Sodawax

I'm going to show you how to make a simple glassy looking avatar using Adobe Photoshop. I used Photoshop CS3 but this can be easily done using any version.

For this tutorial, since I'm working in my Opera blog, I made the standard Opera 50x50 pixel avatar using a their logo. This technique, however, can work for buttons, banners, menu bars etc.

Let us get started...

1. Make a new 50x50 pixel image and fill the layer black. You can really choose any color, but I'm just going with black to make things simple. Name the layer 'background' if not already.


2. Next we want to make a new layer Shift+Ctrl+N. The 'New Layer' box should pop up. Give the layer a name, like glass or gloss or just dude if you want. I named mine glass. Hit Ok.

3. With the newly glass layer selected, fill the layer in with black and double click on the layer to bring up the 'Layer Style' box. Go down and click on 'Gradiant Overlay' but click on the text not just the check mark to take you to the full gradiant screen. This is what you should be looking at.


4. Now it's time to create the glass effect. Click on the 'Gradiant' drop down there in the middle and stay on the Black to White preset. Double click on the bottom arrow or 'Color Stop' as it's called under the black to bring up the color table. Move the circle up to a dark gray color or just type in the color #444343 and hit Ok.


5. Back to the gradiant editor, bring your curser towards the center of the gradiant, just to the left of that little diamond there in the middle and click to add a new stop.

Double click on the new stop and make that sucker black.

6. Now, just to the right of that stop, click again to add another stop. Make that color a lighter gray. I made mine #444444. After you're done with your color, slide that new stop to the left to meet up with the 'black' stop in the middle so it should look like below.

Hit Ok but DON'T exit the 'Layer Style' box.

7. On the left, go up and select 'Inner Shadow' and choose these settings:
Opacity: 75%
Angle: (doesn't matter)
Distance: 0px
Choke: 28%
Size: 5px.
Hit OK.

8. Again at the left, go down and double click on 'Stroke'. Size the stroke to '1', and choose 'Inside' for the position. Leave the blend mode to normal and make the color 'Black'. Hit Ok and exit the Layer Style box.

Your image should look something like this:


9. Now create one more layer and give it a name. It should be the 'top' layer. Bring in a logo, photo, whatever. Again, I made an Opera logo for mine.

Notice the logo is bright red. That's because we're going to drop the opacity on this puppy. If you're using another logo, I suggest you to make it bright also. But do as you feel and what looks best to you.

10. For the last step, drag your logo to the top layer if you haven't already and make your way to the 'Opacity' drop down menu in the layers panel in the top right. No, your other right... I dropped my level down to 45%. You can mess with it and choose a setting you like... After you're done with that, click outside anywhere in the gray area and save your image.


That's it, we're done, enjoy!

Here's some other examples I've made: