Sometimes designers use glow effects to create a fantastic atmosphere or a magical mood in a picture. Even a novice Adobe Photoshop researcher can master this artistic technique.
Necessary
To add a glow effect in Photoshop, first of all, it is necessary that the object, the contours of which will glow, be on a separate layer. How to separate the object from the background has been written many times in other articles, we will not dwell on this now in our instructions
Instructions
Step 1
So, we have a separate layer with an object. To make it easier to adjust the glow parameters, it is advisable to place another layer of dark color under the object, against which all the nuances will be visible.
Select the object layer. Go to Layer> Layer Style> Outer Glow, or click on the fx effect icon at the bottom of the layers panel.
We see in front of us a fairly extensive field for settings:
- glow color; it can be solid or change its color, depending on the distance to the object.
- the width of the halo and the intensity of the glow
- you can also vary the glow blending algorithm - the Lighten and Screen modes are best
Thus, we adjust the glow of the object's outline to the outside. After that, go to the next Inner Glow tab. The settings are similar here.
To make the picture look natural, you need to remember that even if, according to the logic of things, the object glows only outward, then any optical system, including the human eye, due to the non-absolute transparency of the cornea and lens, slightly blurs bright highlights, they look beyond the boundaries of the light source, so if there is an intense glow outside the Outer Glow contour, inside it you still need to play along with a slight Inner Glow glow.
Step 2
In our composition, there can be any number of layers with objects, each of which can be customized with individual parameters - the color of the glow and its character.
In addition, if we want to depict a separate point light source, we can use the Lens Flare filter (in the menu Filer> Render> Lens Flare), which simulates the reaction of various photographic lenses to the appearance of a bright light source in the frame. Thus, we can add any number of glowing bulbs, lamps and spotlights to the composition.
Step 3
By varying and combining glow effects, applying them to different layers, we can achieve very bright and memorable - fantastic and realistic results.
