Creating a Tiny Planet in Photoshop (or GIMP) is easy to do. And they're fun.
Here are the steps.
Step 1: the image
Tiny Planets work best with panoramas, but can also be done with just a few images as long as the width is at least twice the height. Wider is better though and the very best are 360º panoramas. One reason for this is that you will have a seamless fit when the images are turned into a sphere.
The top are of the photo, about 25% should be fairly clean, light and uniform like a blue sky or a night sky. This area will be surrounding your tiny planet, it's the outer rim, so clean is what you're looking for.
The bottom area of the photo, also about 25% should have as little detail as possible as it will make up the very centre of our tiny planet and as such distorted the most. The less there is to distort the better. It could be water or sand or a road.
The left and right edges of the image need to match as best as possible (which is why a 360º panorama is so perfect as the edges will be absolutely seamless).
Make sure to keep the horizon straight so that when the left and right edges are joined, there is no sudden horizon cut off. The horizon is the most important part as it will be the outside of your sphere, pointing out.
Look for a horizon that has upward (vertical) structures like tall buildings, trees, towers etc. They will be pointing outward in your tiny planet.
Once you have an image it's time to import it into Photoshop (or GIMP).
Step 2: Photoshop
Import your image into Photoshop.
In the top menu go to Image > Image Size and click the little link icon to undo the "Constrain Aspect Ratio." Then make the height the same as the width.
Next, choose Image > Image Rotation > 180º to rotate the image 180º.
The resulting image now looks like this: square, vertically stretched and upside down.
The Polar filter will wrap this into a sphere.
In the menu choose Filter > Distort > Polar Coordinates and then select "Rectangular to Polar."
This results in a tiny planet:
This image is a good example of what happens when the left and right sides don't really meet seamlessly. But with a little help that can be remedied. After a bit of work I ended up with this:
