Just Text FX
3D Using the Lighting Effects Filter
Make your text large enough to fill most of the canvas area, but not all of it. My type was set at 100
pixels.
click in the 'Preserve Transparency' checkbox to turn it on.
Photoshop 4 users: check to make sure the 'Preserve Transparency' checkbox is ticked ON after you've
entered your type to a layer, and Deselect the text if it has become selected.
About the Lighting Filter
Before we go on with our effect, i think it's important to understand a bit about the lighting filter.
All it's really doing when it creates a 3D effect is adding light and shadow properties to a 2 dimensional
shape, that give our eyes the impression we're seeing in 3 dimensions. But the effects the lighting filter
creates can also be done in Photoshop using various other techniques, and some of Photoshop's other
simpler filters as well.
The lighting filter just happens to do this effect a little quicker, but with much less control than the other
methods. And there's still some preparations that need to be done before the filter can be used to do it's
thing.
For a more detailed overview of how and why this filter can create 3D effects, please go here.
3 These are also known as 'height maps'. Called that because of the function they serve. A bump map's
properties are based on how many levels of grey it has in it; 256 being the maximum.
your type layer to create a selection of the text. Then open the channels palette and click on the 'Save
selection as channel' icon. Then Deselect.
Create a Duplicate of this channel, we'll be needing a clean version of our text as we go. Now apply a
Gaussian Blur to the duplicate channel. Set the amount to 6 pixels. We're creating a very rounded 3D effect
here, that's why we're using so much blur.
Ctrl-click (Mac: Command) on our clean text channel to load the selection. Then press Ctrl+Shift+I (Mac:
Command+Shift) to invert the selection. Now fill the selected area with black. And Deselect.
Usually after you've blurred a channel like this it's a good idea to balance out the levels by applying the 'Auto
Levels' command. Do that now (Shift+Ctrl+L). Our bump map is now ready.
4 Applying the Lighting Filter
Go back to the layers palette and click on your
type layer. Now Duplicate the layer and name it
"3D text". Change your Foreground colour to a middle
grey - R/153 G/153 B/153. Press Ctrl+Shift+Delete to fill
the type with this colour.
Now open the Lighting Filter. When it opens, you should
see the 'Default' lighting template being used. That's
fine for our purposes here. The only things you need to
change are shown in this screen shot to the right. In the
'Texture Channel' menu list, at the bottom, you'll want to
load the bump map we made. Open the menu and
change the option to use your blurred alpha channel.
NOTE: in PS 4 the channel will be called #5 / in PS 5+ it
will be called Alpha 2.
Apply the filter when you've made all the changes.
Once rendered, you should end up with something
5 Giving our type a personality
Ok, so there's basically how it's done. Now we need to dress up
our text with either some colour or perhaps a texture, or
perhaps even another kind of filter effect.
To add colour (in a non-destructive way), simply create a New Layer
above the '3D text' layer, and fill it with the colour of your choice; name
this layer 'colour'. Then to confine this colour to just our type, we'll Clip
the '3D text' layer to our 'colour' layer. (Clipping Group: hold the Alt key and click on the line between the 2
layers) Now set the Blend Mode of the 'colour' layer to Softlight. Try other modes as well and see if there's a
different one you might like.
There, a done deal.
similar to this sample (depending on what type of font
TIPS2
1 Texture Mapping:
If you want to apply a texture or pattern to your type, there are a few ways of doing this. I'll explain one
of those ways here now. But first, turn off the eye icon for the 'colour' layer.
Open a texture image you'd like to use. Select ALL for the texture image, and Define it as a Pattern. (If
you don't know how to Define a Pattern, go here) Then you can close the texture image once you've
Defined it.
Create a New Layer above the 'colour' layer, and fill it with
your Pattern. Clip this layer to the one just below it (the
'colour' layer). To make the 3D type show through the
texture you'll have to change the texture's Blend Mode.
There are a number you can choose from depending on the
effect you want. But for our example here, we'll use a modethat produces the basic effect. Change the texture's mode to Overlay. Overlay and Softlight modes will
produce the most basic and consistent results. You can also add a simple, subtle 'base shadow' for
the text to make it stand out a bit from a white background.
2 Creating Custom Texture Effects:
Customized patterns can be created using any of
Photoshop's native filters. Or even a 3rd party filter if you
have any. The effect you see here was created using only
2 of Photoshop's native filters. The secret to the look lies in
which Blend Mode i used. But this is a random effect, so
yours won't look exactly like this sample does; very similar
though.
Here's how to produce a similar effect:
: First create a New Layer above the 'colour' layer. Name it 'cut-outs'. Then Ctrl-click (Mac: Command)
the '3D text' layer to select the text shape. Now hold down the Alt (Mac: Option) key, and apply the
Clouds filter; using black and white. Apply the Difference Clouds filter now, and press Ctrl+F 10 or 11
times; this will re-apply the last filter again. We're looking for a marble effect here, with a little more
black in it than white.
: Now apply the 'Poster Edges' filter (Filter\Artistic\Poster Edges) with these settings / Thickness=10 /
Intensity=2 / Posterization=1.
: Open the Brightness & Contrast filter and use these settings / Brightness=+50 / Contrast=+100. Then
Deselect (Ctrl+D).
: And finally, the secret to the effect... change the layer's Blend Mode to Difference. VOILA! ;)
Here's another example, that has a few other effects added
to it. Experiment!
TIP: It's the white colour that's creating the 'cut-out' areas in the image. So if you want to, you can skip
the Clouds filter part and just paint the white onto the image using any brush you like. Just make sure
you set the layer's Blend Mode to Difference first, so you can see immediately how the effect will look.
Try it!
3 More Custom Textures:
Here's a particularily striking effect. This was also
created using just a few of Photoshop's native
filters.
Let's start by turning off any other colour or texture
layers you've made up to this point.
: For this effect, i first cut out a piece from a photo
of a rusty wall, covered in paint. I then applied the
'Ripple' filter to it. You can do this to any texture
pattern you want, just for the sake of this example.
Go ahead now and open a texture, then apply the
Ripple filter to it. But make sure though that your texture image is larger than the area behind the text
in our 3D document (at least 350x150 pixels).
: Ok if you're ready now, select ALL of your texture image and press Ctrl+C to copy it, then paste it
into your 3D text document. Move the texture layer below the '3D text' layer in the palette. And if
you've created any shadow layers, move it below those also. Then set the Blend Mode of this layer to
Color Burn.
: Now Ctrl-click the '3D text' layer to select the text. And while still being on the texture layer, press
Ctrl+J (creates a new layer via Copy).
: Next, move this new copy layer above the 'colour' layer in the palette. Name this layer 'texture'.
: Duplicate the 'texture' layer now, and change your Foreground colour to white. Then press
Ctrl+Shift+Delete to fill the text with the Foreground colour.
: Now apply a Gaussian blur to the text. Set the amount to 6 pixels.
: Open the Filter menu and choose the 'Other' option, then in there choose the 'Maximum' option. Set
the amount of this filter to 5.
: Ctrl-click the '3D text' layer again to create another selection of the text. Then press Ctrl+Shift+I to
invert the selection. Press Delete. Then Deselect.
: And finally, apply the Emboss filter to this layer with these settings / Angle=135 / Height=10 /
Amount=500. VOILA! There we have it!
Now there's one more small thing you'll need to do in order to get the effect to jump off the background even
more. It's a simple thing to do, but read this carefully...
Duplicate the '3D text' layer. When you do, the duplicate will become clipped to the 'colour' layer, and will be
named '3D text copy'. Grab the original '3D text' layer below it, and drag it up to the top of the palette. Once
it's there, change it's Blend Mode to Hardlight. (you can also try using Overlay & Soflight modes for this layer)
Done!
If you care to add even more to this effect, turn on the layer you created for Tip #2 above - the torn looking
effect. Watch how it adds to the look.
OK GOOD LUCK AND HAVE FUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
