How to Make a Stylish Glowing Box in Photoshop

In this Adobe Photoshop graphic design tutorial, we are going to create a magical glow effect coming from a box in Photoshop. This is a pretty simple effect that looks great and can easily be adapted for use in other ways.

Download and set up the stock photo

1 Lets go ahead and get our stock photo. You can download it here. Open it up in Photoshop.

No we want to straighten out the box so click and hold down the Eyedropper Tool in the Tools panel, and  then click on the Measure Tool (also known as the Ruler Tool).

2 Now click and drag a line so it follows the bottom edge of the box. Go to Image > Rotate Canvas > Arbitrary. Don’t change the number, click OK. This will straighten out your box.

Now go in and crop the document so there are no white edges showing.

Cleaning up the stock image

3 Since the light source is going to be from the inside, our shadow is going to be different that how it currently is. So, we are going to get rid of the shadow on the cover.

Use the Marquee Tool and select a part of the bright area, then bring that selection into a new layer (Ctrl + J). Bring it over to the left edge and fit it in the corner. (If you use Ctrl + T to transform the layer, then control and move the corners of the box it will skew them to get a better fit.)

4 Add a layer mask by clicking on the Add a layer mask button at the bottom of the Layers panel, and use a soft black brush to mask out the right side of the highlighted area we just duplicated (the middle area of the box).

Play around with it until you get a smooth transition between the two layers and so there aren’t any duplicated areas.

5 Now link the two layers.

Merge them together, Layer > Merge Layers (Ctrl + E).

6 Now we are going to take another selection, this time grab a selection of the entire width of the brighter area we just made. Bring the new selection into a new layer (Ctrl + J). Then blend the new layer like in step 4.

Use the Clone Stamp Tool (S) by first Alt + clicking on an area you want to clone from, then painting the area that needs to be cloned.

Cutting out the box from our stock image

7 Now we are ready to cut out the box.

Go in and use the Pen Tool to cut out the box and bring it into a new document. Use 1680 x 1050 px for its dimensions. Size it down to around 30%.

Creating the background

8 Let’s work on the background. Pick a dark blue color and fill the background (Ctrl + Del).

9 Grab a lighter version of that color, create a new layer (Ctrl + Shift + N) and create a radial gradient.

10 Transform the gradient (Ctrl + T), bring it under the box then stretch and squeeze it so it fits like so.

Darken the box

11 We are now going to darken the box. Open up the hue/saturation window, Image > Adjustments > Hue/Saturation (Ctrl + U). Change your setting like I have them below.

Open up the Curves window, Image > Adjustments > Curves (Ctrl + M) and change your settings to something like what I have.

Putting in the glow

12 Let’s put the glow in the box now. Using the Elliptical Marquee Tools draw a circle so the side edges of the box touch the inside sides of the box.

13 Select the circle layer by using (Ctrl + Right-click) circle layer and create a new layer (Ctrl + Shift + N). Fill the area with a light blue. Make sure the white circle is the top layer. Click on the white circle layer and transform the circle using Edit > Free Transform (Ctrl + T). Hold down Shift + Alt shrink the circle.

14 Now to give it a glowing look we are going to blur the edges of both the circles. First click on the blue circle layer and then go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian blur. Do the same thing with the white circle.

15 Link the two circles together (click the empty box to the left of the layer, then merge the layers, Layer > Merge Down (Ctrl + E) to merge the two layers.

Now use the Polygonal Lasso Tool to make a box around the bottom part of the circle that isn’t inside the box and delete it.

Creating the outer glow

16 Now we are going to add an outer glow to the circle. Click on the "Add a layer Style" button at the bottom of the Photoshop Layers Panel and select Outer Glow. Adjust the settings like I have them. The color is going to be R: 190 G: 239 B: 255.

17 We are now going to make another radial gradient using white as our color. Put the layer behind the glowing circle and stretch it out so it covers the whole width of the box.

Change the Blending Mode to Overlay. Now duplicate that layer by right-clicking on the layer and selecting Duplicate Layer… in the dialog box (Ctrl + J) to make it brighter.

Adding in the details (floating particles)

18 Create a new layer (Ctrl + Shift + N).

We are going to create some particles floating off the glow. Click on the Brush Tool (B) and get a brush with 0% hardness, around 20 px. Pull up the brush settings (F5).

19 Create a new layer and start painting on a few particles until you get something you like the following. You can adjust the size of the brush and experiment with its settings to get the desired effect.

20 Now go into your layer styles and change your outer and inner glows to what I have below. Drag that layer just below the circle layer.

Giving the box a drop shadow

21 We are going to give the box a little bit of a shadow. Click on the box layer and duplicate the layer (Ctrl + J). Use Ctrl + Right-click on the new layer to select it, and fill it with black #000000.

Drag it below the box layer.

Go to Filter > Blur> Gaussian Blur and change the setting to 12.4. Click OK. Now bump the shadow down a little bit.

22 Click on the Elliptical Marquee Tool, change the feather to 100 px and draw a circle around the box.

Make sure that your foreground is black (#000000) and the background is white (#FFFFFF), then go into Filter > Render > Clouds. Change the Blending Mode of the layer to Soft Light and the opacity to 70%.

Finished!

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Create a Glowing Globe Icon in Photoshop

In this tutorial we are going to create a simple 3D glowing world globe icon. This can then be applied to a logo or one color image instead of a map.

Step 1

In Photoshop lets open up an 800×800px document. Our document doesn’t have to be huge because we are only making an icon.

Step 2

Now we are going to create the basic shape for our icon. Click on the Ellipse tool and hold down Shift, click and drag a circle across the top half of the document. Holding down shift gives us a perfectly round circle.

Step 3

If your colors are set at the default black and white, your circle probably came out black. We are going to change this to a blue to give us a base color to work with.

To change the color, double click on the black square on the circle layer. This will open up a color palette, and we can choose a color from there.

Step 4

Now we are going to go and grab our map image from stock.xchng and open it up in Photoshop. Before we bring it into our document we want to get rid of the white area. To do this, go into Select>Color Range. We want to bring the fuzziness up to 200 and then click on the black area of our document.

Make sure you are using the Pointer Tool (top left in the toolbar) and click on the map and drag it into our globe document.

Step 5

This Image is going to be way too big for our circle so we are going to shrink it down using. Before we do that though we want to drop down the opacity to 50% so that we can see both the map and the circle so we can judge where to line them up.

Now, using Control+T to transform our map we are going to shrink it down.

At this point if we drop the size way down we are going to lose it off somewhere hidden off the document. To make sure this doesn’t happen look for the crosshair that is in the middle of the map, make sure that this is on your document and when you shrink it down it, the map will stay on the screen.

Now, we are going to use the percentages at the top of our screen and drop them down to 15%.

Step 6

We can bring the opacity back up to 100%.

Now to give the globe a rounded, 3D look we are going to make sure we are on our “map” layer. Now we want to Control and click on our “Circle” layer to load that selection.

Go into Filter>Distort>Spherize and change the amount to 100%.

Step 7

With the circle selection that we still have, we are going to do Control + Shift + I to get the inverse selection and then delete. This will get rid of the extra map area we don’t need. Change the map layer’s blend mode to overlay.

Step 8

We are now going to give a little bit of shine to our globe. To do this we are going to duplicate our circle layer and fill with white. Then using Control + T to transform the shape, shrink the shine circle down so we get an oval shape like I have. Try to get the top edges of the circle and the shine to be parallel.

Step 9

Now we are going to take that shine layer, change the blend mode to screen, drop the opacity down to 80% and add a layer mask to it (second icon from the left on at the bottom of the layers palette).

Take a Linear Gradient and with black, click and drag the gradient up to get the shine to fade a bit, as I have done.

Step 10

Now we are going to do some layer styles to give the globe some lighting. First, we want to duplicate the circle layer and drop the Fill down to 0%. This will get rid of the circle but we will still be able to see the layer styles.

Drag the layer above the map layer.

The first thing we are going to add is the Inner Shadow.

Step 11

Next we are going to add a Gradient Overlay. This will give us sort of an inner glow to our globe.

Step 12

Your globe should look something like this so far.

Step 13

Select the “Map” layer. We are going to add some layer styles to it.

The first thing we are going to add is a Gradient Overlay. This is going to add to give our shadow more contrast.

Step 14

Now add a Bevel and Emboss. This is going to give our map a little dimension.

Step 15

Duplicate the circle layer again (Control + J), make sure the Fill is at 0%, and add an Inner Glow with #00C9FF for a color. Bring this layer up to the top of the rest of the layers.

Step 16

Now lets add a reflection. Link all the layers together by clicking on one of the layers and then clicking the empty box to the right of the eye icon on each layer. Then do Control + E. This will combine all our layers into just one layer.

Now duplicate the layer with Control + J and go to Edit>Transform>Flip Vertically (If you just rotate it the reflection will be backwards). Make sure the “Reflection” is just under the bottom of the globe, overlapping a little bit.

Step 17

Add a layer mask to the reflection, and using our black Linear Gradient, click and drag a gradient up until you get something like I have.

Step 18

Drop the opacity of the reflection to 50%.

Step 19

Now we want to add shadow under the globe. So to do this we want to create a new layer (Control + Shift + N). Get your Radial Gradient, and make a small gradient (which we are going to stretch out) using #01133B for a color.

Step 20

Using Control + T stretch out the gradient so it roughly covers the width of the globe.

Final

There you have it, a Globe Icon. This can be applied to other one-color logos, text or images. Just make sure you remember to change your reflection also.

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Create a wood background in Photoshop

In this Photoshop tutorial, we are going to create a wood background. We are going to create the wood from scratch and turn it into a pattern. Then we will finish it off by adding some lighting and texture effects.

What you’ll need:

Adobe Photoshop

Texture

Step 1

Create a new document in Photoshop. You can make your document pretty much any size you want depending on how you are going to use it. I’m going to make mine 1680×1050 at 72 pixels/inch so I can use it as a background wallpaper.

Step 2

Now we are going to create our first board. To do this click on the marquee tool, then at the top, in the options bar, change the style to fixed size. Change the size to 90×325px and click on your document. This will create a box the exact size we specified.

Step 3

Lets fill our box with a brown color. It doesn’t have to be the same exact brown I am using, just something that would be a good base wood color.

Create a new layer (Control + Shift + N) and fill the box with the brown we picked.

Step 4

To get the grain of the wood, we are going to Control + click on the board layer to select it. Create a new layer (Control + Shift + N) and fill it with black.

Step 5

Go to Filter>Render>Fibers. Play around with the Variance and Strength until you get something like what I have. Since the fibers are randomized, yours probably isn’t going to look exactly like mine, but get something where there is some contrast.

Step 6

Deselect the box Control + D. Go to Filter>Blur>Motion Blur. Change the distance to 345px.

Step 7

Make sure you are on the fiber layer we just made, then Control and click on the board layer. Do Control + Shift + I to get the inverse selection and delete the fiber area that is outside of the board.

Change the blend mode to Overlay and change the opacity to 30%.

Step 8

Now we are going to add some styles to our board layer.

First go into the inner shadow. This is going to give us a little more depth to the board.

Second, we are going to add a bevel and emboss. This will give it a slight 3D look and help to make it pop. The contour will make the bevel a little sharper.

Step 9

Now we don’t want every board to be the same so we are going to create another one by repeating steps 3 through 8. This board will be different because when we create the fibers in step 5, the fibers always come out different, which will give us different grains in the wood.

We’ll only do two different boards to keep our pattern fairly simple.

Step 10

Fill the background layer with black so that when we put our boards together, if there is any spaces in between boards, white won’t show through.

Before we go any further we want to make sure that the boards and their grain are in two folders “board 1” and “board 2”.

Now to start creating the patterns we are going to click on the “board 1” folder. Do Control + T to get the transform box around the board.

Click and drag guides so the go through the middle plains as well as on each edge of the board.

Click on the “board 2” folder and do Control + T. This will put the box around it. Like the top of the box with the middle guide of “board 1”. Line up “board 2” so the top aligns with the horizontal middle and left guides.

Step 11

We are going to duplicate “board 2” by right clicking on the folder and doing “Duplicate Layer Set”. Bring that new board, “board 3” over to the right side of “board 1”.

Step 12

We are going to add guides to boards 3 and 4 like we did in step 10.

Now we are going to duplicate “board 1” and move it down so the top is touching the bottom of the original “board 1”.

We are going to do the same thing with boards 2 and 3 except we are going to move them up.

You should end up with 6 boards, and something like I have below.

Step 13

I am going to add some nails to our boards, to give it more of a real look. The reason why I’m doing it now and not when we first made them is because this way we can set them up slightly differently on each one so they aren’t all on the same spot on every board and it isn’t as obvious that it is a pattern.

Start off by clicking on the Circular Marquee tool. Change the style to fixed size and then make the size 7×7px. Fill with a dark gray color.

Go into the layer styles then click on the drop shadow. Change the settings as I have them.

Now go into bevel and emboss and change the settings like I have them. This should give you the look of a nail in the wood.

Now you can duplicate it with Control + J and put two on the ends of each board.

Step 14

Now we are going to merge all of the boards so we can turn them into a pattern.

First click on the eye to the left of the background layer. Now click on the arrow on the top right of the layers palette and go to merge visible.

Click on the eye to the left of the background layer to show the background again.

Step 15

To get the pattern click on the square marquee tool and make sure the style is normal. Make a box along the guides as I have.

Go to Edit>Define Pattern. Rename the pattern “Wood”.

Step 16

We can click and drag our board layer to the trash. Then go to View and clear guides.

Create a new layer called “boards”. Click on the pattern tool, select the patter we made, and paint the entire area.

If you don’t see the pattern tool, it will be under the clone tool in the tool bar.

Step 17

Now we have our seamless wood pattern we can add some effects to it to make more interesting.

Using the circular marquee tool change the feather to 100px in the options bar at the top, then create a circle the same size as the document. Holding down shift use the up arrow to move the middle of the circle to the top of the document, so just the bottom half of the circle is showing. Fill with an orange color.

Step 18

With the marquee still selected, do Control + Shift + I to get the inverse selection and move it down towards the bottom. Create a new layer and fill with black.

You’ll probably have a line at the top of the black that we don’t want. To get rid of this we are going to go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur and change the radius to 35px.

Step 19

Using the circular marquee tool again, with the 100px feather make a smaller circle with the top half above the top of the document. Fill with white. Change the blend mode to Overlay.

Step 20

Repeat step 19 with a smaller circle at 50% opacity.

Step 21

We are going to go in and change our levels to give our image more of a contrast.

Step 22

Let’s go in and put a texture in. I’m going to go to Zen Textures to get this film texture.

Using Control + T, shrink it down to size.

Change the blend mode to Overlay at 40%.

Step 23

Finally we are going to reduce the saturation. Go into Hue/Saturation and change the saturation to -15.

Final

There we have it a wood design that can be used as a desktop wallpaper, background for your website or whatever else.

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