X24 Designs

Some people wanted to know how I did the letters in my last piece called “oil”.

I decided to write a tutorial.

First I have to credit Zilla774 for turning me on to the use of illustrator for 3D text when you don’t have a 3D program to render it. This is my rendition and expansion of his thoughts.

There are two programs required for this:
1. Photoshop CS2 (don’t know if you can do some of this stuff with earlier versions.)
2. Illustrator CS2

Start with a blank slate: I started with a canvas size of 24in by 36in at 300 DPI which is poster sized and print quality.

Now I know that is huge, and if you are just toying around you don’t really need to have
such a large canvas.

I used this image for the base:

http://www.sxc.hu/photo/937346

I just pasted the image on the canvas.

Alright open Illustrator.
Your canvas size doesn’t matter because the letters you will be bringing over will be in vector format. I just started with something like 1024px by 768px.

Paste the “oil” picture in so you have a reference for your letters.

Since I used the 3 letters O I L I stuck them on the canvas as separate entities.
I used Adobe Garamond Pro at # 636466, but you don’t have to if you don’t have it.
Just use something that looks pretty good.

Start with the “O” if you have taken any art classes you will know that things in the distance are smaller.
So make the O smaller and increase the size of the letters as you get closer.

Now to making the letters 3D!

You can the other letters away and focus on one at a time.
Select the letters and go to Effect » 3D » Extrude and Bevel.

Make sure you have preview checked because it really helps when you are making the letters.

Adjust the letter so that it looks like it could be sitting in the picture.

Click on the “more options” button.
you can access the blending modes.

1. Take the Ambient Light down to 8%
2. Surface: Diffuse Shading
3. Blending Steps: 150 (to make the surface smoother).

Afterwards you should get something like this:

If you need to edit it again, just double click here
and you can re-edit the shape without losing what you have previously done.
If you so chose to edit again, you must check preview as it does not automatically get checked
upon return.

Now do the same thing to all 3 letters.
You’ll arrive with something like this:

Now we are finished with Illustrator.

You can either drag the letters over, or save them and import them to Photoshop.
I prefer dragging them. J

Starting with the “O”:

After importing the O place it on the Photoshop canvas:

Since we used that grey, it would be nice to have a better color than grey:
so copy the layer by dragging it up to the new layer icon:

With the new layer rasterize it by going to Layer » Rasterize » Smart Object

Now with the new layer to give it a new color, go to

Afterwards go to Filter » Blur » Gaussian Blur »

Make the blur radius 13

You will finally end up with this:

O shadow.

Ok, remember the original layer we copied the “O” from?
Well copy it again. And make the layer black by either double clicking on the
layer in the layers menu or right click on the layer and going to blending options.

To make it black choose color overlay and make the color black. (by default it usually is red. If you double click on the box, you get a color picker. Drag the cursor down to black.

Hit ctrl-t or go to edit » free transform

and drag the top handle down so that the image inverts
afterwords hold ctrl down and drag left so you
get something like this.

Alright, rasterize the layer and Gaussian blur the layer:
to 30

Now take that layer and move it underneath the original layer.

Alright so you have the o finished.
All the other letters have a similar process but you have to keep in mind that you want the illusion of depth. The only reason the o in the background was blurred out was to make it look like it was farther away than the other letters.

When you place the I in the middle and the L in front.
The I in the middle isn’t blurred because it is in focus.
Also warmer colors should be in the foreground and make the L blurred like the o.
The shadows might not fit all the way so you can use a black brush on the shadow layer to darken the shadow closest to the letter.

In the end you will end up with something like this:

Alright now to textures:

I used some standard rusted metal. You can pick anything.
http://www.sxc.hu/browse.phtml?f=search&txt=rusted+metal&w=1&x=0&y=0

Just make sure that it has a good textured look.
Drag it or copy it into the file. Desaturate it by going to
image » adjustments » Desaturate. Or by hitting: shift+ctrl+U
Afterwards blur the layer by 15 or so. You will get something like this:

Now ctrl+ click on the original letter that you started with: in this case it’s the L and it will select the outline of the layer.

You will see the outline of the L on the rusted layer:

Now reveal the selection by going to
layer » layer mask » reveal selection

Now switch the blending mode to soft light.

Blur the layer a little more to get rid of the hard edges of the rust.

After doing this on all three letters , I used different textures for each, remember not to blur the middle layer, you will end up with something like this:

Lastly:
To make a border I created a new layer filled with white.
Double click on the layer or right click and go to blending options.
Make these changes:

After you finish, make sure you multiply the layers so only the black border can be seen.

You will get something like this:

Afterwards I did a black to white gradient and I overlayed it to get the really contrasted look to the picture.

And lastly I stuck a layer of curves with a cross processing affect over the top of everything.
go to Layer 7 New Adjustment Layer » Curves and in the drop down menu put these settings in:

Your finished product should look like this:

I put little gas pumps to reiterate what the oil was representing but you don’t need that.
You can use this technique on many other things experiment a little.

I hope this was helpful and informative,
questions and comments appreciated.

-Ted