Mastering 3D work can add a whole new depth (excuse the pun!) to your design work. Particularly 3D typography can be an awesome final touch for anything from web design to print design or photo manipulation work.

Basically, it’s time to roll up your sleeves and tackle a new skill!

Today’s tutorial will show you around the 3D capabilities of Photoshop CS6 Extended.

As always, this won’t be a dreary old taking you through the motions tutorial. In fact, we’re getting our drank on and taking you into the depths of the nightclub scene. You’ll be creating a cool neon sign and learning a very cool text effect along the way.

What You’ll Be Creating:

Here’s a look at the outcome you’ll be able to produce by the end of this lesson:

Ready to begin? Great, let’s get started!

Step 1

Start by creating a new document, width: 1440px, height: 900px, resolution: 72. Name it 3D Neon.

Step 2

Fill the background layer with a solid color, #15243b. Name it Background. Now, download the font “You’re Gone”, and type PARTY! with a white color. Size 250 pt. With the text selected open Character window and set the tracking value to 60.

Step 3

With the text layer selected go to menu Type and click on Convert to Shape. Now, select the Pen tool and with the layer still selected we are going to make some change because we’re only interested on the stroke shape. Set Fill to No Color and for stroke use #488dc6 color. Size 10 pt. Press the shape stroke type button, then click on More Options… button and the Stroke dialog box is open.

Set the following values like I show you on the image below:

• Align: Center
• Caps: Round
• Corners: Round
• Dashed Line: Checked
• Dash: 38
• Gap: 3

Leave in blank the other boxes.

Yours should looks like this:

Step 4

Duplicate the layer and name it Party! Black. This time we will just modify the shape of the stroke to a continuous line, set align to center and Caps and Corners to Round. See the image below.

Step 5

Duplicate the black layer and name it support. This time we will just modify the shape of the stroke to a dotted one. Following the path indicated on step 3 open the Stroke dialogue box. Change this values:

• Preset: select the dotted line
• Align: Inside
• Caps: Round
• Corners: Round
• Dashed Line: Checked
• Dash: 0
• Gap: 18

Step 6

This sign needs electricity so let’s create the cable. Using the Pen tool with no color fill and an almost black color for the stroke (#081a2b) and size 5 pt draw the cable through letters. Remember you can add anchor point to modify the flow of your path.

This is how your layers should looks like:

Step 7

Start working with the 3D!

Now we are going to convert all this layers into a 3D extrusion. We can’t do it all at the same time, must be one by one; so repeat this step for all layers except for the Background layer. Select the layer and go to Menu 3D>New 3D Extrusion from Selected Layer. Tip: you can do the same thing just right click on the layer you wish to convert and select the New 3D Extrusion from Selected Layer option from the contextual menu.

Step 8

For the background go to menu 3D>New Mesh from Layer>Postcard or right click on the layer and select Postcard. Your text should looks like this, nothing fancy… for now.

Step 9

Select all layers and go to menu 3D>Merge 3D Layers.

Step 10

From now on we’ll change the depth of all ours 3d extrusions. First select the rope layer on the 3D panel and the Properties panel automatically change. Go there and set the Extrusion Depth to 0. Then click on the Shape Preset and select Pillow Inflate.

Doesn’t matter the order the result will be the same.

Step 11

On the Properties panel with the Party! Blue layer selected, set the Extrusion Depth to 0; click on the Shape Preset and select Pillow Inflate. Now click on Cap icon in at the top of this panel. Set the Angle to 90º and the Strength to 20%, below you can see the panels.

Repeat this step for the Party! Black layer.

Step 12

Change the Extrusion Depth of support layer to 35.

Step 13

Now we’re going to align the layers to make it look good. On your 3D panel select Scene and on the Properties panel, change Presets values to Hidden Wireframe. Right click on the axes at the bottom left corner of the stage and select left. Then using the controls move each element along the z exe until you get the desire position.

Step 14

Change the angle. Using the move tool with the rotate the 3d Object option activated grab into the stage until you get the desired position of the object. These are my View coordinates:

Save your Current view for further usage. Tip: With the Current View selected on the 3D panel click on View>Save; name it final, you can move you 3D object every time you need and get back to this menu and select it to came back to the exact position.

Step 15

Adding materials.

Select all the material layers from the Party! Blue layer. On the Properties panel remove the texture by click on the icon right next to the Diffuse color.

Set the following values:

• Diffuse: #a0d6ff
• Specular: #348bcd
• Illumination: #3ba6f8
• Ambient: #454545
• Shine: 80%
• Reflection: 17%
• Roughness: 0%
• Bump: 0%

Step 16

Select all the material layers from the Party! Black layer. Set the following values:

• Diffuse: # 7f7f7f
• Specular: # 333333
• Illumination: #000000
• Ambient: #000000
• Shine: 20%
• Reflection: 20%
• Roughness: 7%
• Bump: 10%

Step 17

Select all the material layers from the support layer. Set the following values:

• Diffuse: # 7f7f7f
• Specular: # 333333
• Illumination: #000000
• Ambient: #0167a1
• Shine: 20%
• Reflection: 10%
• Roughness: 5%
• Bump: 10%

Step 18

Select all the material layers from the rope layer. We are going to use the same colors used on the Party! Black layer just change the following values:

• Shine: 20%
• Reflection: 43%
• Roughness: 9%
• Bump: 10%

Step 19

Let’s make some change to the environment. Click on the Environment layer. On the Properties panel uncheck IBL option. Unchecking this option will help when we work on the background layer in the further step. Under Reflections set Opacity to 60% and Roughness to 20%.

At this point yours should look like this:

Step 20

Let’s add a cold light. In your 3D panel go to the Bottom and click on the file icon to Add a new Light to Scene. Select New Infinite Light. Change the color to #b4f2ff, set Intensity to 60% and Shadow Softness to 11%.

Step 21

Now we are going to make more credible the background layer. Go and select it. On the Properties panel set the following values:

• Diffuse: # 023963
• Specular: # 333333
• Illumination: #000000
• Ambient: #0167a1
• Shine: 23%
• Reflection: 89%
• Roughness: 47%
• Bump: 10%

Step 22

Let’s add a wall texture. With the Background layer selected, go to the Properties panel and click on the file icon right next to Diffuse color. Select Edit Texture. A message will be open warning you that every change you made to this texture will appear in all places. Press ok and a new document will be open just with the Background original layer.

Step 23

Insert into this new document the downloaded texture. Resize it to fill all the area, leave the two column out of the picture. Rasterize it and them duplicate it and hide the new one.

Step 24

Delete the Background layer we don´t need it anymore. Open the Hue/Saturation dialog box by pressing Ctrl+U or selected from menu Image>Adjustment>Hue/Saturation. Check Colorize checkbox, set Hue to 213; Saturation to 54 and Lightness to -67.

Also open Levels dialog box by pressing Ctrl+L or selected from menu Image>Adjustment>Levels…. Just adjust the midtones to 0,93 and the highlight in Output Levels box to 197 as I show you below.

You can switch between document to see what you are doing on this document how is affecting your 3D composition. At the instant you switch to the original document Photoshop will automatically update the object. Look:

Step 25

Let’s add a touch of light. Back to the background document with the wall texture, unhide the duplicated layer. Again open the Hue/Saturation dialog box. Check Colorize checkbox, set Hue to 213; Saturation to 25 and Lightness to -40

Add a mask revealing just the middle of it. Set Opacity to 82% and Fill to 70%. This is how your mask should look like:

Step 26

Select again the darker layer and let’s darker a little bit more. Open the Levels dialog box and just change, in Output Levels section, the highlight option to 191. Save changes and close it.

At this point you must have this:

Step 27

Final Adjustments.

You can scale the background layer to fill the blank space on the right or simply crop the image, I scale the background layer using the scale option inside the move tool.

When you fill happy with it RENDER the file by clicking the render icon at the bottom of the Properties panel, by pressing Alt+Shift+Ctrl+R or go to Menu 3D>Render.

Step 28

As you can see the glow of the letters by itself is poor. So let’s add a glow to the letters. Go back to the Layer panel and create a new layer, name it Glow. Using a soft brush size 28 and using #00ccff as color draw along the letters. Change the blending mode to Screen and opacity to 85%.

And We’re Done!

You can view the final outcome below. I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial and would love to hear your feedback on the techniques and outcome.

Congratulations, You’re All Done!

Awesome job making it this far! You should be proud of what you’ve created. Show it off to your friends and colleagues and get some feedback.

You can also comment here with your version, or any questions you had about the techniques used. We love to see what you guys create and we’re always here to give helpful feedback and tips to help you to improve.

Have you ever shied away from Photoshop’s 3D features?

They’re becoming increasingly powerful with each version, and are well worth integrating into your design work.

Today you’ll learn how to create a simple wooden text effect using some practical, 3D and texturing techniques in Photoshop CS6 Extended.

It is possible to follow this tutorial using CS5 Extended, but please remember that you must have the extended version of Photoshop in order to work with 3D projects.

Don’t worry if this is your first time working with 3D design, I’ll hold your hand through every step along the way!

Let’s get started shall we?

Final Image

As always, this is the final image that we’ll be creating:

Step 1

Start by creating a new document, width 1000px, height: 1000px, resolution: 72. Name it 3D Text.

Step 2

Now, let’s create the background.

Fill the background layer with a solid color, #ccb79f, this will be useful for blending the wood texture.

Step 3

Open the “wood background” photo into another document and select the focus section like I show you below. Paste it into our document at the top of layer panel, name it Wood. Use Free Transform Tool to make it fit in the stage and look fine. Set the Blending Mode to Multiply, opacity to 77% and fill to 84%. At this point should look like this:

Step 4

Now add a Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer. Set this values:

Hue: 28; Saturation: 21; Lightness: -32; Check Colorize.

Step 5

Download the font and install it or use one of your choice. Type PSD, use #9d8365 for the font color and 24 pt for the font size like you can see below.

Step 6

With the text layer selected go to 3D>New 3D Extrusion from Selected Layer. Now your stage will change to 3D view to work better.

Automatically your layer panel switch to a 3D panel. The Properties panel show you the actual camera. On the left top corner you can see a floating window showing “something”, that’s your camera top view you can switching between different cameras.

Yours should look like this:

Step 7

Now with the Move Tool selected, the Rotate the 3D Object active and on the 3D panel Current View selected drag on the top of the stage over the text and rotate, your mouse will change into an arrow. Your text now will look like this:

Step 8

On your 3D panel you will find your 3D layers. Below “Current View” you will find a layer with a T icon called PSD. The icon represent what kind of content is in the layer. Inside you will find 5 more layers who compose your 3D Object. With the PSD layer selected the Properties panel will change. Go there and change the Extrusion Depth to 347.

Step 9

Now on the 3D panel select the Cap Option to show new options. On Bevel section change the Width to 2% and Contour to the round one. On Inflate section change Angle to 90º. After that you can render to take a look on how is going. Click on the render icon at the button of this panel. You can stop the render when you are happy with the result just clicking anywhere on the stage don’t need to wait until the end.

The result:

Step 10

Let’s add some texture.

On the 3D panel select the last 4 layers inside of PSD extrusion (see the image below). With this layers selected go to Properties panel and click on the arrow next to the sphere. This will show you a list with the defaults textures, scroll down until you find Wood Balsa and select. Make sure that your Diffuse color is: #c18759 and Illumination: #352c22. Also change this:

Shine: 50%; Reflection: 15%; Bump: 37%.

The result:

Step 11

To make it look better with the PSD Extrusion Material layer selected, go to Properties panel and change the wood texture for another one with more cracks. Select Wood Ash. Change Diffuse color to #c99b37 and Bump value to 30%. Now if you want it Render the image to take a better look of how is going.

The result:

Step 12

You can add your own texture. How? Let’s do it. Select the PSD Front Inflation Material layer. Go to Properties panel and click on the folder icon at the right of Bump values > Click Load Texture and give it the path to the wood texture from the resources section for this tutorial.

Step 13

At the Properties panel change this values:

Diffuse: #9d8365; Specular: #020202; Illumination: #000000; Ambient: #030303; Shine: 50%; Reflection: 15%; Bump: 37%; Refraction: 1,550.

The result:

Step 14

On CS5, after we finish our job on 3D section, we CAN NOT change anything on our 3D Object. Now on CS6 is different, we CAN make changes on our 3D Object. How? Go to your 3D panel and select your 3D Object (PSD). Them on the Properties panel, at the button, click Edit Source, this option will open into a new document your text to be retyped. Now change the text, I’ll add FAN on a new line.

Step 15

The letter spacing isn’t looking quite right. To fix this, select only the PSD letters not FAN, go to your Character panel and change the tracking values to 128. Now select the whole word and change the leading values to 16,55 pt.

Close the tab and save changes. Back into our 3D Text document should look like this:

Step 16

Now go to 3D>Snap 3D Object to Ground Plane. The shadow is fixed. Move the text to fit it well in the stage, scale along Y a little bit.

Should look like this:

Step 17

Those textures are too big, so let’s make some changes. Select the PSD FAN Front Inflation Material, at the Properties panel click on the folder icon at the right of Bump values > Edit UV Properties… Change all values to 100%. See the result below:

Step 18

Now we are going to do the same but this time for PSD FAN Extrusion Material. Change the following values:

U Scale: 63,37%; V Scale: 85,15%;U Offset: -18,81%; V Offset: 2,97%. After that Render, the images and enjoy the result. You can do it by clicking on the button icon at the Properties panel or Menu 3D>Render or press Alt+Ctrl+Shift+R.

And We’re Done!

You can view the final outcome below. I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial and would love to hear your feedback on the techniques and outcome.

Today’s advanced tutorial will teach you how to create a realistic stone text effect from scratch in Photoshop.

You’ll learn how to create a custom bump map, and how to use this technique to distort virtually any surface. Then you will combine Layer Styles to create an authentic ancient stone texture. Finally, we will explore few simple techniques for creating fast and realistic jungle vines with leaves.

Let’s get started!

Final Image

This is the final image that we’ll be creating in this tutorial.

Step 1

Open a new file (File > New) in Adobe Photoshop with the following settings. Save the file as “Stone Effect.psd”. During work remember to frequently press File > Save (Ctrl + S) to save and update the file.

Step 2

Select the Type Tool (Or press T), then type the word “King”. I’m using Trajan Pro (Bold, 250 pt), which is coming with Adobe Photoshop CS5. I typed the letters as separate type layers and then resize and arranged them the way I want. For resize use Edit > Transform > Scale after targeting the Type layer.

Step 3

Now select the Rectangular Marquee Tool. Then press Shift and drag a perfect square. Then use Edit > Free Transform to rotate and adjust the size of the square, so it will fit on top of the letter “i” of the word “King” nicely.

Step 4

Now target the black square layer, press Shift and then click on all the type layers to select them. Then Right-click and select Merge Layers. So now the square layer and all the type layers are merged into a single layer.

Step 5

Rename the merged layer to “King Text”. Now create a new blank layer (Ctrl + Shift + N) above “King Text” layer. Rename this layer to “Stone Bg” and fill with white color. We will create the stone textured background on this layer with the help of the Lighting Effects filter. But to produce effective result Lighting Effects filter needs a Bump map. In the next step we will create that bump map within an alpha channel.

Step 6

Click on the Channels panel and then create a new alpha channel by clicking on create new channel button (third button from left) below the Channel Panel. Alpha channels are used for storing transparency information.

Step 7

Bump Map is basically a grayscale image, where white depicts height and black depicts depth and 50% grey is neutral, i.e., neither height nor depth. Target the newly created alpha channel by clicking on it and from Filter > Render > Clouds. Clouds filter generate a random cloud pattern that varies between the current foreground and background color, each time you apply the filter. Apply the Clouds filter a couple more times until you get an even distribution of grey values. Rename the alpha channel to “Clouds”.

Step 8

Now we apply the Difference Clouds filter on top of this cloud pattern to enhance it more. Difference Clouds blend the current foreground and background colors with the contents of the selected layer. Then Filter > Render > Difference Clouds. This will add more depth and contrast to the existing Cloud pattern. Apply a few more times until there is an interesting pattern. Rename the alpha channel to “Stone Bump Map”. Now the bump map for our stone surface is ready.

Step 9

Now duplicate the previously created “Stone Bump Map” and rename it to “King Bump Map”.

Step 10

Go back to the Layers panel and Ctrl-click on the “King” layer to load that text as a selection.

Step 11

Come back to the Channels panel and target the “King Bump Map” alpha channel. Then Select > Modify > Feather and use 2 pixel as the Feather radius value.

Step 12

Now Select the Brush tool (Press B) and white as the color. In the Option Bar click on the Brush Preset and select a soft brush. Then change the Blend Mode to Overlay. Change the Brush opacity to 50% and start painting within the selection. Slowly build up the desired look by painting again and again. Due to the Overlay selection mode within the selection white area will become more white and black or dark area will become darker.

This process will help us to define the aged look of the stone text.

That’s the end of the preview!

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Today I’ll be showing you how to create a realistic metal text effect using only 2 layers! Sound to good to be true? Well read on… even a beginner can following this quick and easy tutorial.

Final Image:

Here is the final image that we will be creating from scratch using layer styles and filters:

Step 1

First we will create a pattern.

Please create new document. Press Ctrl+N on your keyboard.

Use 150 px as a width and height.

Use white background. Now go to Filter -> Noise -> Add Noise

Next press Ctrl+F to apply filter again with same settings.

Now go to Edit -> Define Pattern

Step 2:

Next create new document. Press Ctrl+N on your keyboard.

Use dark grey for a background.

To do this press Shift+Backspace , and from the dropdown menu choose color.

and choose 353535 from color window.

Next apply

Pattern Overlay:

Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 49%
Choose pattern we just created
Scale: 25%

Step 3:

Select Horizontal Type Tool and type desired letter, with desired font. Font I used is Intro Inline. Use 800pt size.Color is not important at this stage, we can use black.

We will use Layer Styles to style the layer.

Inner Shadow:

Color: ffffff
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%
Angle: 120 degrees
Distance: 18px
Choke: 0%
Size: 11px
Noise: 0%
Contour:Cone

Stroke

Size: 7px
Position:Inside
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%
Fill Type: Gradient
Gradient Ranging From: cacaca through 848484 to 333333
Style: Linear
Angle: -90
Scale: 91

Bevel and Embos:

Style: Inner Bevel
Technique: Chisel Hard
Depth: 297px
Direction: Up
Size: 6px
Soften: 0px
Gloss Contour:Cone
Higlight Mode: ffffff Screen 97%
Shadow Mode: 000000 Multiply 36%
Contour: Half Round Range 0%

Satin:

Blend Mode: Linear Dodge
Color: ffffff
Opacity: 51%
Angle: 19 degrees
Distance: 12px
Size: 14px
Contour: Invert

Color Overlay:

Color: 999999
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%

Drop Shadow:

Color: 000000
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 54%
Angle: 90 degrees
Distance: 12px
Spread: 0%
Size: 16px
Noise: 0%

Step 4:

Now Press Ctrl+J to duplicate your text layer, next remove previously applied layer styles from this new copy layer.

Now change Fill Opacity to 0% to do this go to Layer -> Layer Styles -> Blending Options…

Now please apply

Stroke

Size: 7px
Position:Inside
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 0%
Fill Type: Color
Color: 000000

Bevel and Embos:

Style: Stroke Emboss
Technique: Chisel Soft
Depth: 113px
Direction: Up
Size: 30px
Soften: 11px
Higlight Mode: ffffff Linear Light 44%
Shadow Mode: 000000 Multiply 14%
Gloss Contour:Ring Double
Angle: 110 41
Contour: Half Round Range 0%

Inner Shadow:

Color: 484848
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%
Angle: -90degrees
Distance: 20px
Choke: 0px
Size: 26px
Noise: 2%

Inner Glow:

Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 35%
Noise: 0%
Color: ffffff
Technique: Softer
Source: Edge
Choke: 74px
Size: 9px
Range: 50%

Satin:

Blend Mode: Color Burn
Color: 000000
Opacity: 50%
Angle: 19 degrees
Distance: 10px
Size: 9px
Contour: Gaussian Invert

Gradient Overlay:

Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 38%
Gradient Ranging From: cacaca through 848484 to 333333
Style: Linear
Angle: 90 degrees
Scale:100%

Pattern Overlay:

Blend Mode: Overlay
Opacity: 100%
Choose same pattern we created in first step of this tutorial
Scale: 25%

Drop Shadow:

Color: 000000
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%
Angle: 90 degrees
Distance: 3px
Spread: 76px
Size: 3px
Noise: 0%

And we are done!

I hope that you liked and found useful this tutorial . Please Leave your comments.

Final Image:

Here is the final image that we will be creating from scratch using layer styles and filters:

Step 1:

Please create new document. You can do this by pressing Ctrl+N.

Use 1200 px as a width and 800px as height.

Use dark grey for a background. To do this press Shift+Backspace, and from the dropdown menu choose color.

and choose 353535 from color window.

Step 2:

Select Horizontal Type Tool and type what you want, with desired font. Font I used is New Athletic M54. Color of the type is not important for now.

Step 3:

We will use Layer Styles to style the layer.

Inner Shadow:

Color: fbf504
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%
Angle: 120 degrees
Distance: 0px
Choke: 100px
Size: 3px
Noise: 0%

Outer Glow:

Color: bd6401
Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%
Noise: 0%
Technique: Softer
Spread: 100px
Size: 3px
Range: 50%
Jitter: 0%

Inner Glow:

Color: 876a00
Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 23%
Noise: 0%
Technique: Precise
Source: Edge
Choke: 100px
Size: 7px
Range: 50%
Jitter: 0%

Bevel and Embos:

Style: Pillow Emboss
Technique: Smooth
Depth: 800px
Direction: Up
Size: 9px
Soften: 0px
Higlight Mode: b9a56e Screen 20%
Shadow Mode: ac3900 Multiply 76%

Gradient Overlay:

Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 100%
Gradient Ranging From: a72f00 to ffd200
Style: Reflected
Angle: 90 degrees
Scale:102%

Satin:

Blend Mode: Normal
Color: cd9600
Opacity: 52%
Angle: 19 degrees
Distance: 12px
Size: 14px
Contour: Invert

This is how it should look so far.

Step 4:

Now right-click on text layer and choose Convert to Smart object.

Then right-click on layer and choose Rasterize Layer

Step 5:

Create 3 copies of your layer by pressing Ctrl+J 3 times. Name them as follows.

Next choose Layer named “bottom” and while holding Shift press Down Arrow twice, then choose “middle” and again while holding Shift press Down Arrow once.

Step 6:

Now with “middle” selected go to Filter -> Blur -> Motion Blur

Angle: 90 degrees
Distance: 20px

Step 7:

After this still while “middle” selected press Ctrl+J 15 times, then select all copies of middle layers (you can do this by pressing “middle copy 15″ and while holding shift scroll to “middle” and click on it) then press Ctrl+E to merge these layers. Now again you will have three layers.

And this is how it should look.

Step 8:

Please select “top” layer and apply Drop Shadow:

Color: 000000
Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 22%
Angle: 90 degrees
Distance: 32px
Spread: 26px
Size: 29px
Noise: 0%

Step 9:

Select “middle copy 15″ layer and apply Layer Styles:

Inner Shadow:

Color: 000000
Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 22%
Angle: -90 degrees
Distance: 21px
Choke: 0px
Size: 38px
Noise: 0%

Inner Glow:

Color: 000000
Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 25%
Noise: 0%
Technique: Softer
Source: Edge
Choke: 0px
Size: 10px
Range: 50%
Jitter: 0%

and Color Overlay:

Color: 903300
Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 27%

Step 10:

Select “bottom” layer and apply Drop Shadow:

Color: 000000
Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 49%
Angle: 90 degrees
Distance: 3px
Spread: 0px
Size: 8px
Noise: 0%

and Inner Shadow:

Color: 000000
Blend Mode: Multiply
Opacity: 66%
Angle: -90 degrees
Distance: 21px
Spread: 0px
Size: 38px
Noise: 0%

Step 11:

Download the photo of a rock texture from the resources section for this tutorial. Paste it in the document, position over background layer. Center it verticaly and horizontaly. Use keyboard shortcut ctrl+T to resize it. My setting was 40%.

Next add Gradient Overlay

Blend Mode: Linear Burn
Opacity: 44%
Gradient Ranging From: a3a3a3 to 000000
Style: Radial
Angle: -180 degrees
Scale:150%

Finally go to Filter -> Sharpen -> Smart Sharpen

Amount: 50%
Radius: 0.7px

And we are done!

I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial and found it useful. Do not hesitate to leave your feedback!

An Updated Version of a Classic PSDFAN Tutorial:

I had the idea for this tutorial when I browsing some of our most popular posts the other day. One of our most popular posts is our tutorial Create Smokey Typography in 12 Steps.

It still to this day is one of our highest trafficked posts, and has received plenty of positive comments.

However, all I could think when re-reading it the other day were two things:

1. I’ve come a long way as a designer and can honestly do better now. The effect is kind of cool, but in my opinion not all that realistic.
2. The workflow used is pretty dated now. It’s highly destructive, and uses an older version of Photoshop.

So anyway, this tutorial is my attempt at a more realistic smokey text effect (because I still had yet to find one I really liked on any site). I also used a more up to date workflow that’s almost entirely non-destructive (meaning you can edit your image later at any time). Oh, and if you were wondering, here is the outcome from the original tutorial:

Final Image

Here is a preview of the image that we are going to be creating:

Step 1

Create a new document (600X400px).

Create a new layer called ‘background’ and fill this layer with black.

Step 2

Create a new layer called ‘clouds’.

Set your toolbar foreground color to 49667a and your background color to 1b2934.

Select your lasso selection tool and make it’s feather amount ’30px’. Then create a rough selection around the center of your canvas:

With your selection in place, go to filter>convert for smart filters.

Go to filter>render>clouds. Because your selection edge was feathered, your cloud area should have a nice soft edge:

Reduce this layer’s opacity to 40% to make the clouds more subtle:

Step 3

Type out some text in the right-center of your canvas.

I used the free font Dancing Script, which you can download here.

Font Settings:

Font Face: Dancing Script
Font Size: 200pt
Kerning: -50
Color: ffffff

Change this text layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’:

Now go to filter>convert for smart filters.

Then go to filter>blur>motion blur.

Motion Blur Settings:

Angle: 90
Distance: 20 pixels

This starts to give a bit of a smokey appearance:

Duplicate your text layer, reducing the opacity of the duplicate layer to 15%, otherwise it will be too bright:

Step 4

Download one of the smoke images from the resources for this tutorial and paste it into your document, positioning it over your first letter:

Apply a hue/saturation adjustment layer, being sure to give this a clipping mask, so it only effects your underlying smoke layer.

Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer Settings:

Hue: 0
Saturation: -100
Lightness: 0

Change your smoke layer’s blend mode to ‘color dodge’ and it’s opacity to 80%:

Now apply a layer mask to this layer and mask off areas of smoke that go outside your lettering too much. Use a soft, black paintbrush for this masking process:

Step 5

Use the technique used in step 4 to add further smoke to your other letters using the smoke images from the resources section for this tutorial:

Step 6

Download the FanExtra smoke brush set from the resources section for this tutorial.

Apply several of the brushes from the set using a white paintbrush. Resize and angle the brushes to fit roughly to the shape of your lettering:

Change this layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’ and reduce it’s opacity to 60%:

Step 7

Download the photo of a hand holding a cigarette from the resources section for this tutorial.

Paste it in and position/rotate as necessary:

Apply a layer mask and use a black paintbrush to mask off the background of the photo:

Step 8

Now apply three adjustment layers, giving each a clipping mask so that your adjustments only effect your underlying hand layer.

Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer Settings:

Hue: 0
Saturation: -80
Lightness: 0

Color Balance Adjustment Layer Settings:

Highlights: -9 / 0 / +8
Midtones: -36 / -6 / +21
Shadows: -8 / 0 / 0

Also: Select the layer mask that is created for this adjustment layer, and mask off the area over the cigarette. This means that your color adjustments will effect the rest of your hand photo, but not your cigarette, as we want this to retain it’s original color more.

Levels Adjustment Layer Settings:

15 / 1.12 / 233

Here is the result:

Step 9

Paste in your third smoke image, positioning it like the image below:

Change this layer’s blend mode to ‘screen’ to hide it’s black background and then reduce it’s opacity to 40% to make the smoke more subtle:

Apply a layer mask and mask off most of the smoke, leaving one main plume like below:

Apply a hue/saturation and color balance adjustment layer (giving each a clipping mask):

Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer Settings:

Hue: 0
Saturation: -100
Lightness: 0

Color Balance Adjustment Layer Settings:

Highlights: -66 / 0 / +9
Midtones: -4 / 0 / +21
Shadows: -25 / 0 / +5

This is the result:

Step 10

Create a new layer called ‘smoke from cigarette’.

Apply one of the brushes from your smoke brush set using a white paintbrush:

Apply a color overlay blending option to this layer:

Color Overlay Blending Option Settings:

Blend Mode: Normal
Color: 88b7cf
Opacity: 100%

The result:

Step 11

Download one of the smoke images from the resources section for the tutorial again, and paste it onto a new top layer called ‘smoke overlay’.

Keep the smoke really large so that it covers most of your canvas:

Change this layer’s blend mode to ‘screen’ and reduce it’s opacity to 8%. This should create a subtle smokey atmosphere over your composition:

Duplicate this layer and change the duplicate’s blend mode to ‘color dodge’. This helps add a little brightness into the smoke:

Step 12

Create a new layer called ‘dodge/burn’.

Go to edit>fill>50% gray. Then change this layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’. This will hide your 50% gray, but allow you to non-destructively dodge/burn your image.

Use a 10%, soft paintbrush (black to burn, white to dodge).

The images below show your dodge/burn layer at ‘normal’ blend mode and then ‘overlay’ blend mode:

Step 13

For this step you’ll have to use a lot of your own judgement and creativity to get a nice effect. However, I’m going to show you how to use the ‘smudge’ tool non-destructively! You’ll be able to smudge your text and keep your text layers non-rasterized and fully editable.

Create a new layer called ‘smudge’ directly above your text layers.

Set your smudge tool to 20% strength, using a nice soft brush, and then very importantly check the box ‘sample all layers’. This will mean that even though there is no data on this layer currently, you will be able to smudge the data on all other layers.

Proceed to smudge your lettering upwards in various areas until you’re happy with the result.

This shows the ‘smudge’ layer at 30% opacity (at 100% opacity the effect was too strong):

Move this layer to be your top layer. This will make the effect slightly less obvious:

Step 14

Create a new top layer called ‘smudge more’.

Repeat the step used in Step 13 to smudge your lettering more. I reduced this layer’s opacity to 60% to make the effect less strong:

Step 15

I decided to mask off the corners of my cloud layer a little bit.

Then to finish the image, I went to layer>flatten image.

I flattened my image, selected the entire canvas and hit ‘copy’.

Then in my history palette I undid the ‘flatten image’ step, so that I get all my original layers back.

I paste my copied flattened image onto a new top layer and then go to filter>convert for smart filters.

Then I go to filter>sharpen>unsharp mask. Apply the settings below:

UnSharp Mask Settings:

Amount: 100%
Radius: 0.5 pixels
Threshold: 0 levels

Once you’ve applied your unsharp mask you’ll see that the filter comes with a mask of it’s own. Select this mask and use a soft black paintbrush to mask off all areas of your filter apart from over the fingers/initial plume of smoke from your cigarette.

Remember, you’re not masking the images, just the unsharp mask filter. This means that your sharpening filter will only effect these areas, not the rest of your image, which is perfect as we want our letting and background to remain hazy, not sharp.

And We’re Done!

You can view the final outcome below. I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial and would love to hear your feedback on the techniques and outcome.

Download Source File for this Tutorial

Members Only Tutorial

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Members Area Tutorial: Create Beautifully Lit Jellyfish Typography

Final Image

The result of this tutorial is shown below:

What You Will Learn

This tutorial is very in depth, and covers the design techniques listed below:

• Learn how to create a subtle, elegant backdrop for your typography.
• Learn how to construct beautifully lit lettering, by photo manipulating jellyfish for a typographic result.
• Learn how to correctly extract and blend photos.
• Learn how to light your typography and give it extra ‘wow’ factor!
• & Much More!

Learn how to construct beautifully lit lettering, by photo manipulating jellyfish for a typographic result.

Learn how to correctly extract and blend photos.

Learn how to light your typography and give it extra ‘wow’ factor!

Learn how to create some creepy typography created out of winter branches:

Final Image

As always, this is the final image that we’ll be creating:

Step 1

Create a new document (800X600px).

Drag out a radial gradient ranging from f8f8f8 to e0e0e0 on your background layer:

Step 2

Paste in your bark texture:

Now apply a hue/saturation adjustment layer. Be sure to apply a clipping mask (layer>create clipping mask), so that your adjustment layer only effects your underlying bark layer.

Now return to your bark texture layer. Reduce it’s opacity to 30%, and change it’s blend mode to ‘overlay’.

Step 3

Now download the abstract lights brush set from the resources for this tutorial.

Create a new layer called ‘brush marks 1′.

Apply several of the brush marks (using a black paintbrush). Then change this layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’ and reduce it’s opacity to 80%.

Step 4

Now apply a couple more layers, applying more black brush marks, and then some white ones. The idea is just to layer up your background effect:

Step 5

Now apply some text in the center of your canvas. The text can say whatever you want, but in this case I’ve just typed out the letters ‘PSD’. The font is not important, but it’s easier if you use a legible, bold font:

Step 6

Now cut out and paste in your branches from the branch photos in the resources for this tutorial. Keep these images on separate layers, so that you can easily paste them onto subsequent layers:

Step 7

Paste your tree photo into the bottom left of your canvas, positioning it against the bottom of your P letter.

Now we want to make our tree more stylized to fit with our overall composition. Apply a color overlay blending option to your tree layer, and then apply a hue/saturation adjustment layer (being sure to apply a clipping mask to it).

Color Overlay Blending Option Setting:

Blend Mode: Normal
Color: 000000
Opacity: 65%

Hue/Saturation Adjustment Layer Settings:

Hue: 0
Saturation: -100
Lightness: 0

Step 8

Now we want to start morphing our branch images to fit to our letters. To do this we’re going to use the puppet warp tool. Position the branch roughly over your letter, and then go to edit>puppet warp. Warp the branch to fit around part of your letter:

Step 9

This is how your composition looks once you’ve warped several branches to cover all your letters. With each branch layer, be sure to apply the same color overlay blending option and hue/saturation adjustment layer as your original branch layer.

Here is the composition with the original type layer hidden:

Step 10

Now create a new layer called ‘brush marks over letters’. Select your abstract marks brush again, and apply your brushes over your letters, applying a subtle frayed edge effect:

Step 11

A quick tip when applying your brushes is to rotate your brush marks where necessary. Brush sets may not always be at the correct angle to follow the contours of your layers, so you can easily alter the angle of your brushes to fit. Simply open up your brushes panel, and change the angle option (see below):

Step 12

Now create a new layer called ‘highlights’.

Drag out several white to transparent radial gradients over the tops of your letters.

Then change this layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’ and reduce it’s opacity to 40%.

Step 13

Now paste in your crow photo from the resources for this tutorial.

Position it on top of one of your letters, and then apply a color overlay blending option:

Color Overlay Blending Option Settings:

Blend Mode: Normal
Color: 000000
Opacity: 65%.

Step 14

Now apply a final levels adjustment layer in order to add extra contrast to your composition.

Levels Adjustment Layer Settings:

0 / 1.08 / 247

And We’re Done!

You can view the final outcome below. I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial and would love to hear your feedback on the techniques and outcome.

Download Source File for this Tutorial

Final Image

As always, this is the final image that we’ll be creating:

Step 1

So let’s start with a new document of 3300 px width and 2336 px height at 300 resolutions. I created large document because I wanted to print it on A4 size.

Step 2

Press U and select rectangle tool and create a rectangle of document size and apply gradient overlay with colors 890000 & ffb400. Now select transform tool and increase rectangle size from document size to 4515 px width and 3196px height.

Duplicate the rectangle and apply 10% transparency with normal mode. Your gradient will automatically transform and results will be like this.

Step 3

Now select type tool and write letter “H”. Font is your choice but I used here font Akashi of 180 pt weight. Go to the layer style option and reduce the Fill Opacity to zero in Advanced Blending. Now apply these layer styles.

Gradient overlay: color c00000 & ec7272

Inner glow: color fba8a8, opacity 76%, blending mode screen.

Inner shadow: color ffc7c7, 65% opacity and size 13px.

Step 4

Now duplicate the letter H and name it emboss. Remove all layer style and fill opacity to 100%. Shift it slightly right and down to give it emboss look. Now ctrl + click on text layer “H” and press delete to remove unwanted area.

Ctrl + click emboss layer, right click and click on “Make Work Path”. Now select direct selection tool by pressing A and select anchor points. Adjust them and fill it with color d90000 to give it a real 3d look.

Step 5

Now isolate all the faces of emboss layer like right face, bottom faces, and apply these layer style.

Step 6

Apply layer style same as in step 5 here.

Step 7

Now select the bottom of letter H and apply gradient overlay same as in step 5 with 90 degree angle.

Step 8

Repeat step 3,4,5,6 & 7 in letter O and T. The result will look like this.

Step 9

Merge all layers of text HOT and name it hot. Change its blending mode to overlay. Duplicate the HOT layer and change blending mode to darken name it HOT 1. Duplicate this HOT1 layer.

Step 10

Ctrl + click HOT1 layer, select a soft brush of color black and size 100 px and paint the shadow of text considering the source of light on top left. Change its opacity to 10% and blending mode to multiply.

Step 11

Now ctrl + click letter H, O, and T and save this selection to HOT and apply layer mask. Create new layer & name it shadow, load selection HOT and fill it with black color. Apply motion blur of -36 degree and decrease its opacity to 25% with multiply mode.

Step 12

Copy HOT layer and change its blending mode to dissolve. Create a new Hue/Saturation adjustment layer with setting; Hue 6, Saturation 3, Lightness 0. Create clip mask by pressing alt + click on between the adjustment layer & HOT layer.

Step 13

Duplicate HOT layer again and keep it on top go to Filter gallery choose Reticulation filter with these settings:

Density: 3
Foreground Level: 40
Background Level: 5

Change its blending mode to soft light. Name it R filter.

Step 14

Looks good! Now select brush of 15 px size and 100% hardness, press F5 to access brush option and increase size jitter to 100% on Shape Dynamics. On the scattering option keep scatter 90%. Now click layer mask button bottom to layer pallet. Click on the layer mask, choose black color and hide the area where we’ll burn it.

Final Image

Here is a preview of the image that we are going to be creating:

Step 1

Create a new document (1000X600px). Fill your canvas with a radial gradient ranging from ffd800 to ffae00.

Step 2

Download the crumpled paper texture in the resources for this tutorial.

Paste it into your document, scaling it to fit your composition.

Then change this layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’ and reduce it’s opacity to 35%.

Step 3

Now type out some text in the bottom-center of your canvas.

Font Settings:

Font Face: Arial Rounded MT Bold
Size: 400pt
Kerning: -50
Color: ffffff

Step 4

Now in your layers palette reduce the fill opacity of your type layer to 0%, keeping your overall layer opacity at 100%.

Then go to blending options for this layer and apply a stroke effect:

Stroke Blending Option Settings:

Size: 3px
Opacity: 100%
Color: d80000

Step 5

Now go to the Yummy icon pack located in the resources for this tutorial.

Start pasting in icons from this set, and resizing/positioning them to fit over your letters. To add definition to each icon add a stroke blending option to each icon layer.

In order to quickly apply the same stroke to each icon simply right click on your initial icon layer and click ‘copy layer styles’. Then with each subsequent icon layer right click on it and click ‘paste layer style’.

Stroke Blending Option Settings:

Size: 1px
Opacity: 30%
Color: 000000

Step 6

Now continue to paste icons over your letters, until each letter is totally covered. Then hide all layers apart from your icon layers and go to layer>merge visible. This means that your icons should be all on a single layer. The end result should look something like this:

Step 7

Now apply an outer glow blending option to your icon letters layer.

Outer Glow Settings:

Blend Mode: Normal
Opacity: 40%
Noise: 0%
Color: 633b0c
Spread: 0%
Size: 4px

Step 8

Now duplicate your icon letters layer.

Move the duplicate layer beneath the original. Then go to edit>transform>flip vertical. Then apply a black color overlay blending option.

Step 9

Go to edit>transform>distort and drag out the corners of your letters, giving perspective.

Then go to filter>blur>gaussian blur and apply a 12px gaussian blur to this layer.

Now reduce your layer’s opacity to 30%. Go to layer>layer mask>reveal all and drag a linear gradient (black to transparent) upwards from the bottom of your canvas. This will cause your blurred shadow to fade smoothly into your background:

Step 10

Now create a new layer called ‘dark shadow’. Use a medium sized, soft, black paintbrush to enhance the shadows underneath your letters:

Step 11

Now create a new top layer called ‘dodge/burn’. Go to edit>fill and fill your canvas with a 50% gray.

Then change this layer’s blend mode to ‘overlay’. This will hide your 50% gray, but will allow you to paint black/white over your canvas.

Use a soft black paintbrush (around 10% opacity) to paint in the shadows of your letters. Then use a white paintbrush to paint in the highlights. This should really add a nice gleam to your letters:

Step 12

Now create a new layer called ‘white bars’. Use your lasso tool and paintbucket tool to create some diagonal white bars going over your letters.

Now go to filter>blur>gaussian blur and apply a 12px gaussian blur to your white bars layer. Then option+click on your icon lettering layer in your layers palette. This will select the shape of your letters. The go to select>inverse to invert your selection. With this selection in place, ensure that you’re on your blurred white bars layer, and hit ‘delete’. This will delete all areas of your white bars that are outside of your letters.

Then change this layer blend mode to ‘overlay’, and reduce your layer opacity to 35%. This should create a subtle lighting effect over your layer.

Step 13

Now create a new layer called ‘ketchup’. Use your path tool to create a dripping shape coming from the top of your canvas. Then in your paths palette right click on your path and click ‘make selection’. Fill your selection with cb0000.

Step 14

Now go to blending options for this layer and apply a drop shadow.

Drop Shadow Settings:

Blend Mode: Multiply
Color: 000000
Opacity: 25%
Angle: 90 degrees
Distance: 1px
Spread: 0%
Size: 1px

Step 15

Now apply some additional drips and splatters:

Step 16

Now create a new top layer called ‘ketchup shading’.

Option+click on your ketchup shape layer to select your entire ketchup shape. Then with your selection in place return to your ketchup shading layer. Use a small, soft black paintbrush at around 10% opacity to paint in shadows for your ketchup splatter. Then use a soft white paintbrush to paint in highlights. You should try to really make your ketchup splatter look 3d.

Step 17

Now create a final top layer called ‘vignette’. Use a large, soft black paintbrush to paint around the edges and particularly corners of your canvas. If needed reduce the opacity of this layer to make the effect more subtle:

And We’re Done!

You can view the final outcome below. I hope that you enjoyed this tutorial and would love to hear your feedback on the techniques and outcome.

You can view the full-sized finished design by clicking the image below:

Download Source File for this Tutorial