Photoshop Elements Tutorial: Adding effects to type in Photoshop Elements

What you’ll learn in this Photoshop Elements Tutorial:

  • Adding text to multiple images
  • Warping type

This tutorial provides you with a foundation for working with Adobe Photoshop Elements effects. It is the seventh lesson in the Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 Digital Classroom book.

Photoshop Elements Tutorial: Adding effects to type in Photoshop Elements

In this exercise, you will add the word copyright and use the Emboss effect to give it a watermark look. This is the same thing that professional photographic studios do to protect their images from illegal copying. Then you will drag that text layer over another image to apply the same text to that image.

There are many effects that you can apply to type inside the Effects panel, including filters, layer styles, and photo effects. Filters can be applied to type, but the type must be simplified first. This means that the type is no longer editable; however Layer styles can be applied to type without simplifying the type first. Photo effects are applied to all the layers inside an Elements document. In this exercise, you will use a filter, and then later on, you will use a layer style.

1 Choose File > Open. In the Open dialog box, navigate to the Lessons folder and double-click the saddle1.psd file to open the file. You can also open the file using the Organizer, if you prefer.

2 Select the Horizontal Type tool () from the Toolbox, and click in the middle bottom area of the image.

3 Type Photographic Productions Copyright 2010.

4 Click-and-drag to highlight all the text or press Ctrl+A (Windows) Command+A (Mac OS). Change the font to Myriad Pro by typing its name in the Font Name text field in the Options bar. Change the style to bold.

5 Change the type size to 30, by typing 30 in the Size text field.

6 Change the color of the type to white. Click the green arrow to accept the changes.

7 Select the Move tool () and move the type to the bottom-right corner of the photo. Keep the type selected.

The text added to the image.

Now you will add a filter to make the type appear embossed into the photo.

8 Make sure the Filters button () is pressed in the Effects panel. By default, the only filters that appear are the artistic filters. Click the drop-down menu to reveal all the other filters that can be applied. Choose Show All to see all the filters you can use.

Showing all the filters.

9 Scroll down the list of filters to find Emboss. If you hover your cursor over a filter for a second, a tool-tip appears with the name of the filter. You can also select Show Names from the Effects panel menu () to make identifying the filters easier.

10 Double-click Emboss to apply it.

11 A dialog box opens, warning you that the Type layer must be simplified in order to proceed. Press OK. This means that the type attributes will no longer be editable, but the filter will be applied to the Type layer.

A warning dialog box appears when you simplify the type.

12 The Emboss effect is applied to the selected text and the layer is converted from a text layer to a standard layer.

The finished layer with the Emboss filter applied.

 

Adding text to multiple images

Now that this image has the correct copyright information on a layer by itself, you can apply this to other images that you also want to contain this layer. In this exercise, you will apply this simplified type layer to another image.

1 Choose File > Open. In the Open dialog box, navigate to the Lessons folder and double-click the saddle2.psd file. You can also open the file using the Organizer, if you prefer.

2 Press the Arrange button () at the top of the workspace and choose Tile All in Grid (). You should now be able to see both images inside the center work area of Photoshop Elements.

In order to get the layer from one image to the other, you only need to drag and drop the layer from the Layers panel over the other image.

3 Using the Move tool (), click the saddle1.psd image to make it active and select the Photographic Productions layer in the Layers panel. Click-and-drag this layer over the saddle2.psd image and release.

Note

As long as the images are the same size and resolution, you can hold the Shift key as you drag from one image into another so that the layer appears in the same spot in the second image.

Dragging the text layer over another image.

4 Press the Arrange button () and choose Consolidate all () to show all images in their own window. Choose the Move tool, select the image saddle2.psd, then visually move the type wherever you’d like.

Moving the embossed type into place.

5 Choose File > Save, save the file to your desktop, then choose File > Close. Do this for both saddle1.psd and saddle2.psd.

Warping type

In this exercise, you will learn how to warp type to a shape. In Photoshop Elements, you can warp type to an arch, flag, wave, or even look like a fish, then change those settings any time you like, because warping type is a non-destructive edit. In this exercise, you will create the front cover of a photo book using a type warp and also a layer style.

1 In the organizer, type mountain in the search text field. Select the file mountain.psd and then click on the triangle to the right of the Edit tab and choose Full Photo Edit to open the image in the Editor. This will be the background image for a book cover.

2 You will now enter the title of the book. With the Horizontal Type Tool () selected, click above the mountain man’s head and type The Mountain Called Life.

3 Change the text color to white by clicking on the text color box in the Options bar.

4 Change the text alignment to centered by choosing Center Text in the text alignment drop-down menu in the Options bar.

5 Change the font to Poplar Std. Change the size to 77 points.

6 Now it’s time to warp the text. In the Options bar, press the Create warped text button ().

Choosing the Create warped text button.

7 Choose Arch as the style, and change the bend to +45. Press OK.

Changing the warp style.

9 Use the Move tool () to move it where it looks best.

10 Choose File > Save. In the Save As dialog box, type mountain_work for the file name and make sure that the format is set to Photoshop. Press Save.

Continue to the next Photoshop Elements Tutorial: Adding a layer style to type in Photoshop Elements >