Simple Metalic Textures

Metallic textures can come in handy for many purposes, from making cool backgrounds for your web-page or desktop to adding borders to photos or cards you want to print. This tutorial will show you how to make a basic metallic texture. It assumes you are making a web-page background, but you can enter different dimensions if you like. This will produce a smooth, brushed looking metal. You can adjust many of the settings and the color to get something that exactly fits your needs.

Step 1
Open Photoshop. Select "File" from the menu and click "New."

Step 2

In the dialog that pops up, choose "Web" as the type of document and choose the size from the options offered. Click "OK."

Step 3
Click on the "Foreground" color at the bottom of the toolbar. In the dialog that appears, click in the color box and choose a medium gray. Click "OK."

Step 4
Select the "Paintbucket" tool from the toolbar.

Step 5
Select "Filter" from the menu and choose "Noise." From the options, choose "Add Noise."

Step 6
In the dialog that pops up, make the settings "Monochromatic" and "Uniform." Set the "Amount" to 25 and click "OK."

Step 7
Select "Filter" from the menu and choose "Blur." From the options, choose "Motion Blur."

Step 8
In the dialog that pops up, make the "Distance" 10 and the "Angle" 0. Click "OK." You'll see now that we are getting there.

Step 9
Select "Filter" from the menu and choose "Render." From the options, choose "Lighting Effects."

Step 10
This part is more complex. In the dialog that appears, go to the lighting "Preview" on the left and drag the light handles (the 4 dots at the edge of the circle) to approximate what I have done in the screen capture. The goal is to have the light coming from the lower right corner and spreading out fairly evenly. You don't want the other three corners extremely dark. Then in the controls on the right make the "Intensity" 30, the "Focus" 70, the "Gloss" 20 and the "Material" 70." Click "OK."

Step 11
Wow, thank God Step 10's done. And that's it. Here is what it should look like. These settings and the color used give you something like aluminum. Play around with the settings to get what to want, from gold to steel.

Photoshop Faded Edges

This is a simple tutorial that explains how to create a faded border around an image. I will not go into actually using this image, but only how to make it. This sort of faded edge image works for things like greeting cards, ads and web-pages.

Step 1
Open Photoshop. Select "File" from the menu and choose "Open Recent." Select an image you want to work on and click "OK." 

Step 2
Go to the toolbar and select the "Rectangular Marquee" tool.

Step 3

Go to the "Layers" panel on the lower right and right-click on the "Background" layer. From the options, choose "Layer from Background."

Step 4


Go to the tool options at the top and adjust the "Feather" to whatever you want. The exact amount depends on the size of your image and the result you want to achieve.

Step 5


Hold down the left mouse button and drag over the area you want to keep after the fade. You will notice that the square selection becomes curved when you release the mouse button.

Step 6
Select "Select" from the menu and choose "Select Inverse."

Step 7
Hit "Delete" on your keyboard. This will remove the area around the central area. In this case, I used too much feather. If you want less or more, use the "Step Backward" under "Edit" three times to get back to Step 4 and enter a different amount.

Step 8
Select the "Eraser" tool from the toolbar.

Step 9
Go to the tool options at the top. From the drop down, choose a soft brush and set the "Size" to about 64 and the "Opacity" to about 51. Again, the exact amount will depend on your image. Use the tool to erase any sharp edges at the sides of the fade.

Step 10
Select "File" from the menu and choose "Save for Web or Devices."

Step 11
In the dialog that pops up, go to the upper right and change the file type to PNG.

Step 12
Go to the bottom of the dialog and click "Save."

Step 13
In the dialog that pops up, name the file and click "Save."

Step 14. And that's it. You can now use this PNG file in other projects. Here's what it might look like against a white background.