcome to Creative Nerds! In this quick tutorial, we’re going to explore how to color blend photos in Adobe Photoshop to match color tones and lighting with the background seamlessly. To create a lego photo effect . This technique is perfect for integrating subjects into different backgrounds smoothly.

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Tutorial details

Program: Photoshop
Time estimation: Under 3 minutes
Difficulty: Easy
Resource used: Lego background

Step 1: Download a Lego Background

First, you’ll need a Lego-themed background. We found ours on Unsplash:

Go to Unsplash.com.
Search for “Lego background”.
Download your preferred image.

Step 2: Convert the Background to Black and White

Once you have your background:

Open the image in Photoshop.
Navigate to Image > Adjustments > Black & White.
This will desaturate your image, turning it into black and white.

Step 3: Create a Smart Object

Next, consolidate your image for non-destructive editing:

Select all layers by clicking on the first layer, holding Shift, and clicking on the last layer.
Right-click on the selected layers and choose Convert to Smart Object.

Step 4: Prepare Your Primary Photo

Now, let’s prepare the photo to which you want to apply the effect:

Drag and drop the photo (e.g., a photo of a car) into Photoshop.
Place this new photo layer above the Lego background layer in the Layers panel.

Step 5: Change Blend Mode

Adjust how the two layers blend:

With the top photo layer selected, change the Blend Mode to Overlay.
- You can find the Blend Mode option at the top of the Layers panel.

Step 6: Apply the Mosaic Effect

Let’s pixelate your photo to match the Lego theme:

Ensure the top photo layer is still selected.
Go to Filter > Pixelate > Mosaic.
Set the Cell Size to 13 (you can adjust this based on your preference).
Click OK.

Conclusion

There you go! You’ve successfully created a mosaic Lego-style photo effect in Photoshop. This technique can be applied to any photo to give it a unique, playful look.

Thanks for following this guide, and stay tuned to Creative Nerds for more quick tips on how to use Photoshop!

Video Transcript

Hello, welcome to Creative Nerds. In this short Photoshop tutorial, we’ll be sharing with you how you can create a Lego style photo effect using Photoshop. So first we want to start off by downloading a Lego background, which we have downloaded from Unsplash.com by just simply typing in Lego background into the search. And what we want to do from there is turn the background to become black. So we’re going to head over to our adjustments and we’re going to select black and white. And then we’re going to select both layers and create a smart object. So convert to smart object. And then from there, what we want to do is drag that layer under the photo effect, the photo that we want to apply our effect to. So the photo that’s above is of a car. And we’re simply going to change the blend mode to become overlay. From there, we’re going to ensure our layer of our photo is still selected, head over to filter, select pixelate. And from there, we want to choose mosaic. And we’re just going to adjust the settings to be, go with 13, and then select OK. There you go, we’ve created a cool mosaic Lego style photo effect that you can apply to any photo. Thanks for watching and stay tuned to Crave Nerds for other quick tips on how to use Photoshop.