The production of crystal icon

The function of Photoshop in texture performance is amazing, and whether you start contacting it today or have studied it early on, there is no denying that (there may be a difference in understanding levels). In this sense, you may never know what it "can't" do. Adobe software engineers are constantly expanding the field of Photoshop, and the new version will give you more shock before you find out what it's doing. With each version of the update, more and more ideas become reality, people can rely on Photoshop to make ideas leaps. Now, Photoshop rarely gives you the opportunity to shake your head and sigh, as long as you study hard, it will make your dream come true!

This time, we're going to make a crystal-textured icon. If you're still worrying about the same icons, try this one, and you'll get a beautiful and unique effect.

1. Create a new Photoshop document based on the size of the desired icon, white background, RGB image mode.

We're going to create your icon prototype in the new layer. Here, you can have a lot of choices: text, selections, and custom shapes can be used as a base. I use Photoshop 7.0, in this release, Adobe offers rich preset shapes to choose from. I chose the flower-shaped heraldry as the base image. Sets the foreground color for the underlying image. The foreground color here is RGB (91,120,243). Select the custom Shape tool in the toolbox, select Create shape layers and anti-aliasing in the tool options, and drag the mouse diagonally out of shape. If you want to be in the height-to-width ratio, press the SHIFT key as you drag. If you want to modify the shape, use the direct selection tool to modify the path node. When you are satisfied with the shape, right-click the layer name and select the grid Layer command from the pop-up menu. It is more convenient to use a shape layer than to add a new layer directly to the pixel fill.

Of course, Photoshop's preset shape is 10 times times more difficult to meet all the needs, and more often, you need to define the shape of the icon yourself. In addition to the preset shapes of Photoshop, a good choice is the graphics font. By default in Windows 2000 systems, Photoshop can use graphics fonts such as Webdings, Wingdings, and ITC Zapf Dingbats, and you can install more fonts. Or, the crystal clear text is also a good choice. In this case, it is best to select a larger font of rounded corners, the effect will be better. After writing, you also need a grid layer. If your icon is based on a selection, you need to create a new layer, select the selection, fill the selection with the foreground color, and then deselect. (Figure 01)

Figure 01

2. Determine that within the Shape 1 layer (your file may be a letter-named layer or Layer 1, which depends on your previous selection), press CTRL + A to select all images, Ctrl+x cut, Ctrl + V paste back, this step to ensure that your image is in the middle of the canvas. Rename this layer to basic.

3. Create a new layer on the basic layer, named multiply, which sets the layer blending mode to multiply. Load the transparent area channel of the basic layer, narrowing the selection down by 5 pixels with the shrink command. This contraction is prepared for the next step, and you can increase or decrease the amount of shrinkage according to your image. Next, you can select a brighter foreground color, fill the selection with the foreground color, and deselect.

If the foreground color you've just chosen is already high enough, like our example, then you can also copy the image from the basic layer directly from the same level after shrinking. The method is to load the transparent region channel of the basic layer, reduce the selection by 5 pixels with the shrink command, press Ctrl+j to copy the image to the new layer, name the new layer multiply, and the blending mode to multiply. (Figure 02)

Figure 02

4. Copy the multiply layer, rename the multiply copy layer to gel, restore the layer blending mode to normal, blur the layer with the Gaussian blur filter, and the radius is 5.0 pixels.

Next, we'll use the layer style to add a stereoscopic effect to the image. OK in the gel layer, open the Layer style panel, select Bevel and Emboss, in the bevel and embossed structure, set the style to Emboss, the method is smooth, depth 200%, direction, size 50 pixel, soften to 0; set shadow angle to 120 degrees, use global light, height is 30 degrees, The high light mode is normal, the color is white, the opacity is 100%, darkened mode for color dodge, color is white, opacity is 40%; for layer selection contour line, style by default; Enter the texture options, where you can select patterns as surface markings, here, I choose the first bubble pattern, Set the zoom scale to 150%, and the depth to 10%.

The key to making this kind of translucent material is light reflection and refraction, in which the reflective effect we have to use the bevel and relief very good performance, the following we continue to use the layer style for the image to add refraction effect.

As you can imagine, when we do this kind of image that doesn't need to be rigorous, it's not necessary to strictly follow the laws of physics, and we just have to visually create that feeling. Like here, we do not have to calculate the Crystal Refractive index, the pattern superposition can achieve dazzling effect: in the pattern blending mode to choose overlay, opacity is 100%, select bubble pattern, the zoom set to 80%, check with the layer link. In this way, the simple transmission effect comes out. We adjust the brightness and contrast slightly, reduce brightness by 20, contrast increase by 20, so that the color is not too bright. (Figure 03)

Figure 03

5. Because the background is white, it is not possible to see how the layer style affects the icon selection. But if we change the background color, you will see that the bevel and emboss range is much larger than you need (Figure 04). The extra layer style range will affect our work below, and we need to get rid of the extra style effects. Create a new layer on the gel layer, select the gel layer, link layer 1, and flatten the gel layer to layer 1. This makes gel a normal layer, but retains the bevel relief and pattern overlay style, while the image is slightly changed by flattening: The layer style effect is reduced and the image becomes slightly blurred. Then load the selection range of the basic layer, deselect it, delete it in the gel layer, cancel the selection. In this way, we eliminate the extra images, and the edges of the icons become clearer. (Figure 05)

Figure 04

Figure 05

6. Below we want to the edge of the image processing. Select the basic layer, load the transparent channel area of this layer, subtract the multiply layer from the selection, get the edge selection of the icon, and deselect it after copying. Select the gel layer and press CTRL + V to paste, which creates a new layer on the gel layer, renames the layer to stroke, and sets its layer blending mode to multiply.

Again, we want to add an embossed effect to it. Select the bevel and Emboss styles to maintain the default bevel and Emboss styles, select the Gloss contour application anti-aliasing, the high light mode to normal, color set to white, opacity is 100%, darkened mode set to color reduction, color white, opacity to 40%; then select texture Options, the pattern is still bubble, Zoom to 75%, depth to +100%, select link with layer. (Figure 06)

Figure 06

Create a new layer on the stroke layer, select the stroke layer, and flatten the Layer 1 link, at which point the layer blending mode of the stroke layer is restored to normal and the edge effect is more obvious. (Figure 07)

Figure 07

7. Next we'll make the shaded part of the icon. Copy the multiply layer, name the replica layer shadow, move the layer down to the background layer, and change the layer blending mode to normal. Blur the image with the Gaussian fuzzy command, the radius is 5.0 pixels, filter > Other > Displacement is selected, the horizontal and vertical displacement values are set to 12, that is to move 12 pixels to the right and the lower. Because the image is in the middle of the canvas, the undefined area can be set arbitrarily, without impact. Except for the special function, the displacement filter is more precise and convenient than moving the image manually with the mobile tool or moving the image with the arrow keys on the keyboard.

We also add bevel and emboss effects to the shadow layer: leave most of the default settings in the bevel and emboss panels, Change only the high and darkened modes to filter (the filter mode is called the screen in the version below Photoshop7.0), the color is white, opacity is 100%; Select texture options, use bubble pattern, zoom to 150%, depth is +50%, check with layer link. Such a setting helps to show the penetrating effect of light in a transparent material.

We used the method to convert the shadow layer to a normal layer: Create a new layer, move it below the shadow layer, select the shadow layer, and merge down. The newly generated layer 1 preserves the image content of the shadow layer, but does not have a layer style. (Figure 08)

Figure 08

8. What we have just made is not a real shadow, but rather a case of light through a transparent material. Now let's make a real projection. Copy the basic layer, move the replica layer below layer 1, rename to shadow, use the displacement filter again, set the horizontal and vertical values to 10, and move the shadow layer down and to the right 10 pixels. Here, you can also use the selection tool with the keyboard arrow keys to move the image, hold down the SHIFT key, moving in 10 pixels as a unit. Then select the Gaussian Blur filter and set the blur radius to 8% pixels. (Figure 09)

Figure 09

9. If you think the color of the shadow is too heavy, then set the blending mode of layer 1 to strong or filter, which will result in a more transparent effect, you can even copy layer 1, in two layers, respectively, using strong light and filter mode, but to reduce the opacity of the filter mode layer. Most of the time, the strong light mode will make the shadow layer better and the background fusion. The associated shadow layer is then pieced together to flatten the stroke, Gel, multiply, and basic layers. Separating the shadow layer from the other layers makes it easy to apply in other images. Note that for mixed-mode layers, the image may be changed after flattening, so make a backup before flattening, once you find that the image of the split is large, can be restored in time, to modify the blending mode of the layer. (Figure Crystal)

Finally, according to the image status, to see if the icon layer to apply curve adjustment. (Figure 10)

Figure 10