-My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

falldown · 2012-03-28 22:37:37

**This is my first Tutorial so if I make a mistake Please be kind and ask questions**
**This is just a tutorial and the settings that I am using to make this specific image**
My process can be used for not only fonts, but any shape or outline.

Here is the font I used for this Tut..
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/60081679/Purita … ttf.tar.gz

The settings can be changed for your specific needs.. so experiment!!

Step1
First off you will need to open Gimp and Create New using these settings..

Keep this layer named background and fill it with black.

Step 2
Now we need to select our Text tool.. selecting the font I provided above and use the setting here
Make sure to apply the 5.0 gap and beside Justify: select centered.. and be sure that white is selected as well

**For this Tut I decided to use a Member of the community that I think we all respect and Value**

In your text box type your chosen name, word or phrase.. once finished with your text center it by using
your Alignment Tool and merge this layer down to the black background. Should look similar to mine This will be our Bump Map.
For the Final part of step 2 we will go to Filters/Blur/Gaussian Blur and do 7 for both settings.
Should have a slight blur to your Bump Map now.

Step 3
Now we need to take our Fuzzy Select Tool (or magic wand) and we need to select our text by clicking the black area outside and the inside black areas of our Bump Map layer.
With the selection still active we will create a new transparent layer.
Now we need to select our Blend Tool and change our foreground and background colors to these.

Foreground color "cecece"
Background color "9e9e9e"
With our outline selection still active we need to go to Select/invert click to invert our selection.
Now on the newly created layer take the Blend tool and start at the top of the selection and go straight down to the bottom of the selection as shown

And it should look like this after the gradient fill with the Blend Tool

Go to Select/none and click it to remove the outline selection.

Step 4
Now we will use our Bump Map.
Still on our new layer with the Gradient gray text go to Filters/Map/Bump Map and select it.
Use these settings for the Bump Map filter
Make sure to select your original Black and White layer for the top option
Click ok and your gray text should look like this.

With some nice depth added to our text.
Lets turn off the visability our Original B/W Background layer by clicking the eye out to the side of the layer.. because we are done with it..

Step 5
This step is one of the coolest in my opinion. You get to see some of the power that Gimp has!! big_smile
Go to Color/Curves and select it.. In the Curves setting window move the slider into an S pattern as I have Click ok and now it should look like this

Now you have a really cool looking Chrome effect text and could actually stop here, but we will go a bit further big_smile

The dimensions of your project will determine what settings you use for the next 2 steps
**smaller font = lower settings / larger font = higher settings**

Step 6
Now lets duplicate our chrome text layer and turn off the visibility of the copy as we will work with it later.
Go to Layer/Transparency/Alpha to Selection which will select our text.. Now go to Select/Shrink and use 5 for the selection.
Now go to Select/Feather and use 5,000 and click ok. Finally go to Edit/Clear and click.. then Select/none.. Now This Text layer should look like this

Step 7
Now for the inside of our text.
Now we will work with our copy.
Almost the same process as step 6
Go to Layer/Transparency/Alpha to Selection and then Select/Shrink and do a selection of 7 this time around.
Now we need to Select/Invert then Select/Feather and chose 7,000 for this one.
Edit/Clear and Select/none.. now you should have this
Now lets Merge the 2 layers together and you should have this..

Step 8
This is our Final step big_smile
This is how we get our "transparent" Glass effect.
Go to Layer/Transparency/Color to Alpha.
We need to select a gray that is the middle of the gradient that we used earlier so we will select "d4d4d4" and click ok.
Low and Behold!! We now have a very cool Glass looking text!!

Have fun with this and experiment!! You can use different colors for the Gradient.. just try different settings. big_smile

Sector11 I hope you don't mind that I used you in this Tutorial big_smile

**Like I said earlier this is my first time trying to explain my techniques in Gimp so I am sorry if I left something out or if I didn't explain something well enough**

Last edited by falldown (2012-04-02 02:20:32)

VastOne · 2012-03-28 23:55:37

Awesome falldown! cool

Nice work. I have put this in the Quick References under Miscellaneous - falldown Glass Gimp Tutorial .

mrpeachy · 2012-03-29 00:43:49

thanks for this falldown
i foresee many hours of cussing at gimp ahead of me as i try this out big_smile

falldown · 2012-03-29 00:45:07

Thank you VastOne.. Perhaps my next Tut will be a little bit more organized!! big_smile

Last edited by falldown (2012-03-29 00:47:05)

falldown · 2012-03-29 00:50:42

mrpeachy wrote:

thanks for this falldown
i foresee many hours of cussing at gimp ahead of me as i try this out

lol You are welcome Peachy Sometimes you have to use the right words (this includes cussing) when talking to Gimp big_smile
If you have questions about anything just blurt them out!

johnraff · 2012-03-29 16:19:44

This looks fun!
Can't wait to give it a try. cool

falldown · 2012-03-29 18:07:17

Feel free to post anything that you create with this on the thread. It would be cool to see your creative minds at work!! big_smile

damo · 2012-03-29 20:36:20

I knew most of the workflow for the effect, but the Curves tweak is great!

falldown wrote:

Feel free to post anything that you create with this on the thread. It would be cool to see your creative minds at work!!

Great idea big_smile

Sector11 · 2012-03-29 22:58:20

OH boy! I gotta try this ... My name in a Tutorial!

Thanks Falldown. Another project for Saturday.

EDIT:

**For this Tut I selected to use a Member of the community that I think we all respect and Value**

I didn't see this earlier ... thanks for that too!

Last edited by Sector11 (2012-03-29 23:05:17)

falldown · 2012-03-29 23:17:38

Sector11 wrote:

**For this Tut I selected to use a Member of the community that I think we all respect and Value**
I didn't see this earlier ... thanks for that too!

It is my pleasure S11
I do want to see your creation when you get around to it big_smile

Sector11 · 2012-03-30 02:38:03

falldown wrote:

It is my pleasure S11
I do want to see your creation when you get around to it

Did one last mail run before bed. I will be out all day tomorrow.
This will be my first project for Saturday morning.

Xing fingers I'll do well.

falldown · 2012-03-30 02:54:31

You will get the creative juices flowing S11..
Look forward to your piece of work!!

@Damo I'm not sure if I welcomed you to the #! gang or not.. so Welcome!
The curves tool is just one of my favorites.

vicshrike · 2012-03-30 15:20:24

Astonished I stand here at the feet of this mountain of creativity, Eh..I mean great work falldown.

saneks · 2012-03-30 20:16:19

nice one.

but you forgot the keming.

Last edited by saneks (2012-03-30 20:23:08)

falldown · 2012-03-30 20:40:08

Thank you saneks

EDIT You are totally right!! I didn't space 11 properly.
Good eye saneks!!

There is a lot of different things that could be done with this technique. big_smile

Last edited by falldown (2012-03-30 20:51:40)

falldown · 2012-03-30 20:42:10

Thank you Vicshrike!!
I'm thinking of doing some more gimp tuts, depending on the feedback from this one. smile

saneks · 2012-03-30 20:49:42

no, not the perspective. the 11 have too much space while the first 1 is pretty close to the word- so it looks a bit like "sectorl l" - letters are nice, but the numbers look like L's.
just my two cents, I am a bird of a typography nerd. - but still very cool effect.

falldown · 2012-03-30 20:53:25

saneks wrote:

no, not the perspective. the 11 have too much space while the first 1 is pretty close to the word- so it looks a bit like "sectorl l" - letters are nice, but the numbers look like L's.
just my two cents, I am a bird of a typography nerd. - but still very cool effect.

You are right and I edited my above post. I completely misunderstood what you were saying. big_smile
Thank you for the positive criticism.

The 1's in the puritan font that I used look like lower case l's, but the font is cool.

Last edited by falldown (2012-03-30 21:11:29)

damo · 2012-03-30 20:58:56

And in honour of falldown big_smile ......

falldown · 2012-03-30 21:07:27

damo wrote:

And in honour of falldown ......

big_smile That is very cool !! Thank you Damo!!
Did you use the curves bend filter?
The inner shading gives it some depth.. cool beans!

damo · 2012-03-30 21:38:07

falldown wrote:

Did you use the curves bend filter?
The inner shading gives it some depth.. cool beans!

I blurred a chunky font a little, then selected and filled with white again - this softens the corners a bit.
Then select and shrink selection a bit at a time until I got the shape I wanted.
Then IWarp filter to shove/shrink/grow as desired

I was looking for a "spherical" water-drop effect using blurs to get an inner gradient for a bump map, but I'll need to keep working at it... wink

An svg editor like Inkscape is probably a better tool for this kind of thing, but that's a whole other learning curve.... (not to mention I find it a bit buggy and greedy with the cpu's on cb. It shames me to say it runs better on my machine on xp in virtualbox sad )

falldown · 2012-03-30 21:53:04

Thats a very nice design.. I would have never thought of using IWarp!
Hmmm water-drop.. Thats an interesting thought. big_smile
Thats what I was wanting to do with this thread.. You got me thinking of different methods to try out!

I use inkscape now and then and is a much more difficult tool to learn.
You can use inkscape with gimp, but it is very limited right now.
I do believe that Gimp will eventually be able to handle and create vector.

Last edited by falldown (2012-03-30 21:53:52)

falldown · 2012-03-31 02:07:29

Just a slightly different approach..

mrpeachy · 2012-03-31 17:26:29

just tried the technique out
works exactly as described and was very easy to follow!
and looks great

ill post an example when i do something more interesting

Sector11 · 2012-03-31 18:22:05

mrpeachy wrote:

just tried the technique out
works exactly as described and was very easy to follow!
and looks great
ill post an example when i do something more interesting

Well, it ain't "MrBreak-It" proof! I'm so dumb a "Dummies Guide to (insert subject)" needs to be brought down a few levels. lol

I got out my GIMP, probably a version or two behind what you guys use and in Step 7 I loose it.

As soon as I do:

Select/Shrink and do a selection of 7 this time

I loose the 'selected text' so there is nothing to 'invert' is the next action. sad

CrunchBang Linux

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#1 2012-03-28 22:37:37

-My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#2 2012-03-28 23:55:37

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#3 2012-03-29 00:43:49

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#4 2012-03-29 00:45:07

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#5 2012-03-29 00:50:42

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#6 2012-03-29 16:19:44

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#7 2012-03-29 18:07:17

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#8 2012-03-29 20:36:20

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#9 2012-03-29 22:58:20

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#10 2012-03-29 23:17:38

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#11 2012-03-30 02:38:03

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#12 2012-03-30 02:54:31

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#13 2012-03-30 15:20:24

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#14 2012-03-30 20:16:19

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#15 2012-03-30 20:40:08

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#16 2012-03-30 20:42:10

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#17 2012-03-30 20:49:42

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#18 2012-03-30 20:53:25

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#19 2012-03-30 20:58:56

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#20 2012-03-30 21:07:27

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#21 2012-03-30 21:38:07

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

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Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

#23 2012-03-31 02:07:29

Re: -My Glass Gimp Tutorial-

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