Glow effect for Paths with Smoke Background - Photoshop
Final image:
A._) Procedure for creating the smoked background:
Open a new document of any size and fill the background with Black color. Let us create a background with smoke effect by following the Procedure below:
Create a new layer and fill it with BLACK color. Right click the layer and use the Blending options. Select the Gradient Overlay option and enter the following settings:
Gradient Overlay settings:
Set the Blend mode – Normal with opacity as 100% and style used as ‘Radial’ with angle-90% and scaled to 125%.The Gradient is custom made. Select a bicolor gradient divided equally for two colors. Set one color as Black and the other color as # ff7c00. Do not forget to select the ‘Reverse’ option. See that the background appears as Black with Orange radial. The mode of this layer is left to normal.
Since the above layer is not strong enough, create a new layer and fill it with black color and simply set the mode to-‘Soft Light’. Other effects need not be added. The blend mode alone is effective.
Now create another new layer but this time with WHITE background and set the foreground color to Black. For this layer, we are going to use the Filter effect to bring out the smoke effect. For this, select the Filter menu > Render > Clouds. You should be able to see the clouds effect. Set the Blend mode of this clouds layer to- ‘Overlay’ and reduce the Opacity to 50% so that the smoke effect is visible and also reduce the fill opacity to 90%.
Create another Duplicate for the above adjustments made clouds layer. Actually you do not need a duplicate but for stronger effect, let’s create a duplicate. After creating the Duplicate, select Filter menu > Filter Gallery > Sketch > Chrome and set the Detail and Smoothness to 5 or as per your requirement. The following is the summary images of what we have done so far.
B._) Procedure for Applying effects to Text:
Type a text with the following adjustments. Type a text (in this example,’ B’) with Font- ‘Times New Roman’ and Style-Regular. The Size is - 325pt and sharp effect. And color used is - # aac4de. The mode for this layer is- ‘Linear Burn’.
Now Duplicate the Text layer and apply the following options for Bevel and Emboss in Blending options and set the Blend mode to- ‘Overlay’. The Highlight color used is # d12e2e and the shadow color is Black and the Gloss contour style can be anything according to interest. I used a custom style as shown in the following image: The image of Text shown below is obtained by making both the text layers visible. Do not hide any text layer.
Bevel and Emboss:
C._) Drawing glowing lines Using Pen tool:
Use the Pen tool to draw the curves. Create a new layer first and name it-‘Glow1’ and then use the pen tool to draw. The layer has nothing to do with pen tool path because pen tool path does not appear as a layer but for adding color to the path we need a layer. Click on an area and then click near the point but this time do not remove your finger from the mouse but instead drag towards any direction to form a curve. Repeat the process for few times till you get a desired shaped curve. Now create another new layer for another curve. By doing this you can apply different effects to different curves. You can also duplicate the layers using ‘CTRL + J’ and use the Transform tool and resize them and rotate them and select –Flip horizontal/Vertical option, instead of creating new paths again and again. Now in the layer box, near the Layer option on top, you should see an option called paths. Since the paths are not formed in separate layer, this is where they are available. You can come here to delete or rename or add color to paths.
To add color to the path drawn (anything drawn with a pen tool is called a path), after selecting the path (you can select paths by selecting Paths option) right click and select the option- ‘Stroke path’. Under tool, select Brush and click the option- Simulate pressure. Note: You have to set the brush style, size and color before selecting the stroke path option. Once it is done the path is colored with brush and is seen in the layer you created- Glow1. Follow similar procedure for all the curves. You can keep the curves. If you do not need them, you can delete them in Paths option in layer box. Once all the curves are colored, you will have something like this.
D._) Now I am going to list all the effects used for different curves one by one. You can choose any one style for all curves to have a neat look or combine different styles.
Style 1 with Blend mode set to Color Dodge:
Style 2 with Blend mode set to Color Dodge:
Style 3 with Blend mode set to Normal:
Style 4 with Blend mode set to Normal:
Style 5 with Blend mode set to Normal:
The layers are arranged as following and I note that the glow curves are grouped together and are shown in a group.
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