Why do you love the holidays? Is it because you get to spend time with your family, eat like crazy, open gifts, buy gifts, or to create some awesome text using Photoshop? Well, for me, it is all of the above <grin>. I love the holiday season, it brings out the best is everyone. For this tutorial, I will show you how to create some really cool candy cane text using Adobe Photoshop. I currently use CS4, but you could get this done in CS2, or CS3. Enjoy!

Step One

Open up Photoshop and create a new document that is 10px wide, by 1 pixel high. Zoom all the way in, and make half of the document red (#ff0000), and the other half white (#ffffff).

This is my zoomed in document.

Step Two

Turn this document into a pattern. Go to edit > define pattern and create a name for it.

Step Three

Create a new document with your desired size. For this example, I used 500 width x 100 height.

Step Four

In your new document, go to edit > fill. In the drop down choose pattern and then choose the candy cane pattern.

You will have this:

Step Five

You want to extend the height of this and hit control-t and then extend the top and bottom like so:

To make life easy, hit alt and shift before you make the background bigger. This will make like easier.

Step Six

Now you want to create the angle on this, so while you are still in transform, click on the middle box on the top or bottom, hit control + alt + shift and drag the mouse to the left (or right).
(click image for full view)

Step Seven

Click on your Text Icon and create new text.

It is hard to tell, my text is in white, and it says Candy Cane Text. Make sure the text layer is on top of the red stripes.

Step Eight

On your text layer, go to layer > layer styles > blending options…
Use the following options on your text layer.

Blending Options: Custom

Drop Shadow

Inner Glow

Bevel and Emboss

Gradient Overlay

You will not have this:

Step Nine

Now you want to create the red stripes that are outside of the candy cane text. To do this, hold control and hit the text layer.

Then go to Select > Inverse or hit shift + control + I.

Select the layer with the red stripe and hit delete on your keyboard.

Step Ten

Create a new layer on the bottom and add your background color or image.

You are now finished.

I used this effect on my person logo.

HELP SPREAD THE WORD!

Related Posts

• Tutorial: Create realistic grass in Photoshop.
• Tutorial: The game of pool – The Ball!
• Tutorial: Make yourself look thinner!
• Tutorial: ‘Press’ your text into the background.