Introduction
7 years ago, someone told me about picture-tuning or pixel-tuning. Not knowing what it was, I began to let the classmate explain to me what it was.
Back then, car-pimping wasn't as popular as it is now, but it was still a booming business. Now, 7 years later, everyone knows tv-shows such as Pimp my Ride and car-tuning has become a real hit.
All and all, it still costs a lot, so if you do not have that much money, or if you don't even have a car (like me), but still want to pimp cars, stay tuned!

The Stocks
For the base of the pimped out car, I'm gonna use 2 cars I both kinda like. I couldn't find a good stock of a Rolls-Royce Phantom, so I'm gonna use 2 Chryslers.
I have no idea what kind of Chryslers they are, I just got them off the website under the catagory "Chrysler". I'm going to use the bumper from the second stock and place it on the first stock.
We will also be needing stocks of a hood-scoop, rims and maybe some graphics to put on the side.

The Bumper
What you need to do first is make sure that both cars are the same size. Do this by copying both stocks into one document. Then grab our Pen-Tool.
Cut out the bumper of the second stock and place it over the other car. Now of course, you may need to tweek it a littlem so use CTRL+T to rotate it and make it a little smaller.

As you can see, there are some parts overlapping the open area of the tires and the height of the hood is a bit too much. Since the copy-pasted bumper is placed on a new layer, simply erase those parts using the Pen-Tool.
Next up, is the actual Eraser. Grab a soft Eraser-brush and make sure the top of the pasted hood flows into the original stock nicely. Also do the side of the bumper above the wheel. Notice that the original bodykit has a darker line going across the wheel-opening. Create a black shape to make the bumper in the same color to follow this.

Hood Scoop
Every cool muscle-car needs a hood-scoop. And every other pimped car needs one as well. Okay I'm just making this up. But are there really pimping-rules? I think not. As long as it's over the top and in the same style, it's pimping in my book.
So we are gonna need a stock of a hood-scoop. Ofcourse it's too big, the wrong color and off center. That's why you just need to cut it out and make sure it's the right size. Use CTRL+T to make it smaller and position it the way you want.

Go to Edit>Transform>Distort to transform it even better. This way, you can grab the individual anchor-points and drag them to the desired shape. Much handier and easier then the regular scaling.
Position it in the middle and take out the Eraser or the Smudge Tool and make the edges of the scoop-image a little softer to they seem to fade in.

Set the blending-mode of the layer to MULTIPLY and see how it will instantly merge with the car. Though, the shine on top is gone.
That's why you should grab a small soft brush and use White to brush some lightning on a layer behind the Hood-Scoop, but in front of the car. Set the blending-mode to OVERLAY or just lower the opacity to 10-20.

Giving the car color
This step is a bit hard in the beginning, but after this, changing the color is really easy. What you need to do first is make an outline of the bodywork of the car you want to paint. What I always do is just grab my Pen-Tool, outline the parts I want to paint, and fill them with White on a new layer.
Then you can always lock that layer or hide it and select it for an empty selection to fill it with a color. Make sure you do this. I recommend the Pen-Tool for those hard to reach area's and the higher usability. The learning-curve may be high, but in the end, it really pays off.
Once you have that White layer, press CTRL+J to duplicate it and hide the first one. Set the second one to COLOR, HUE or SATURATION. This will change the color to black and white. It's much easier to change the color of a grey car, since it has no color. If you would change the color of a red car, you will always stick with the redness.

Variations
Then, you simply keep on selecting the White layer to get the selection and fill this with a desired color. Then change the blending-mode to MULTIPLY or OVERLAY if you want a special color.
To select the White layer, hold CTRL and click on the thumbnail of the layer. In the images below you can see a few variations which I made.
First off, a simple Purple layer set to MULTIPLY will make the car nice and Purple. Changing the layer to OVERLAY, duplicating it, changing it to Red and erasing the top half, will get you the second image.
You can also make it a little more feminine by adding some silky White. Blue and Green can also be used to make a nice Turqoise transition.
I ofcourse, will keep it in "MickM-Green", which over the years has almost become a real color...

Window-Tinting
Make a new layer and grab the Pen-Tool. Trace the windows and fill the selection on a new layer with Black. To darken the windows, simply lower the opacity to a desired setting. Again, if you want a different color, instead of Black, choose your color and set the blending-mode to MULTIPLY and lower the opacity.

The Rims
Every pimped out car needs new rims. I got some fancy rims from sxc.hu. When you start looking for good stocks, make sure not too many stuff is behind the rims. I chose this stock because it has a black background, which works perfectly, because from this angle, with this lightning, you usually won't see anything there.
Grab your Elliptical Marquee-Tool and cut out the rim. Press CTRL+J to duplicate the layer and CTRL+T to transform the layer into place. Looks great doesn't it?

Graphics
From sxc.hu again, I got this fancy tribal-flame. There's something about tribal shapes that works so well with pimping cars.
Copy the flame-image into your document. Since most of the images are Black and White, a simple setting the blending-mode to MULTIPLY will do the trick of removing the background. If the image is inversed, press CTRL+I or set it to Lighten to see the flame in White. Use Edit>Transform>Distort to transform your flames in the right direction.

I really prefer nice straight lines. Racing-stripes. I did this the same way. Just playing around with the opacity and making sure that if the shape is larger then the car, CTRL+click the White layer again, press CTRL+SHIFT+I to invert the selection and press DELETE.

Neon
On a new layer, use either the Pen-Tool or the Polygonal Lasso-Tool to create a green rectangle over the car. Grab your 200px soft Eraser and gently erase the parts that overlap the car.
The press CTRL+J twice to make 2 duplicates of the layer. Go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur and give the first copy a blur or 6-10 and set the blending-mode to OVERLAY. Give the second one a Gaussian Blur of 10-20 and change the blending-mode to LINEAR LIGHT and tweek with the opacity of both layers.

Conclusion
There you have it. Your own pimped out ride. Pimping was never this easy. Experiment with different objects from other cars. Now you can have a Ferrari with Porsche-doors. I am no car-geek, so I have no idea how many impossible mixtures can be made.
But just upload your car somewhere and show it in the comments. The best ones, will be featured in this tutorial! Have fun and remembers, EXPERIMENT. Especially with the colors. Don't be affraid to try something new to get a cool new result. ANd if you fail at something, you've also learned something. You've learned never to do that again!
Enjoy!