The Final Result:
Notes:
* the software used in this tutorial is Adobe Photoshop CS5 Extended
* the size of the final result image is 1600 * 1200 px
* you might want to check the Basix Page to see some useful topics on dealing with Photoshop basics, such as loading palettes and some shortcuts.
Resources:
* Sparklies Photoshop Brushes by *redheadstock.
* Square Photoshop Brush.
Step 1:
- Make sure your document is 1600 * 1200 px. Create a Linear Gradient from left to right, with the Foreground color set to #713c5c and the Background color to #97316e. Then, duplicate the Background layer.
- Set the Foreground and Background colors back to Black and White, then go to Filter - Noise - Add Noise. Set the Amount to 3, the Distribution to Uniform, and check the Monochromatic box.
- Go to Filter - Distort - Glass, set the Distortion to 3, the Smoothness to 8, the Texture to Tiny Lens, and the Scaling to 200%.
- The background should have a simple nice texture now.
Step 2:
- Create the text using the black color. The font used is Alfredo Heavy, and the size is 370px. The effect looks better on very bold fonts. Also, you can change the Leading value to adjust the line spacing if necessary.
Double click on the text layer to apply the following styles:
- Drop Shadow: Change both the Distance and the Size to 8px.
- Inner Shadow: Change the Blend Mode to Linear Dodge (Add), and its color to #c577a4. Also, change the Distance to 8, and the Size to 20.
- Outer Glow: Change the Blend Mode to Overlay, the color to #ffe0f3, the Size to 8px.
- Inner Glow: Change the color to #ffffff, and the Size to 12px, and the Contour to Half Round.
- Bevel and Emboss: Change the Depth to 300, the Size to 16, and the Soften value to 1. Un-check the Use Global Light box, change the Angle to 70 and the Altitude to 30.
Change the Gloss Contour to Notched Slope and check the Anti-aliased box. Also, change the Highlight Mode to Vivid Light, its color to #ffe8f6, and the Shadow Mode color to #d495bb.
- Contour: Change the Contour to Ring - Double, and check the Anti-aliased box as well.
- Satin: Change the Blend Mode to Color Dodge, the color to #bf93ad, the Opacity to 70%, the Distance to 17, the Size to 40, and the Contour to Cone - Inverted.
- When you hit OK, change the text layer's Fill value to 0 so that the text looks transparent.
Step 3:
- Press the Ctrl key and click on the text layer's thumbnail to create a selection.
- This is optional, if you like the noise that appears beneath the text, leave it as it is, but if you want the text to stay clear then select the "Background copy" layer and hit Delete.
- Create a new layer on top of the Background layers and call it "squares". Set the Foreground color to #ffa8cf.
Step 4:
Load the Squares Photoshop Brush, and open the Brush panel (Window - Brush) to take a look at the settings:
- The Spacing is set to 50%. If you want more squares to appear when you use the brush decrease the Spacing value, and if you want less squares, then increase the Spacing value.
- Under Shape Dynamics, only the Angle Jitter is changed. But if you like the sizes of the squares to change as well, set the Size Jitter value to whatever you like.
- Under Scattering, you can also increase and decrease the Count value for more or less squares.
- Finally, under Transfer you can control whether you want the squares to have different opacity values or not.
- Once you modify the brush settings as you like, make sure that the "squares" layer is active (selected), and that the selection you've created in the previous step is still there.
Start painting the squares inside the selection. Don't paint over the same area more than once, as this will make the squares overlap and look very bright, but if you like that then go for it!
You can undo, redo, and repeat this until you're satisfied with the final result.
Step 5:
- Set the Foreground color to White (#ffffff), and load the Sparklies Photoshop Brushes. You can choose the sparkle you like, but here, the brush single7 is used.
In the Brush panel, change the Size to something around 40px.
- In order for the Size to change with each click, change the Size Jitter under Shape Dynamics to 50%. A 100% Size Jitter will create very small sparkles that might not even be seen, so a 50% is good.
Also, to change the Angle of the sparkles, set the Angle Jitter to 100%. You can also check the Flip X Jitter and Flip Y Jitter boxes as well.
- Create a new layer on top of all layers and call it "sparkles". Start clicking over some bright edges to add sparkles. Click once only, don't click and drag.
Too much sparkles will ruin the effect, a couple of sparkles should be enough.
- Change the "sparkles" layer's Blend Mode to Overlay, then duplicate it to make the sparkles look brighter.
And you'll get an awesome super glossy "party" text effect!
Hope you enjoyed the tutorial.
