Creating 3D Textured Text with Photoshop

This Tutorial Resource from: http://www.grafx-design.com/02photo.html

This tutorial will show you how to render a 3D texture and apply it to some text. The end result will resemble hammered copper. I used Photoshop 3.04 for Windows. Some things may be done differently with other versions.

Start off by opening a marble texture (see figure 2.1). (You might want to try other textures later. I did this the first time with a wood texture :)) I used one I got with a 3D program I bought a while back, but you can find stuff like this almost anywhere on the 'net.

Apply Filter, Render, Lighting Effects with the following settings. Later you can experiment.

• Style: 2amspot
• Light type: spotlight
• Intensity: 17
• Focus: 34
• Gloss: 49
• Material: 34
• Exposure: 0
• Ambience: 4
• Texture channel: red
• White is high: checked
• Height: 100

You should have something that looks much more three-dimensional than you started with (see figure 2.2).



Assuming you started out with default foreground and background colors set (i.e. black and white, respectively) reverse them by clicking on the 90 degree two-headed arrow.

Use the text tool to enter your text. DON'T de-select it, though. Drag the opacity setting in the layers palette to zero. Choose Select, Inverse then press the delete key. Now de-select. (CTRL-D) or Select, None.

TIP: To center your text automatically while it's still selected, use CTRL-X then CTRL-V. This will cut and paste your text, or any other selection for that matter, and center it automatically.

For the final touch we'll color the text. Use Image, Adjust, Hue/Saturation. Put a check mark in the colorization box. I used the following settings, but feel free to play around and try to get, for example, a gold-look.

• H=16
• S=68
• L=-8
  

Your final graphic should resemble figure 2.3.