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I'm going to show you how to make a sig that looks something like this:
It might not end up exact, but I'll try to remember what I did.
Open a new document 400x120 with a transparent background.
BASE
Go Select/All. Now go Select/Rounded Rectangle - 50% radius, concave unchecked. OK. Now make your foreground colour black. Fill in the selected shape with the bucket, so you have a black, rounded rectangle. It should now look like this:
GLOW
Go Select/Shrink - 10 px, check shrink from image border. OK. Create new transparent layer called 'Glow'. Have it selected. Make foreground black, and background colour of your choice. I used red in the original sig, I'm using blue in this sig. Use the gradient tool. Drag from top of selection to bottom (use ctrl to make it straight) so it looks like this:
Go Select/All. Go Filters/Blur/Gaussian Blur - 30px. OK. It should now look like this:
HIGHLIGHT
Create new transparent layer called 'highlight'. Right click on the Background layer in the Layers box. Go Alpha to Selection. Go Select/Shrink - 5px. OK. Select rectangle tool. In tool options, select the 'Subtract From Current Selection' box. Drag rectangle across the bottom half of selection, so you are left with this:
Select 'Highlight' layer in Layers box. Select gradient tool. Have foreground as white. In tool options, make it 'FG to transparent'. Now drag gradient from top of selection to a bit past the bottom, so it looks like this:
Drag guides from the top of the Image box, and left side of the image box, so it is set up like this:
Select Perspective Tool. Click on selection so that little boxes appear on the corners. Drag the two bottom boxes to where the guides intersect, like this:
Click Transform in the little box. It should now look like this:
Drag the guides back to the sides. It is now a floating layer, so click the little page icon in the bottom left corner of the Lyers box:
You can delete the Highlight layer now, and call the new one Highlight. Now you've finished your glassy thing! Here's what mine looks like:
Sorry, I forgot to change transparentcy of highlight - make it 80%.
METAL CORNERS
Right click on the background layer and go 'Alpha To Selection'. Now go Select/Invert, so that the corners are selected. Make a new, transparent layer called 'Corners', and put in on the top of the layers stack. With the bucket, fill the selection with grey. I used 909090.It should look like this:
Duplicate the 'Corners' layer, and fill the corners of that with white, like this:
Go Select/All. Then go Filters/Blur/Gaussian Blur - 8px. Now select original 'Corners' layer and go Filters/Map/Bump Map. The Bump Map you are using is 'Corners Copy'. Map type is Linear. Compensate for darkening checked. Nothing else checked. Depth - 8. OK. Delete 'Corners Copy' from Layers box. It should look like this:
Have 'Corners' layer selected. Go Layer/Colours/Curves. Make it look like this:
OK. Now it should look like metal like this:
METAL BAR
Using the rectangle tool (make sure you click the 'replace' box, since we had it on 'subtract' before), select a bar across the image, like this:
Make a new transparent layer called 'Bar'. Fill the selection with the same grey we had before (909090). Duplicate the layer, and fill selection on the new layer with white. Go Select/All. Then go Filters/Blur Gaussian Blur - 10px. OK. Select original 'Bar' layer. Go Filters/Map/Bump Map - Use 'Bar Copy', keep other settings. OK. Delete 'Bar Copy' Layer. It should now look like this:
Go Layer/Colours/Curves. Have the graph like before:
It should now look shiny like this:
TEXT OUTLINE
Put in some text in any colour.
Duplicate it. Right click on the newest text layer in the Layers box. Go Alpha To Selection. Go Select/Grow - 5px. Fill with 909090 - use ink or large brush to fill in gaps.
Select the first text layer, right click and go Alpha To Selection. Go to newest layer and go Edit/Clear. Go Select/All. Do the same that you did with the pipe and corners with the text outline, using 8px on the Gaussian Blur. It should end up like this:
COLOUR OF TEXT
Make the original text a colour that looks good with your glassy thing.
Right click on original text layer, go Alpha To Selection. Go Select/Shrink - 2px. make a new transparent layer called 'Text Glow'. Fill the selection with a lighter version of the text colour.
Go Select/All. Then go Filters/Blur/Gaussian Blur - 8px.
Go Alpha To Selection on original text layer. Cut the bottom half off using subtract with the rectangle tool. Create new transparent layer called 'text highlight' Fill with white fading to transparent, like highlight on glassy thing.
Go Select/All. Make 'text highlight' layer 80% opacity. Add drop shadows on text and pipe.
Add lots of small text behind the 'highlight' layer, saying whatever you want. Make it 60% opacity.
I adjusted the 'highlight' layer to 70% opacity because it looked better.
Here is my result:
Original:
Hope you can understand everything in this tutorial!
