Interface Vents

Step 1.

Start a new document in photoshop, or open an existing one. I will be working with an existing file for this example.

Step 2.

First get out the rectangular marquee tool, and select a square about about this size. Notice it is much larger than the ending result of the vent. We'll make the vents large, and scale them down when we're finished.

Step 3.

Next get out the gradient tool, and use these settings:

Step 4.

Now hold down the Shift key on your keyboard, right click your mouse, and drag it.

Here's how it should look:

Step 5.

Now we'll do this again from the top of the selection, to the center:

and the result:

Step 6.

Once more from the bottom, to the center:

and the result:

Step 7.

Now bring the opacity of this layer down to around 35%

Step 8.

Now that we've got the first vent made, we'll resize it to the proportions that we need it. Do this by pressing CNTRL + T on your keyboard to bring up the "free transform" tool.

Step 9.

Go ahead and drag one of the corner nodes towards the center of the vent, to make it smaller.

and press RETURN on your keyboard once you're satisfied with the size.

Step 10.

Next we'll duplicate the vent. Do this by selecting the cursor tool (press V on your keyboard) and while holding down the ALT + SHIFT keys on your keyboard, click anywhere on the vent and drag it upward, or downward to duplicate it. Do this again to make a total of three vents

Step 11.

Merge these three layers together by highlighting the topmost layer, and pressing CNTRL + E two times. With the arrow tool (press V on your keyboard) drag the vents into an area that you'll want to them to be positioned.

Step 12.

Next with the vents layer highlighted, go to "layer->add layer mask->reveal all" to apply a mask to this layer.

Step 13.

Get out the gradient tool, it should still be set like so:

Step 14.

With the gradient tool, drag a selection from the open end of your vent to the center.

Step 15.

Here's what I've got:

Step 16.

And that's all there is to it!

Position these small vents all over your layouts to create a great sense of techno depth. Here are a couple examples of their uses:

Good luck, and have fun!