Photoshop Metal Interface Tutorial

Posted in Photoshop, Web Design by Khaled on April 7th, 2008

Another old Adobe Photoshop tutorial from Kyscorp old archives. I’ll be reposting most of those. This is not a text effect tutorial but it is a simple Photoshop tutorial for beginners that will show you how to use the dodge and burn tools in Photoshop to create a metal-like interface. Quite easy to learn with good results at the end. It is an old tutorial that was created for Adobe Photoshop 7 but you can of course use Photoshop CS, CS2 or CS3. More old tutorials will be posted soon…

In this quick Adobe Photoshop tutorial I will try to show you how
to use Dodge tool (and also burn tool) to

- create new file i chose 175X150

- make a new layer

- with the rectangular marquee tool make a selection and fill it with a dark
shade of gray; I chose #333333

- grab your dodge tool and set the options as it follows: brush: 65, range:
highlights and exposure: 50%

- drag your dodge tool onthe middle of the rectangle to lighten it as if it is
exposed to light also lighten the top and

bottom sides, your shape is no longer plane

- grab your burn tool and set its options to: brush:65 range: highlights and
exposure: 50%

- drag your tool through the dark zones in order to darken them more

- with the magic wand select the white background (working on the layer that
contains your shape)

- hit ctrl + shift + alt + I to reverse selection

- go to: Select >> Modify >> Smooth… and set the sample radius as 10 px

- hit ctrl + shift + alt + I to reverse selection

- hit the delete button to clear it

- this could have been done since the beginning with the first selection but the
point here is to have the final shape

after using the dodge and burn tool to make it look more realistic, also now we
have to learn how to anti-alias the

edges of our shape.

- hit ctrl button and then click on the layer containing your shape (selection)

- go to the channels palette (Window >> Channels) and click on “save selection
as channel” on the bottom of the

channels palette

- go to Filter >> Blur >> Gaussian Blur. Set the radius to 5 pixels or so.

- hit ctrl+shift+L to apply auto levels

- use the dodge tool with the same settings and with a smaller brush (17 px for
instance) to lighten the edges and

the mid section

- now fill your background with black color

- add some more stuff to it in order to obtain what you want

- Or use as an element of a larger template or interface…