The magical effects of the Photoshop layer style "zoom effect"

Many people use Photoshop's layer styles, but few use the scaling effect of the layer style. Using the Zoom Effect command in a Photoshop layer style, you can scale the various effects in the layer style at the same time without scaling the object that has the layer style applied to it. When you apply a variety of layer styles to a layer, the zoom effect can play a more unique role. Because scaling effects work with these layer styles, you can save yourself the hassle of adjusting each layer style individually.

The zoom effect command is hidden in the Layer | Layer Style submenu, at the bottom of the Layer style menu, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1

Here's how to use this as an example.

1. Open a picture in Photoshop.

2. Enter the text "Happy Day", as shown in Figure 2, select the appropriate font, set the text size.

Figure 2

3. Select menu Command Window | style, display the Styles panel, click the small arrow in the upper-right corner of the panel, open the Panel menu, select "Text Effect 2" from the menu, and then the "Append" button when the prompt dialog box appears. This appends a lot of text styles to the bottom of the panel.

4. Click the yellow Gold bevel sag style in the Styles panel, as shown in Figure 3, to add a preset layer style for the text "Happy Day."

Figure 3

You can see in the layers panel that many of the layer styles appear in the text layer as shown in Figure 4.

Figure 4

5. After you have applied multiple styles to a layer, you can try the use of the Zoom Effect command. Select menu command Layer | layer Style | Zoom effect to open the Zoom Layer Effect dialog box as shown in Figure 5, you can enter the scaling scale in the text box to the right of zoom, or click the right arrow to use the slider to adjust. Because the preview check box is selected by default, the change in the layer style can be observed in real time using the slider adjustment.

Figure 5

For example, the layer style that adjusts the scaling to 30% is shown in Figure 6.

Figure 6

Looking at the difference between the effects of Figure 4 and Figure 6, you can see that the strokes, gradient overlays, and bevel and emboss effects have changed. So mastering this technique in many cases can save a lot of time adjusting the layer style options.