Embossed Text Watermark assistance

Sunnyvalejohn

I have been following the great tutorials on creating watermarks for images on the site... then I went and checked out Andy's site and he has a nice embossed text watermark. I can't figure out how to do that! Any assistance would be appreciatted!

Here is the gallery of Andy's with the cool watermark.
http://www.moonriverphotography.com/gallery/634937

Thanks!
John

jcdill

Sunnyvalejohn wrote:

I have been following the great tutorials on creating watermarks for images on the site... then I went and checked out Andy's site and he has a nice embossed text watermark. I can't figure out how to do that! Any assistance would be appreciatted!

Here is the gallery of Andy's with the cool watermark.
http://www.moonriverphotography.com/gallery/634937

My watermark isn't quite as cool as Andy's, but I'm working on a new one now, inspired by Andy's watermark. Here's the process I use:

In photoshop, new document, transparent background. Add a layer, put your text on that layer (not on the background layer). Now go to Layer -> Layer Styles. Add embossing, shadow, etc as desired. Set the layer opacity to ~25-50%.

Drag a photo behind this layer (this is why you don't put the text on the background layer) and see how it looks. Play around with the layer styles and opacity/transparency values (use transparency values that you can duplicate in the watermark options on SM) until you like how it looks over your sample photo. For best results pull in 3 or 4 different sample photos including some that are mostly white, mostly black, bright colors, muted colors. Hide or reveal each one as you test to find something that works well with all types of photos.

Save the file as a .psd (so you can go back to edit it later), then hide all the layers except the text layer. Set this layer to 100% opacity, then save as a .png file, preserving the transparency.

Upload the .png to SM and set the transparency on SM to the transparency you used when layering it over your test photos. Upload your test photos and check to see that it works as well on the server as it did when you tested in Photoshop.

Good luck!

Sunnyvalejohn

Thanks! I will give that a try and post a sample!
Cheers
John