Text Effects in Photoshop

Introduction to Text Effects in Photoshop

I am going to introduce you today with the various cool text effects using Type Tool, Layer Style, Blending Options, Warping and Gradient tool of Photoshop. In today’s social media frenzy world, making the words look more attractive in online ads or various forms of marketing gimmicks is very important as it would make a selfie or an Instagram story look eye-catchy and trendy!!.. For e.g. what would you respond to better “mood” or  So that’s the theme for today…”INSTAGRAM STICKERS”….In recent years the Instagram App has become one of the most used social media platforms. Texts are designed in two forms: GIFs stickers and still stickers.

Either way, they are fun to create. Let us try to create some cool text effects that we use in our day to day Instagram lives.

Adding Mood Sticker in Photoshop

This sticker is one of my favourites to use, and it is super easy to create too. All you have to do is apply a good gradient in layer style and apply the Arial font. So without further adieu, lest see a step by step by process.

Step 1: Let’s first start by creating a new working window and a layer.

Step 2: You may want to select the “Web” option from the drop-down menu in the “Preset” dialog box. That adjusts the resolution of the image and makes it suitable to be passed online.

Step 3: Now we all know that the Background layer is locked in the workspace, meaning no changes or effects can be added to it. Normally I unlock it, make all sorts of effects in my layers, and then finally lock it later.

Step 4: To unlock the Background layer, double-click on the tiny lock along with the Background layer heading. It will ask if you wish to create a normal layer. Press OK.

Step 5: Next, just select the type tool from the Tool list on the left side of the screen and type MOOD in Caps like this.

Step 6: Once that’s done, please select the word MOOD and adjust the following in the character/paragraph window in the right as shown. i.e., Font size to 72 pt, Font style Bold, Vertical stretch to 70% and horizontal stretch to 110%.

Step 7: Further, please right click on the MOOD layer and select Blending Options.

Step 8: Once that opens, you would see the Layer Style dialog box. Kindly select Gradient Overlay in the box.

Step 9: You will see a black and white default gradient is applied to your text in the file. Please click on the black and white color, and that will open the Gradient Editor as shown below.

Step 10: As I could not see my red and blue gradient, I created a customed gradient as follows: I selected the bottom controls of the gradient as they denote the colors and change them as per my preference as shown.

Step 11: Now hit Ok in Gradient Editor. Also, you can see I have adjusted the options in Gradient Overlay as follows: Style: Linear, Angle: 180 degrees, Scale 76 %. Please Check Reverse Layer and Align with layer options as it was needed in my case.

Step 12: Just Hit Ok everywhere and Viola…That’s my MOOD Sticker.

Creating #TBT Sticker in Text Effects in Photoshop

Well, well!! This is trending for sure. #TBT stands for #ThrowBackThursday. We all love to fondly remember all the good memories that we have had in the recent or a really way back past and share it with people we love. So, if I want to post probably what I did last week or month, I would want to tag the pic as #TBT and believe me, this theme is a hot cake online, which compelled Instagram to come up with one of its most attractive stickers. So let us just get started, shall we!!..

If you see in the sticker, there are flying stars in the background. A lot of designs are available online, or you can create yours using Corel draw or Photoshop. I found it from here.

Step 1: Go to File and click on Place.

Step 2: In my case, I have my clipart in the Downloads folder; you will find your reference. Select it and click Place.

Step 3: It will look like this.

Step 4: Press Enter from the keyboard so you can move and make changes from here. Once you have pressed Enter, make use of dragging arrows to create a mirror image of stars.

Step 5: Now, in order to delete the excessive drawing, you will need to Rasterize the Layer like this.

Step 6: Now, please make use of the Eraser Tool to erase the unwanted part.

Step 7: Finally, it will look like this.

Step 8: Now start duplicating the Layer by Right-clicking on the layer and selecting Duplicate Layer. Make at least 3 copies.

Step 9: Now align each of them and resize them to form a design.

Step 10: Now, I would suggest to select each layer and then click on Paint Bucket Tool and start filling desired colors from Swatches on the top right corner like this.

Step 11: Now select the Type tool and write #tbt.

Step 12: Now select the following options from the Character/Paragraph as shown below: Font Type Brush Script Std. Font Size 500 pt, Horizontal stretch 90 %, Vertical Stretch 110 % and finally color yellow. It should look like this.

Step 13: Now, Right-click on the TBT layer and go in Blending Options and select Stroke. Adjust the stroke width to 8 px.

Step 14: Now select Drop Shadow in the Blending options and assign the following values. The color red and Align angle to 130 degrees, Distance to 35 px and Opacity to 100 % and Blending Mode Normal.

Step 15: Now align the #tbt layer on top of other layers and align the text like this on top, and we have the #tbt sticker ready. So go nuts and make these already!!!!

Recommended Articles

This is a guide to Text Effects in Photoshop. Here we discuss how to create TBT stickers and step by step to add them in photoshop. You can also go through our other related articles to learn more –

1. After Effects Tools
2. Lens Flare in After Effects
3. Text Effects In Illustrator
4. Metal Effect in Illustrator