Members Area Tutorial: Design a Colorful and Futuristic Photo Manipulation
Distort Paint Splatters to Construct a Unique Photo-Manipulation
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PSDFan Extra
Final Image
This is the final image that we’ll be creating:
User Suggestion
This tutorial is actually a suggestion of some of our visitors. I always welcome user suggestions and would love to get your ideas for future tutorials.
Images/Files Used
Here is a list of images and files used in this tutorial:
http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1114780
http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1111544
http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1080080
http://www.sxc.hu/photo/1063678
http://www.sxc.hu/photo/345436
Step 1
Open up a new document (600X250px) and create a new layer called ‘black background’. Fill your entire canvas with black.
Step 2
Now add some white text to the center of your canvas. I used the font ‘Gill Sans’ set to bold.
Step 3
Now duplicate your text layer. Select your original and rasterize it (layer>rasterize>layer). Then apply a motion blur to this layer by going to filter>blur>motion blur. Set your angle to 90 and your blur strength to 20. Finally reduce your layer’s opacity to 60%.
Step 4
Now paste in an image of some smoke. Make sure that you find an image of smoke on a black background, and if there is any color to your smoke go to image>adjustments>desaturate. Then change your layer’s blend mode to ‘exclusion’.
Step 5
Now select a large, soft eraser brush at a low opacity (around 10%) and erase the edges of your smoke image.
Step 6
Now repeat the same technique with another smoke image.
Step 7
Add some more smoke, being sure to erase parts of each image until things are looking good.
Step 8
Now paste in another smoke image, and set your layer blend mode to ‘multiply’. Then go to image>adjustments>levels and set your input levels to 0, 1.00, 100.
Step 9
You’ll notice that this layer now hides some of your previous smoke layers. To fix this grab a soft eraser brush and erase around your letters, exposing the rest of your smoke.
Step 10
Now if you remember we created 2 text layers earlier and rasterized the first one. Now it’s time to rasterize the second one. Once you have done this grab your smudge tool, and set your brush size to 40px and your strength to 60%. You want to start smudging the tops of the letters of your top text layer. To achieve a nice smokey effect, don’t simply smudge upwards, but make small circular smudging motions.
Also reduce this text layers opacity to 75%.
Step 11
Select your paintbrush tool and apply the settings shown below in your brush palette.
Step 12
Now paint over your text on a new top layer. To make your scattered brush marks more obvious duplicate your layer and merge it down with the original. Then apply an outer glow blending option to your layer (settings below).
And We’re Done!
I really hope that you enjoyed this tutorial, and as always I’d appreciate your comments.
About the Author:
Tom is the founder of PSDFAN. He loves writing tutorials, learning more about design and interacting with the community. On a more interesting note he can also play guitar hero drunk with his teeth.
117 Comments:
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Very cool results, I love that it in Black and White too
)
Thanks! I’m glad you liked the result.
Thanks for using my suggestion Tom. Been waiting a while for you to come up with a tutorial for smoke text effect. It looked pretty hard, yet you made it look pretty easy and you have pulled it of terrifically! Well done
I had a quick play in photoshop just to see if i could get a near result. Also i used the same smoke picture throughout but just stretched it, rotated it and used the liquify tool.
http://i513.photobucket.com/albums/t340/shawmiester/smoke-test.jpg
No worries Shaw, it was a great suggestion and a fun tutorial to write. Nice outcome by the way!
That’s great idea to put something like this together -how always – very good looking outcome! Nice, Tom!
Thanks Dainis
Ah awesome!
I took a few smoke pics a while back.. Guess this will be a nice thing to add on when I post them
Awesome, I’d be happy to post your smoke images here if you’d like?
nice result, but how about a tut teaching how to take pics of smoke or how to create realistic smoke like that??
Great idea! I’ll try and get a tut done on that next week.
TO MAKE THIS AWESOME EFFECT BETTER, CHANGE THE TEXT TO BLACK AND PUT IT AS THE TOP LAYER
Wow great tutorial, I loved it, put my own style into it with some color
http://i42.tinypic.com/2jb85mw.jpg
Wow! That’s a truly incredible outcome Matt. Nice work!
hey Matt its really superb and incredible…. Great work with the help of great tutorial….
=) couldn’t have done it without the tut
nice out come
A++ tutorial it was easy to read.
how come I can not join this site ?
Thanks for the kind words Teknotik. I’m afraid the members area hasn’t launched due to some totally unforeseen problems in the file upload. I’m getting it fixed currently though and will announce when it launches.
its cool effect i love this effect thanks Tom
Thanks Vasu!
step 4 dosnt make sense when i paste the image in it covers my letters can u tell me how i can get the background of the smoke and only leave the smoke ????
Make sure to set your layer’s blend mode to ‘exclusion’ in your layers palette. If this doesn’t work try setting it to ‘screen’ mode.
This is not typography. Yes, it is nice, yes, it is well done. But please stop calling this typography, this is design using type as an element or centre piece. Nice job on it but please consider what you are calling it next time.
Yeah I see your point. Thanks for the kind words anyway.
this is such a rip off of PSDVAULT.com’s smoke text effect
I just looked through their text tutorials and I’m not sure which tutorial you’re referring to? Either way I didn’t rip them off, if it’s similar then it’s purely through coincidence.
aqui esta mi resultado es un tutial easy pero good.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/wdsdesing/3386956715/sizes/o/
I’m afraid I’m not quite sure what you said there (being terrible at languages), but I had to approve your comment as your result is really awesome! Nice work
he said that was his result. Also said it was an easy tutorial but very good :p these spanish guys suck at english xD im still trying to follow your steps and its looking good! awsome result. thanks a lot.
oh btw what are those brushes you use?
Thanks very much for this tutorial, nice
nice
and cool
very thank’s for your Tutorial
What a really great result. These design tutorials serve to keep a lot of people inspired. Thanks for sharing.
thanks….that’s great tutorial…keep it up…
^^ nice tutorial but theres something was not good.copying a smoking to an image?? do you can make a tutorial how to make a smoke???thanks email me at tech9_god@yahoo.com
Thank you for the tutorial, only I have a small problem, it(he,she) is that not to do that the smoke sees on the letters and not below.
Thank you
thanks so much for this tutorial i made a rockin insert for my scanlation group and it came out great after a couple of tries ^^ i used a font that already had splatter so i wouldnt have to worry about that later lol…and i just want to comment that there are some really rude postings in this tutorial and just want to thank you for even wanting to share with us and continuing to reply to each and every comment.
Thanks Arus, that means a lot
. Feel free to share your work here.
where can I find Gill Sans Bold?
thanks
Dude thanks a bunch this was incredible and very easy to read
TYVM!!!
Result: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=82172&id=839858705&saved#/photo.php?pid=2206552&id=839858705
tank you
This was extremely helpful! I’ve been trying to learn to do typographical designs and this smoke style was quite easy to do. here is the link to my result:
http://hautalken.deviantart.com/art/Intuition-Smoke-138515872
that’s pretty cool
thank a lot
i love smokey typography where you given great tips and tricks. thanks
I am from Azerbaidjan and i liked it
I just got contracted to do some work for a hookah bar and really didn’t have any good ways to make smokey text, but this is great! Thanks so much for helping me keep my job!
http://ooohoman.deviantart.com/art/Fail-Gloriously-2-0-147659025
my attempt! i added color as well =]
thank you for making such an easy to follow tutorial! my lack of patience thanks you.
[...] Create Smokey Typography in 12 Steps [...]
Nice tutorial, great work!
I love these smoke-effects!
great! thank you
Thank you dear tom ,
very cool tutorial .
i love it
Nice work… Simple and very effective. Thanks for posting
thx…looks great!
plz can someone explain it so i can follow 
but i still dont understand how to manage step 4…
im using the german version of PS, i can try hours but i just dont get how u do this step…
how the smoke is in front of the text while its not just smoke but has also a black background…I’m a newbie
thXxxx
omg
) i got it…thXxx so much 4 the tutorial ^_^
This smokey typography is awesome and it is not one of the hardest to achieve.
Thanks for the tutorial.
Quite an easy tutorial, thanks. =)
one question how can i add the image to the project ??
when i open the image it opens it in a new file …. not with the project ..
Hi Knazze, I’m a little confused by your question? What exactly do you mean?
smoky
and cool design!
gotta try that on my comp. thnx allot! =)
very easy to follow tutorial Tom, thanks a lot.
That is an awesome tutorial, thank you for making it sound so easy!
Hi!
Could anyone explain
“Step 8
Now paste in another smoke image, and set your layer blend mode to ‘multiply’. Then go to image>adjustments>levels and set your input levels to 0, 1.00, 100. ”
? I don’t understand the “now paste in another smoke image…”… I added 4 smoke images and put the bend mode like exclusion like the tut says… What layer am I supposed to turn the blend mode to multiply?
thanks, and great tut!
I still dont understand step 4 the smoke wont come in front of the text
I’d be tempted to find some decent smoke stock on black, set blend mode to screen and warp it a bit, just to add a touch more realism.
Awesome tutorial! A natural as always!
hi tom,
wen i set the blend mode of the smoke to exclusion my text and the smoke turn into a brown color?!
help me plz
hi can you say me where do i download the brush used in stp. 11 at the beggining
thanks
awesome thanks man..!! really easy
A really nice effect. I am trying to get use to using more effects and tools in photo shop so I will definitely will be trying this out. I will be searching through some other effects too so thanks for all the help!
How to create smokey text….first, create your text….now paste in an image of some smoke. And We’re Done!
hey tom i didnt understand step 4 ….when i go through step 4 ..the smoke back ground is covering whole text …help me man ..how can i mix smoke with text as u shown in step 4
Awesome effect. It seems very natural. Love it.
Thanks for sharing.
hey for those of you who’re having trouble with step 4, try changing your mode to RGB. Worked for me!:P
Onefreedonut speaks the truth
Awesome Tutorial! gave me great results, thanks
man i loved this effect so much but if we want to have a smooth overlay of rainbow gradient will it look nice…!
easy to follow?good?
Nice result thanks for you idea
It is a cool tut but I don’t get it on Step 4!
I tried Exclusion, screen mode(and actually all the mode) to get the smoke come out through type but I can’t.
I found out many others ask you the same question here.
It’s been a while but if you happen to check comments again, please let us know! thank you
Hi there I have the same problem on step 4 please some one to help thanks….
I DIDN’T GET 8TH STEP …..CAN U PLEASE EXPLAIN ME HOW WE CAN PASTE ANOTHER SMOKE IMAGE…….? AND HOW WE CAN GIVE THAT CRUSH EFFECT TO THE TEXT…?
Nice post – very easy to follow. End result seems to create a big file size. How would one reduce this?
i got ur tut right till 7th step..
then in 8th step u said
“Now paste in another smoke image, and set your layer blend mode to ‘multiply’. Then go to image>adjustments>levels and set your input levels to 0, 1.00, 100. ”
till 7th step i have got about 5-6 layers..so i am not getting as to change which layer blend mode to multiply..
plzz reply me fast…..
I Am also having the same problem at step 8 …. can someone please advise how to get this progressed.
Thanks looks a lot nice the final effect.
Nice tutorial. I forgot I had an account at http://www.sxc.hu.
Thanks for sharing its lots of fun working with smoke.
This comment is for Swift Services who asked about reducing file size; if the end file size is too big, the easiest way to reduce it would be to compress it. You could use a program like Arles or Photoshop. Keep in mind that the more you compress the image, the lower quality the image will be (blurrier etc).
I know this is an old tutorial but I had a question about a complication I’m having with completing it. I’m trying to apply this smoke effect to something I’ve drawn digitally. The object is colored. Now, when I lay the smoke layer on top of the object the smoke starts looking like a film negative, if you know what I mean. I desaturated the picture of smoke I used just to be on the safe side and it’s still doing that. Any idea on what I could do to fix it?
nice tutorial
Here’s what i got, thanks for the tutorial!!
[IMG]http://i53.tinypic.com/rlkdj7.jpg[/IMG]
Nice work Bert, I really love your application of color. One thing I’d advise is to make your final image a bit sharper so we can see all of the work that went into it even more clearly.
Awesome,Easy And Fun.
Thanxxxxxxxxxxx
worked 100%
I did fine til step 8 .. idk what to do there… if someone can help me out there, my email: bbsimonrd@gmail.com
anyone post a .psd file please
thanks for this awesome tutorial!
here is my result:
http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/180/dubby.png
Awesome outcome Max, in fact one of my favorite results I’ve seen from people following this tutorial!
So you could make this smoke another color right?
Absolutely, a simple color balance adjustment layer, or color overlay would work great!
THanx for excellent pix broher tom It was a great help to me for making a bullentin board. I was sooooooooooooooo easy to follow. Thanx again bro I dont know what I would do without you
Sweet.. I realy enjoyed.. twas very helpful
Simple and awesome. great when negative
Woooooow!! nice one… keep it up student..
Not enough explaining. If it was meant to be self explanatory it didn’t come off as such. Redo.
Hi Ashley, what stages were you struggling with? I’d be happy to help. We also have an updated version of the tutorial.
Can someone upload the Lightcloud 2 picture because the person/account who uploaded the file at sxc is “canceled”?
Thanks in advance
Ps what an awesome tutorial!
AWESOME THNX
I’d Like to Smoke Effect……Very happy to sharing your Post
This is absolutely awesome.
Well written and the end effect is fantastic.
Thank you so much.
Thanks Lizzie! I really appreciate the kind words.
Oh, and this my final result: http://s1268.photobucket.com/albums/jj576/Winglets14/?action=view¤t=SmokeMasala1.jpg
Thanks once again!
Thank you for a very precise explanation. Great result even for the beginners!
can I have someone write the word ‘Vzone ‘ with this technique. I am willing to pay for your time. Thank you.
where do i get the brush tip shape in step 11? i dont seem to have it, thanks
hi, tutorial was great… i m fscing problem in step 12. can anyone of you explain it to me?? please
i am also Very happy to sharing your Post thanks for this triks….
Pls help…i got stuck on step 8. If you change the blending mode of this smoke pic to multiply instead of exclusion, then the background shows up…what am i doing wrong? Oh actually maybe its that my backgrounds not black but a grey-ish sort of metal texture…does that interfere with the design?
I’m having trouble with finding that type of brush you used in step 11
Fantastic tutorial. I am teaching my little brother how to use photoshop for text effects and this is perfect. Would it be possible to obtain a psd file with all the layers so he could see how they are all interlinked? thanks.
hi is there any chance someone can do this design but with the words One Step Ahead….if anyone can do i need it before next thursday thanks