A reader requested a tutorial on how to make the gold effect I’ve used on the Creative Curio and Extras titles. It’s a pretty simple technique, but like most things, it takes time and experimenting with different filters, layer styles, layer modes, etc. to get the right look.
The gold lettering that I’ve created actually only uses layer styles. I’ll show you them below.
First, you have to get your shape/text. You can see that there is a lot of variety in the width of my letters and you’ll need this when we apply some of the layer styles later on.
For the fill color, I used #927847 or 146R, 120G, 71B.
Inner Shadow
Next, for some depth, I applied the Inner Shadow layer style.
These are the settings I used:
Blend Mode: Multiply (default)
Color: Black (default)
Opacity: 17%
Distance: 2px
Remember that your shadow distance will depend on your resolution. Since this is for web, the resolution is 72px, so the 2px distance is sufficient. I almost always lower the opacity, too, because I want my shadows to blend, not stand out and say, “Hey! I’m a shadow! Look at me!”
Bevel and Emboss
“But real designers don’t use Bevel and Emboss!” I hear you cry. Oh, just like they don’t use gradients, eh? In the right hands, all of these tools are useful. But that is what they are, tools. You have to know when and how to use them to get the end results you have in mind. Here is an appropriate place to use Bevel and Emboss.
Style: Inner Bevel
Technique: Chisel Hard
Depth: 301
Size: 2
Angle: 117 degrees
Altitude: 69 degrees
Highlight: Color Dodge, #faecb4, 54% opacity
Shadow: Multiply, #000000, 22% opacity
I also used the Contour layer style to darken the gold color a little more. You can decide if that’s what you want for your gold look (I think it looks good without it too).
Contour: Cone Inverted preset
And there you have it!
this is a inspiring blog..thank you
Great tutorial! It was so nice of you to share how you came up with your “Creative Curio” and “Extras” titles.
Your blog’s design looks so lovely. It complements your blog’s title and concept.=)
Wow, now I can use Bevel and Emboss tool in PhotoShop. I will give it a try to surprise my cousin who is getting disappointed to me because I am so slow in learning PhotoShop
I will embed her name in my page and will wait if she can notice it. Thanks for sharing Lauren! 
Very interesting. I used Bevel and Emboss a lot – too much, in fact. But I’ve never used it in this way to create a speckled effect. Really useful!
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Yes very generous, thanks for sharing. It’s a unique style and very effective, I’ve never seen it anywhere else.
waw. very creative, unique and stylish.
Thanks for this post trying to learn it ..simply unique
For the real comments, Girlie, Julie, Rob, Amanda, thanks much! I’m so glad you’ve found this useful. Let me know if you ever use it in a design! I’d love to see the final results you achieve.
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It’s a great photoshop tutorial. I thought it’s too complicated to make this design, but with the use of tools, everything becomes so simple. The gold effect of the lettering gives the its elegant look. I’ve noticed you used the design for your comments (heading). Nice look!
great tutorial, thank you.
Thanks for the tutorial, I really like the gold effect on your website title and was just wondering how you created it!
Interesting tutorial, I can see you used this in your homepage header!
Very realistic.
I like your tutorial.
Keep going.
We waiting for your tutorials
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nice little tip, didn’t realise you could do that with bevel and emboss. looks good
Very interesting. I used Bevel and Emboss too much. But I’ve never used it in this way to create a speckled effect. Really useful! keep it up.
I can see you used this in your homepage header
Im thinking to make something like this. Right now my blog title is almost invisible and it didn’t look like that in preview while i was still making it.
Very useful tutorial. I learned it first time from this post, it was very easy to understand. I think it will help other web designer as well. Keep up the good work. And thanks a lot for sharing this.
I loved this and i just ran into it this week. Thank you for sharing. I love your site, I’ve learnt loads from it and I really do appreciate your approach. I’d like to ask though, when you say “get your shape/text” what exactly do you mean? DId you type this text or is it scanned? Tried it with text I typed and it looks good but I wonder if it looks better with specific font types. Thanks.
Kiki,
Glad you liked it! Actually, that’s hand lettered. I drew it with the brush tool! I imagine it would look really good with letters that have a lot of thick and thin variation.
Fun tutorial! Many have wondered about achieving the look in your header, I’ll bet, and now they shall know.
haha same as the comments text effect=)
Nice process. It’s much better to take your time and make your work more original than to simply apply a bevel and be done. I sometimes zoom in to 400% and use the burn/dodge tool to add some shading manually.
Wow..These typography effects look exemplary. Great collection here.
Personally, i like the cleaner designs and think cleaner ones are better suited for the web unless you have some kind of a photo blog.
However, its good to add new tricks in ones Photoshop skills inventory. This post was definitely useful.
Great Post again.
First of all, thanks for your effort on this tutorial. You made it simple with screen shot and detail text below within it in a humorous way “Hey! I’m a shadow! Look at me!” (made me smile).
I normally use filter to achieve spatter effect but the main disadvantage of filter is that i have to raster the text. For other title of text i have to repeat whole step again. But this tutorial now enables me to edit text as well with spatter effect. That is very useful for me. In Bevel and emboss effect, normally designer use basic options like depth, size etc but you have shown the full capacity of bevel and emboss options to achieve this golden text effect. I wish one day CSS also support not only drop shadow but also bevel emboss so that the text with such effect can be read by google as well.
Nice golden lettering effect. I think this is not a simple affect at all but very simple proses to learn. Thanks
I have been doing designs in Adobe Photoshop and this is very new to me. I love lettering and I am grateful that you shared something new.
Nice! This was super helpful. I’ve been trying to find a good way to do gold lettering for ages. Thank you thank you.
Great Tutorial! Thank you
Aha! So that’s how it’s done? Great I was searching all weekend for guidance. I am doing a golden wedding invitation card and menu for my parents and this is exactly the effect I needed. Thanks for your tutorial.
Lauren Marie you’re not just a great blogger, you’re a good lady helping us to develop our interest. Thanks for sharing this nice and helpful tutorials.
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