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How To Make Reflective Mirror Image Text Using Photoshop

Posted on 08. Jul, 2009 by Shawn Ramsey in Design

In this tutorial I will show you how to make clean Reflective Mirror Image Text. The same principal can be applied to objects (pictures) as well. I was pretty detailed when writing the tutorial, so that anyone can get the results. Let’s get started.

How To Make Reflective Mirror Image Text

Step 1

Create a new canvas in Photoshop. I chose the dimensions 500 px X 250 px.

Step 2

Type some text on the canvas. In this example I used the Lucida Bright - Demibold - 36pt -Crisp with a color of #16364b.

Step 3

We now need to Rasterize the type. To do this, right-click on the text layer and select Rasterize Type. Now, go ahead and right-click on the text layer again and choose Duplicate Layer… name the new text layer whatever you wish in the pop-up window and click OK.

You should now have three layers, a Background Layer, Text Layer, and a Text Layer Copy.

Step 4

With the duplicate copy of the text layer selected, choose Edit > Transform > Flip Vertical

You should now see something similar to the example below.

With the Flipped Text layer selected and the Move Tool selected, use the arrow keys to move the flipped text down until it is about 2 pixels below the original text, as seen below.

Step 5

With the Flipped Text layer still selected, hit the Add layer mask button as seen highlighted below.

Step 6

Still with me? Hang on, we’re almost done. Select the Gradient tool and make sure that the gradient is set from foreground to transparent, with black (#000000) set as the foreground color.

Drag upward over the text with the Gradient tool to begin the reflection (with the flipped text still selected). Start about 1/2 inch below the flipped text and drag just over the top of the right-side-up text (holding the shift button while dragging will give you a straight line). You will have to do this about 3 - 4 times to get the look you desire.

You can see below how multiple gradients start to show the reflective effect.

Step 7

Drop the Fill down to about 80% to finalize the reflective text effect. The Fill bar can be found just above the layers.

Final Image - Reflective Mirror Image Text

Here is the final product. You can play with the amount of gradients you use and the opacity to tweak the reflection however you wish.

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Tags: Photoshop