Use PS layer styles to create crystal-clear pearls – production example

Can you imagine using PS layer styles to create crystal-clear and moist pearls

? An ordinary small round will turn into a crystal clear pearl in your hands! And it’s all the magic of layer styles, no other tools or filters at all! Isn’t it incredible? Let’s uncover this mystery step by step.

Let’s take a look at the finished rendering first.

Create a new document, select the Ellipse tool in the toolbar, and select “Create New Shape Layer” in the toolbar. Open the information panel, hold down the Shift key, and drag a perfect circle on the screen. While dragging the mouse, pay attention to the information panel. When you see that the length and width of the circle are both 24 pixels, relax the mouse. In this way, a small circle filled with the foreground color appears on the canvas, and a layer named “Shape 1” will also appear on the layer panel. Here, the foreground color has little to do with our final result, so don’t worry about it.

If you are not used to this way of layer clipping path, you can also use the old method: create a new layer, because we need to use layer styles to achieve this effect, so the new layer must be indispensable. Use the Elliptical Marquee Tool to draw a 24×24 pixel circle. The method is the same as above. Fill it with color and deselect it.

If you use the second method, then double-click the layer thumbnail to bring up the layer style menu. If you’re like me and did the first method, then double-click on the layer name to bring up the layer style menu. We add styles to the layer. The first is the shadow, click on the drop shadow style, change the distance to 3 pixels, the size to 6 pixels, and keep the others as default.

Next is the inner glow, which It is to emphasize the rounded edges. Change the blending mode of the glow from screen to multiply, change the opacity to 40%, and change the light source color to black; in the image, change the size to 1 pixel; in quality, increase the range to 75%, and other constant.

The following is the bevel and relief. Note: In our example, this is the most critical step, the pearl Most forms are represented by it. In the Structure panel, select the style as Inner Bevel, the method as “Sculpt Clear”, the depth as 610%, the direction as upward, the size as 9 pixels, and the softening as 3 pixels; in the shadow panel, the angle is -60 degrees, and global illumination is disabled. , the height is 65 degrees. In the gloss contour type, first select the preset “Rolling Slope – Decreasing” mode, and then press the figure. Modify the mapping curve, cancel the anti-aliasing option, and keep the default highlights and shadows Color and Mode, but change the Opacity to 90% and 50% respectively. Click on the contour panel and click on the contour line to display the contour editor. Set the contour curve to a shape similar to Figure 06. You can first select “Record” in the contour type, and then change it slightly. The role of contour lines is very obvious, it gives pearls a strong reflective effect , at the same time, the roundness of the pearl is also well expressed.

After applying the relief effect and contours, the image will look like yours The background color has a lot to do with it. If you used a dark fill at the beginning, your image will not look like pearls now, but like small metal balls. The darker the background color, the more obvious the metallic effect will be. ; If you use a light fill, your image will probably look close to what we’re going for, and if you start with white, you’ll almost have a perfect white pearl. If you want To change the color, just double-click the layer thumbnail.

The Photoshop color picker will pop up, where you can choose to change the color of the layer. The following process is designed for those colors that are too dark. Definitely.

Generally, light-colored pearls have a special pearl luster, which is crystal clear and soft. Dark-colored pearls will have a metallic luster, but still have a soft color. So we use color overlay to eliminate excessive colors. Select the Color Overlay style, set the Blending Mode to Lighten, Color to White, and Opacity to 52%.

The effect of color superposition is especially obvious for dark pearls. Pearls come in a variety of colors due to different mineral elements contained in seawater. If you want to get some colorful pearls, you can get them here, cream yellow, lilac, pink, rose, bronze, dark blue, black, it depends on what you like. However, there are still some tasks that need to be completed in order to obtain the best pearls.

Anyone who likes pearls knows that white and slightly rose-red pearls are the best among light-colored pearls. Let’s make this kind of pearls below. Select the Gradient Overlay style, and with the default settings, the result can be a bit discouraging – it looks a bit like little steel balls.

But don’t worry, we can use another layer style to get the gloss back for it, by the way, that is the “glossy” style. Select “Overlay” in the structure’s Blending Mode, Color RGB (225, 159, 159), Opacity 72%, Angle 135 degrees, Distance 8 px, Size 9 px and in Contour Style “Taper – Invert” and select the anti-aliasing option. In this way, we can show the color produced by the mixing of reflection, refraction and interference on the surface of the pearl.

So far, our The pearl pattern is all finished. You can click the New Style button in the style panel to save it and name it “pearl”. It’s best to use the preset manager to save them permanently, so you don’t have to worry about losing them when you reinstall Photoshop.

Now let’s test the effect. Create a new layer, click on the style you just saved, and apply this style to this layer. Select the airbrush tool, set the brush size to 24, and set the hardness to 100. Give it a try. Spray freely on the canvas, and a string of pearls will appear. Photoshop will redistribute the styles within the layers so that our pearls transition naturally from light to dark. If you want to draw a pearl necklace, you also need to increase the brush spacing. In the example below, the brush spacing is 107%, and you can add a chain. If it feels a little monotonous, use dark blue as the background, add some noise and blur effects, and imitate the velvet substrate, which can make the pearls more radiant.

If you want a larger What about some or smaller pearls? After reducing or enlarging the brush, I drew on the layer with the style set, only to find that the style was deformed and the pearl became unrecognizable.

Can we just Making single diameter pearls? of course not. Photoshop provides us with a way to apply layer styles flexibly. In the layers panel, right-click the icon indicating the layer effect and select “Zoom Effect” from the pop-up menu.

The diameter of the small brush is 12 pixels, so we will set the zoom to 50% so that the layer style can completely match the image. Similarly, the larger brush diameter is 48 pixels, so set the zoom value to 200%. This way, you can get a big East Pearl without any effort.

The resulting effect is as shown in the figure.