Start off by opening a new document in photoshop. Any size will do, although mine is 411x129 (A bit small, you might want to try 600x600.) Pick a good brown color (I am using #532118) and type out your phrase in white. My font size 100px, but you can chose your own size (Remember, it varies from font to font, use your judgment.) Choosing a good font is very important, I myself am using a font called HouseBrush, part of House Industries' Sign Painter Collection. I chose this font because of it's style, any similar looking font will do. Here is what we should have so far:
Now we are going to create a shadow. Name your current layer "Text". Duplicate your "Text" layer, and set the color to black. Rasterize your duplicated layer and name it "Shadow". First make sure "Shadow" is below "Text" layer, then hold down your ALT key, and press the down and right arrow three times. This should make 6 copies of Shadow, and a nice 3D shadow effect. Now merge down all of your "Shadow" layers into one layer.
Now comes the creative part. Select your "Text" layer and rasterize it. Then grab your eraser tool (E) and select a grunge brush. I'm using the beautiful grunge brushes from We Function, I would recommend grabbing their brush set for the purposes of this tutorial. Start lightly erasing bits of text, try not to overdo it. There is a delicate balance, if something looks too dirty it becomes hard to read. Here are my results:
Then of course you are going to want to do the same thing with "Shadow" moderation is the key, you don't want to erase too much or the effect won't have the same impact.
So right now we have a pretty cool effect, right? It seems to be missing something, What if we added some color to the text? Start by Ctrl+Clicking your "Text" layer's thumbnail in the layer palette to select your text, then going to Select -> Modify -> Contract. I set it to 2px, now create a new layer called "Color" and fill your selection with a lighter form of your background color. It doesn't really matter, you can make it brighter or darker as time goes on.
Deselect your selection, and do the same thing that you've done with your other two layers, lightly erase "Color" with a grunge brush. Now you can add a smooth fade effect. Make sure the "Color" layer is selected in your layer palette, grab your "Rectangle Marquee Tool" (M) and set the Feather to 10px. Draw a box around the top of your color layer, like so:
Then hit delete. Simple as that.
Here is my final version, with a fancy background:
Download The PSD!
Click here to download .psd file.
Hope you enjoyed! Feel free to post your results in the comment section. I love seeing what people do with these tutorials.
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