Transcripts
1. Introduction: Hey everyone. I'm Pritika and I'm a graphic designer and illustrator from India. Welcome to today's class; Create High Quality Shadow Mock-ups. When I was starting out, one of the biggest problems I faced was I [inaudible] my technical skills and I knew what to do though end product would never end up looking so great. If I was to revisit what the problem was, it all came down to one thing; presentation skills. In today's class, we will learn how to present our designs better using high-quality shadow mock-ups. This style of mock-ups has been trending since a few years. Not only does it look stunning, it also ends up adding depth to your design and makes it easier to visualize the final product. We will be learning how to create this from scratch, which means how to find resources, how to work with shadows, how to make your mock-up look authentic, and more. This class is meant for both beginners and pros at Adobe Photoshop, anyone who's looking to up their presentation skills. I'm really happy. Let's get started.
2. Making Your Background: Now that you guys already know, let's get started. I have Photoshop open and I'm going to begin by creating 2000 by 1400 pixel document. This would be at 72 PPI and RGB color mode. Most presentations that I end up making are landscape and the same works across format, but still gives me enough margin to crop the picture if needed. Let's start. Now our first step is to add a background. We will choose something which has a slight bit of texture, so that it ends up adding more visual value to your mockup. We also doesn't take away from your branding. I'm just going to quickly show you some examples of these. Here is this beautiful vintage paper texture that I found on Shutterstock. It's got just a slight bit of green and I absolutely love it. We can also use something like this, a marble textured background. Again, it ends up looking really luxurious. But it doesn't really take away from your branding elements. In case you don't want to end up spending money and buying something from Shutterstock, you can also use some pictures from Unsplash and reject them a little and use them as a background. Again, going to quickly show you some examples. Here's this really really pretty picture and if you were to just clean out this center bar, so you will get a nice uniform textured background. Unsplash honestly has these really nice colored background pictures and I would really recommend you to explore and try and find something that works for you. Again, really nice, really clean.This is also beautiful, but this still doesn't really have that paper texture, but it's worth to try. Here is another one. The blue is so nice and saturated and it has a bit shadows and textures. These end up looking a better than just having one uniform color. Now, I'm going to show you how we can rigid these pictures. Then, I'll go back to Photoshop and I have my Unsplash picture downloaded, so I'm just going to place it. Now I'm going to clean the center part using the content aware tool. I'm going to quickly rasterize it and I'm just going to select this roughly using the Lasso Tool. Once you have your loop selected, simply go to edit, fill, and just hit content aware. This might end up taking a minute or two based on the size of your picture, wait let's see the magic, and we have a nice clean background which we can use. You might want to change the color of the scene. There are two ways to do this. One is by changing either the hue saturation or the second is by changing the appearance by adding a second layer. I'm going to show you how we do both. Now, in order to change the hue saturation, we're going to create an adjustment layer. To do this, just go to your bottom right corner and click on this tiny half-full circle. Over here you have options and we're just going to click on hue saturation. Now, this bar will open and you can play around and see what kind of a color you want. Say like I want a nice light blue, maybe something like this. You can also try playing around with the saturation and the lightness and just see what works for you. Now, in case you want a beep saturated color and you feel that that isn't really coming through, through the hue saturation, the second way to change your background color is to simply add a layer on top and play with the appearance. I'm just going to close this, I'm going to make a new layer by choosing this icon in the bottom right and I'm going to fill it using the bucket tool. You can choose your color from over here. Now in this case, I already have a color selected. I'm just going to hit G or the paint bucket tool and click on my bowl. Now, I'm just going to start playing with the appearance. I really like this final texture that I haven't hard light. Again, I can try playing with the color a bit more and seeing what it looks like. I actually like the previous one better. These are the two ways you can change your background colors. I have also included links for all of these in the project and resources section, so don't forget to check that out. Okay guys, so now our background is ready. We can always go back later and change the colors in case we feel it doesn't really go with our elements. In our next video, we will begin by making our branding elements.
3. Making Elements: Moving on to our next step, which is to create our branding elements. When you end up taking a project, let's say inwards branding or logo design, the best way to showcase them is by showcasing them on different mediums, such as a visiting card or an A4 paper, just so that the client can easily visualize how they look. Now, in this case, let's begin by creating two such elements, which is a A4 order letter paper and a visiting card. You would begin by creating a rectangle, which is the size of a A4 sheet. I am going to go to the Shape tool, and I'm simply going to click on the screen, so that this bag opens. Over here, I'm going to enter the size of a A4 paper, which is 8.5 inches by 11 inches. I'm just going to press ''Okay''. I'm just going to make the color of white. This is my A4 sheet. Now over here, I'm going to just quickly convert this into a Smart Object. Why? I'll explain later. This is my first element. But it ends up looking really flat. Now we are going to add a texture in Adobe and and we're going to add drop shadow. Given this is paper, it will have a paper texture to it. Again, I'm just going to show you some quick textures I found online that can be used for this. We have these 12 free paper textures by this amazing designer. I have included the link for the same in the projector resources section, but do check it out. They are completely free to download and then you can use them as required. I also really liked this texture I found on Shutterstock. Again, the link is there, which we can use. Alternatively, you can also find some paper texture on a site like freepik and use them. I'm going to go back to Photoshop and I'm going to place my paper textures over here. In this case, I'm just going to use the Shutterstock texture I found, and simply going to scale it. Now, I'm going to press ''Control'' on top of my rectangle, to select what was in the layer which in this case is our A4. I'm simply going to click ''Command J'' or ''Control J'' on my paper texture layer to make a duplicate of it in the same size. I'm now going to hit ''Multiply'' and reduce the opacity. This ends up adding a little more authenticity to your design. Now, we move on to the next step, which is to create our drop shadows. I'm simply going to select my rectangle, take a new leaf, and fill this with black color. I'm going to press ''Command D'' to de-select, and now I'm going to add a Gaussian Blur Width. Go to ''Filter'', ''Blur'', ''Gaussian Blur,'' and simply make this say 15 pixels. Once this is done, I'm going to move this below my mean paper layer. As you can see, it now has a shadow [inaudible] to all directions, whereas I just wanted two. I'm going to simply use the Arrow keys and shift this downloads insidewards. You can also reduce the size. Hit ''Command T'' or ''Control D'' just to reduce the size of it. Now, I'm going to change the appearance to my reply mode. I'm going to reduce the fill. Maybe like a [inaudible] person. My shadow is created. It was as simple as that. Simply select all these layers by hitting ''Command'' and then selecting all your layers and just press ''Command G'' to make a group. Again, using the same method, I am going to create a visiting card. Visiting cards are only 3.5 inches by 2 inches. Sometimes in such cases when the background is stuffed, the shadow ends up not being that prominent. You can also create a second shadow and just change the blending mode to make it a bit more prominent. I'm going to hit ''Command J'' or ''Control J'' to duplicate this layer. I'm going to simply change the mode to Color Burn to make it a lot darker as you just saw. Again, I can just reduce the size a little to make it less prominent. Again, can play with the fill, in case I want to increase the shadow or decrease it. But now my branding elements are ready. Now guys, let's move on to the next video where you would learn how to create our shadows on the top of these elements.
4. Adding Shadows: So now let's move on to the third step which is to add our shadows. Again, we're going to use pictures of the internet to create our own shadows. To find pictures for this, I would again recommend you can check out on splash and freepik. I found this really, really pretty picture on freepik. The background's really plain so it'll be easy for me to select the leaves, and I love the redundant bunching below so I feel like this would end up creating a really nice shadow. Alternatively, you can also use something like this. Again, the leaves, it'll be easy to select and we can use them to create our shadow. So now let's go to Photoshop and do this. I'm simply going to select my leaf image, I'm just going to drag it to this bar to open it in a new file. Now, I'm going to select my monstera leaves. Now, the quickest way to do this is by either the Magic Wand Tool or the Quick Selection Tool. I'm going to first try it for the Magic Wand Tool and simply hit the background. But then it's not a very smooth selection. So maybe I should do this with the Quick Selection Tool instead. So I'm going to hit command D to deselect and then shift to work with the Quick Selection Tool. Now, over here you have three options where this is the normal, this is add to selection, and this is minus from selection. I like to work from add to selection and I'm just going to quickly start selecting my monstera leaves. All you have to do is click the mouse and just drag it over the picture over the area you want selected. So now given that this yellow area is also selected and I don't want it, I'm going to simply click on this and drag my mouse a little by little till it's not. Now that my selection's done, I'm going to go open a new layer. I'm going to simply hit the paint bucket tool. Just make sure that the color you fill is not a black. It can be like a dark gray and I'm now going to hit command D. So now this becomes my shadow. Now I'm going to take this to my Mockup layer, so I'm going to simply right-click on this layer, hit on duplicate layer, and from the drop-down menu choose my original file. I'm now going to slightly reduce the size so that it fits my frame like this, and now I'm going to make another copy. So now this is my initial copy which I am keeping just in case I end up messing something, I have this as a backup. Now [inaudible] I'm going to simply apply my Gaussian blur. I'm going to change my mode to multiply and reduce the fill and my shadow is ready. Now in case you want to add a little more contrast, you can again, just make a duplicate and change the color mode to color burn instead but that's entirely up to you. So guys our Mockup is now ready. You can also experiment and try different leaves or say different shapes like rectangles or something and see what shadows you want to go with. I'm going to show you two other options for this. So you notice that [inaudible] that you're talking about, again, I selected it, I brought in and I created my shadow. I also found this really nice image of shutterstock which was like a bouquet of leaves and this can also be used to create a shadow like this. So now that our shadows are created, let's move on to our next and final step, which is to add up artwork.
5. Adding Your Design: So guys let's move on to the best part. So now that our mock-up is ready, let's start pasting our designs in it. So I'm going to go to my A-4 and remember how I asked you to make your rectangle a smart object, so the reason I did this was, as soon as you double-click on this, your rectangle opens as a new file, and all edits you make over here get reflected in your mock-up document. So essentially you can keep using your mock up again and again and every time you just need to replace your design in your rectangle smart object and you're sorted so I'll begin by placing my design in this. I'm just going to scale this. I've just hit control S and then you go back to your other document and you will see the change has already reflected over here. So how we finished our A-4, we're just going to quickly finish visiting card like this. So I'm going to quickly open my layers and again, I'm just going to double-click on my rectangle, go to Illustrator, bring in my design and simply hit Command V. Command S and as you can see, it's already reflected. So now that you have your basics sorted, you can play around. You can add or remove as many elements as you want. Experiment with sizes and just sort of see what works for you. So in this case [inaudible] back of the invitation also so I have created that also and as you can see, I did the same thing. I created a rectangle, made it into a smart object, added my shadows, et cetera and there you go, my composition is ready.
6. Wrapping Up: Using the above steps, you can create all different kind of markup of just who will do whatever you are showcasing in that particular Markup. In this case, because our showcasing a squared artwork I had made, I decided to use a squared peace of paper. You might be wondering how I made these shadows. You can make this knifing geometric. We know sorrow shadows may easily, all you have to do is make a fresh layer in Photoshop and simply fill it a color in their designing one. In this case, I sort of wonder to suffer shadow across the [inaudible] space , which is why i decided to make this. Then all you have to do is repeat this test, which is make two copies, one and multiply mode, and one and collarbone mode of motion block. You can see now if you want to add a little more drama to your presentation, another way to do this is by doing this. Violates are normal markup that we do.The only thing is that all the elements that we have used have window dated at around 40 degrees to create a bit more intrigue to make the design a little more fun. Now for your class, assignment, you have to choose any one of your designs or R-tool. Create a markup specially for it, you can choose to upload the step-by-step procedure in your class project alone with the resources you use, or you can simply upload your final project. I really cannot wait to see what you come up with in case you have any questions or you want to discuss anything, all you have to do is go to the community section, and you can do so. If you like the class, please takeout two-minute leave me a review, so that other people can also find out about my class. Thank you so much. It was wonderful teaching you bye.
Krittika Mittal, Graphic Designer
