Reflective liquid type text

1


Create a new image with the following attributes:

• Width: 11 inches
  
• Height: 11 inches
  
• Resolution: 300 ppi, 8 or 16 bit
  
• Background Color: White
  

2


Since
the desired effect is to appear liquefied, a font that appears to have
been made with a crayon or round brush will work perfectly. Select the
Type tool and open the Character palette from the Options bar. The font
I’ve chosen is called ‘WallowHmkBold’… if you do not have this
installed on your system just use the font of your choice. The
attributes for the characters are seen below:

3



Note that the color is gray in the #666666 range and NOT stark black.
Type a word across the face of the image.

4



Rasterize the type layer, then paint a few additional gray dots around the type.

5


Open the Channels palette and duplicate a channel… the Blue channel will work fine. Go to Image>Adjustments>Invert.

6


Open
the Filter menu and select Blur>Gaussian Blur. First, blur the
channel at a 25 pixel radius. Blur the channel again at a radius of 15
pixels.


7


Turn off the Blue copy channel, but don’t delete it… you’ll need it in a moment or two.

8


Go
to Filter>Render>Lighting Effects. Set it up as outlined in the
image below… be sure to select the Blue copy channel as the Texture
Channel.

9


The
result of all that is a pretty basic bevel, and yes, you could do
pretty much the same thing with a layer style. Some habits die hard,
however, and I like the end result better when channels come into play.
What can I say? I’ve been doing it this way since at least PS 6, and if
it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!

10



Duplicate the text layer and go to Filter>Sketch>Chrome. Set up the reflections as seen in the dialog box below:

11



Now
you can play with Layer Styles a bit. Open the Layer Styles dialog box
and select Bevel/Emboss. Enter the following settings… note that the
Shadow color is again gray in the #666666 range and not black. Once
done click OK.

12



Let’s
shine this up a bit. Command/Control+Click the text layer to generate a
selection, then make a Curves adjustment layer and Levels adjustment
layer with the settings seen here:

13



Against a black background the shine really comes out.

14


Turn off the background layer or layers (if you added the black separately) and merge all the others together.

15


To
give the type an enhanced liquid quality, go to Filter>Liquify. Use
the Bloat tool to expand or otherwise warp areas of the text as seen
here. Once you are happy with the distortions, click OK.

16


You
can now throw the text into any image you so choose. In the following
example, I’ve blurred a tech-style background, placed the type in that
document, then placed a duplicate of the blurred layer above the text.
The Blend mode of the top layer is changed to Soft Light to serve as
reflections off the type, or making the type appear transparent
allowing you to see the background through it. I’ll let you decide what
is actually happening.

That’s it for now. Until next time, I’ll see you at ActionFx.com. Take care!

wow nice tutorial uve made a great tutorial hehehe nice thankx for this tutorial