04.07.2016 27.01.2018

In this tutorial you will learn how to create flat flat social media icons.

What you will create:

To create flat icons, we will start with the background, then we will add effects to the icons to give them originality, then we will draw long shadows. To repeat this tutorial, you will need Photoshop CS3 or later.

Resources:

• Font 1 - http://fontawesome.io/cheatsheet/
• Font 2 - http://fontawesome.io/

Step 1

Create a new file (Ctrl + N) size 500 × 400 pixels.

Create a new group (CTRL+G) and name it "Background".

Step 2

Fill the background color # e7e9ea by using Bucket Tool.

Step 3

To add more effects to the background, we'll add a gradient. Click on the icon Adjustment Layer and select Gradient (Gradient), use the following settings:

Layer blend mode Soft light (Soft Light) | Opacity: 25%

Step 4

Create a new group and name it "symbols".

Step 5

Before we get started, we need to set up the menu Rulers And Grids (Rulers and Grids). Go to menu View-Rulers (View- Rulers) And View-Show-Grids (View— Show— Grids) . Here are my settings for Rulers and Grids(they can be opened by going to Edit-Preferences:

To create Guide line, you just need to click and drag it from the ruler. To create a vertical guide, drag from the vertical ruler and vice versa. This is how I divided the canvas (each icon is equal to 50 × 50 pixels and the distance between each icon 25 pixels):

Step 6

In this tutorial we are working with the Awesome font, you can add custom icons for your website. Typically this is done by placing a CSS font on your site, but since we're working with Photoshop, we'll need to copy each icon you want to use from the cheat sheet. Go to the page, select the icon you would like to draw. I used icons for the following ( social media) sites: Twitter; facebook; Tumblr; Google+;Instagram; YouTube; Twitch; Dropbox; DeviantArt; Pinterest; Skype; Feed.

Step 7

Once you've found the icon you'd like to use, copy it ( Select it then right click-Copy)

Then go back to Photoshop and select Text tool (TextTool) on the toolbar. Change the font settings as shown in the picture:

Now paste the icon you just copied. ( Right Click-Paste)

Step 8

Repeat the previous step until you have inserted all the icons you would like to use.

Step 9

Create a new group and rename it “icon bg”, place the group below the “symbols” group.

Step 10

Create a new layer and place it in the group created in the previous step. I renamed the layer to "icon bg".

Step 11

Using the tool Rectangle with rounded corners (RectangularCircle Shape Tool)(located in the toolbar below Text Tool) I created the background of the icons,

Here are all the colors I used:
Twitter: # 6bd1f4;
Facebook: # 5a93cb;
Tumblr: # 3c6a9c;
Google +:# e44940;
Instagram:# 9bd29d;
Youtube:# f4504c;
Twitch:# a96db6;
Dropbox:# 81d5ed;
Deviantart:# 6e8e61;
Pinterest:# f25f5f;
Skype:# 67d5f4;
Feed:# e9951d;

You can use these colors, or you can use colors at your discretion - this way the work will acquire originality.

If you don't like the look of rounded rectangles, you can choose a different shape, such as a square or circle. To make a perfect circle or square, remember to hold SHIFT key at the moment of their creation.

Step 12

If you're happy with the results at this point, you can move on, but if you want to add some life to the icons, let's continue making improvements. Let's start with layer style Shadow (Drop Shadow). Open the "symbols" group, select one of the icons and click the icon Fx-Shadow (Fx-Drop Shadow)

Step 13

Repeat the previous step with the remaining icons. To make your work much easier, click right-click on the layer - Copy Layer Style. Then select the remaining icon layers, click right-click-Paste Layer Style.

Step 14

Now let's add inner shadow to the background of each icon. Open the “icons bg” group, select the layer with the icon, click on the icon Fx-Inner shadow (Fx-InnerShadow) . Use the following options:

Step 15

Create a new layer and name it "Gloss Effect". Change the foreground color to # ffffff; and with the help Rectangular Marquee Tool create some rectangles half the size of the icons (approx. 50x25 pixels). Do this for all icons.

Then change blending mode to Soft Light, reduce Opacity layer up 20% , A fill before 80% .

Step 16

Turn off the visibility of the "Gloss Effect" layer. Create a new layer and name it "Long Shadow". This step is a little more complicated compared to the rest of the effects. Place a new layer below the "Gloss Effect" layer.

Step 17

Take Polygonal Lasso Tool and start creating a rectangular shadow by touching the icon's edge on the bottom right side only, then make a diagonal line until it reaches the bottom right edge of the icon's background, make a straight line until it reaches the center of the background, then connect the lines. In the image you can see more clearly how to draw a long shadow.

Step 18

Last step! Reduce Opacity shadow layer to 10% , And fill (Fill) before 0% .

Now Click on the Fx icon and select Overlaycolors (ColorOverlay). Use the following options:

Now select Overlaygradient (GradientOverlay) and use these settings:

Final results:

Everyone knows that a standard computer keyboard has a little more
hundreds of keys, which means it cannot display all the characters that
used by humans in everyday life. But not everyone knows that
in addition to entering the characters that we see on
your keyboard, Windows allows you to use other symbols as well. For example:

But
despite the fact that these (and many other) symbols are not on
keyboard, we can very easily use them when typing our
texts. Let's try to do this...
Let's assume the simplest option - we type text in Notepad ( Start - All Programs - Accessories - Notepad) and we need to insert a copyright symbol into the text:

In order to do this we need to open the so-called Symbol table, which exists in operating system Windows. It's very easy to do this: Start - All Programs - Accessories - System Tools - Character Table.
A table of symbols will open in front of us Unicode, in which we need to find the symbol we need:

After this, you need to click on this symbol with the left mouse button, then press the button Choose and a button Copy:

This will copy the selected symbol to the clipboard.

After this, the symbol we need will appear in the text:

As you can see, there is nothing difficult about this! This is the simplest and most understandable (on
my opinion) method, although you can slightly change the order of actions and
enter characters without opening Symbol table. To do this, you just need to know a certain key combination.
The fact is that in Windows, many characters are assigned a unique code, which is entered using the key Alt.
For example, to enter the same copyright symbol you need to press the key combination Alt+0169, i.e. press (and hold) a key Alt, then press the number keys 0 , 1 , 6 And 9 .
Please note that when the key is pressed Alt
numbers on the main keyboard field can be blocked, and therefore, for
To enter numbers, you can use an additional keyboard field
(having previously turned it on with the key NumLock

You can see which key combination corresponds to the selected symbol in the lower right corner Symbol tables:

If you use some symbols constantly, then I
I recommend creating a reminder for yourself (a table with a description of often
codes used) and print it on a printer. For example, like this:

But keep in mind that not every symbol from the table has a similar
combination and therefore some characters must be entered as described above
way.
To make it easier for you to find the desired symbol in the table,
you can use additional options and view
symbols by groups.
To do this, check the box Extra options and then select the desired options in the fields Character set And Grouping. For example, this figure shows how you can display only numeric characters:

Or, for example, we can display only the one that is convenient for us Windows encoding"Cyrillic":

Well, in conclusion, I would like to note that some programs have a built-in ability to insert special characters.
For example, in the menu Word programs can choose Insert - Symbol(photo from Word 2010):

This greatly speeds up your typing, because... there is no need to resort to the Windows symbol table.

Very often they ask the question of how to insert specials while in Windows (whether in Word, Notepad or Photoshop - it doesn’t matter). symbols?

For the uninitiated, I’ll explain just in case: special. symbols are various icons and symbols, such as a copyright (©), or a degree (5²) or a fraction (¼). All these are special characters.

So here it is. Let's say you need to put the fraction ¼. How to do this? And it's very easy to do!

How to insert a special character in Photoshop or any other program

And so, first of all, let’s look at what kind of symbols and special symbols exist. To do this, open the symbol table.

It is located here: Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Character Table

The following window opens in front of you: In which you can see various symbols. Select the symbol that interests you and in the lower right corner (indicated by a blue circle) a keyboard shortcut for inserting this symbol will appear.

On this moment the copyright symbol © is selected and, accordingly, to insert it you need to do the following: Click Alt key and holding it on the numeric keypad (the one with the arrows, see the picture below) type the number 0169, then release alt. That's all!

Please note that non-standard fonts may not support special characters. Also in the special characters viewing window, you can view which Fonts support which characters. To do this, simply select the font you want at the top of the window!

For most users of the Word application, this issue is resolved very simply. In text Word editor press “Insert” -> “Symbol”. A window will appear in which you can select symbols. When you click the "Insert" button, they will automatically appear in the main field of the text editor.

Basics of working with the tools of the Text group in Photoshop: control panel, settings, functions and capabilities.

The group is located on the toolbar under the button with the letter “T”. Open it in any way:

• by clicking on the black lower right corner of the icon;
• by right-clicking on the icon

You can activate Text by pressing the T key (Russian E) on the keyboard. And it doesn’t matter what keyboard layout is at the moment. While holding down the Shift key, pressing the "T" key several times will alternately activate all four tools in this group.

Fig.1. Text tool group

Everything here is intuitive.

1. Horizontal – to create the usual recording in a horizontal position.
2. Vertical – places the inscription from top to bottom.
3. and 4. Create quick masks with horizontal and vertical selection.

The horizontal direction is used most often.

Text tool group control panel

When the tool is active, the top control panel looks like this:

Fig.2. Top toolbar Text

IN Photoshop versions CS6 introduced a Font menu containing several options for settings. This will be discussed in another article. Now let's look at the settings of the top control panel.

Attention! It is better to set all the settings of the top panel for the Text tools in Photoshop before typing the inscription. But you can make changes later by first selecting the text or part of it that needs to be changed.

• Above number 1 Fig. 2 – saving parameters. A very convenient feature to save installed settings(name of the font, its size, etc.) if you have to return to them periodically or before rasterizing the text layer.

Click on the small arrow to open the window. Select “New set of parameters for tool. A second window opens where you can set a name for the parameter. Click OK. The editor remembers the settings.

Fig.3. Saving text parameters in Photoshop

A new line appears in the list. For clarity, in the previous step the name “Example of a new save” was entered.

Fig.4. Saved Settings

Now, to set on the panel all the values ​​that were there when saving, you need to click on this line.

To delete a line, right-click on it and select delete.

• Above the number 2, Fig. 2 – change text orientation. Pressing the button with the letter T and arrows - the direction of the inscription changes from horizontal to vertical and back. Don't forget that this text layer must be active in the Layers palette.
• Above the number 3, Fig. 2 – font typeface. Clicking the arrow button opens the entire list of fonts available on your computer. You can select the one you need from the list or enter it into the window manually, then press Enter.
• Above the number 4 Fig. 2 – font style. The arrow button opens a list of styles that the selected font supports. If the button is inactive, then the selected font supports only one suggested style.
• Above button 5 Fig. 2 – font size, aka Kegl. The drop-down list offers options from 6 to 72 pixels. You can enter any of your values ​​into the window manually, then press Enter. It is enough to enter only numbers, and the editor will insert the letters “pt” automatically.

You can select the size like this: move the cursor to the left of the window when it looks like a finger with arrows, hold down with the left mouse and drag to the right to increase the size or to the left to decrease it. The digital value in the window will change. As soon as you release the mouse, the text size will change.

• Above the number 6 Fig. 2 – font style. Clicking this button opens a list of styles that the selected font supports: italic, bold, bold... Not all fonts support full list styles, so there may be a different number of options. If the button is not active, then the selected font supports only one suggested style.
• Above the number 7 Fig. 2 – text alignment on one side or in the center. The buttons work the same way as in Word document. The settings are in the Paragraph panel. Read about it below.
• Above the number 8, Fig. 2 – color selection. The box shows the color that will be applied to the text. You can change it by clicking on this window and selecting any other one in the palette that opens. If the text has already been entered, then it must first be selected.
• Above the number 9 Fig. 2 – text deformation. Click on this button, then open the styles and we have various deformation options. Experiment.

Fig.5. Warping text

• Above the number 10, Fig. 2 – opens/closes Character, Paragraph panels. More about this.

Character, Paragraph panels

The Character and Paragraph panels open in Photoshop using the button on the top control panel or on the right panel. If they are not on the right panel, turn on the Window menu along the way - select Symbol or Paragraph. The corresponding icons appear on the right panel. If they are both selected, two icons of the same group will appear, but when you open either of them, there will be two tabs in the window for convenient switching between these panels.

Attention! The Character panel, when working with the tools of the Text group, has priority over the Paragraph panel.

Fig.6. Character, Paragraph panels

Symbol panel

Some of the settings on this tab duplicate the functions of the top control panel and have already been discussed. Let's not repeat it. The values ​​in them will be set to the same ones that you set in the top panel - font, its size, etc.

The rest are indicated in Figure 6 above:

1. Line spacing. Defines the spacing between lines.
2. Kerning to adjust the distance between two characters. For example, out of the entire text, only two characters need to be brought closer or further away from each other. Place the cursor between them, open the list and select the right option, or enter it into the window manually.
3. Character spacing to set the distance between text characters.
4. The vertical scale for increasing/decreasing the height of characters is set as a percentage. Enter the number into the box manually. You don't have to put the % sign; Photoshop will put it in automatically as soon as you press Enter.
5. The horizontal scale stretches/compresses the stitching. Just like the previous parameter, it is entered as a percentage.
6. Baseline offset. A convenient function when introducing mathematical formulas and other notations with superindex and subindex. It allows you to raise/lower part of a line or word. This part must first be selected. Enter the value into the window manually. The next line provides similar opportunities – pseudo-parameters.
7. Pseudo-parameters. The font settings in this line are clearly visible - bold, italics, capitalized text, etc.
8. Ligatures, that is, symbols that are obtained by merging several letters or characters, that is, combining them into one character. Very rarely used. Only those that support the selected font will be active.
9. Opens a list of languages ​​for spell checking.

Paragraph panel

Setting paragraph parameters such as indentation, wrapping, etc.

Fig.7. Paragraph panel

In the first line, the first three buttons are duplicated from the top control panel. They have already been discussed. The remaining buttons will most likely be inactive. The next three buttons on this line are designed to align the bottom line of text, and the last one is to align the entire width.

The second block has three windows where you can set in pixels the indents from the right or left edges and the indent of the first line.

The third block indicates indents before or after the paragraph

In the next block, automatic stitching is enabled/disabled.

Use the Glyphs panel to insert punctuation, superscripts, subscripts, currency symbols, numbers, special characters, and glyphs from other languages ​​into text in Photoshop.

To open the panel, select Text > Panels > Glyphs or Window > Glyphs.

Glyphs panel

A. Recently Used Glyph Slots | B. Selecting a font family | C. Selecting a style | D. Selecting a font category | E. Glyph Slots | F. Zoom out | G. Zoom control | H. Zoom in | I. Zooming out glyphs | J. Zooming in on glyphs |

• To change the glyph in the active text layer, follow these steps:
  1. Select where to insert the glyph using the Text tool.
  2. Double-click a glyph in the Glyphs panel.
• The Glyphs panel supports Latin, Greek and Cyrillic alphabet. Limited support Hebrew, Arabic and other complex scripts such as Indian.

• For each font, the glyphs are organized into different categories, such as Basic Latin, Extended Latin A, Extended Latin B, Numerals, Currencies, Symbols, and many more.
• Glyphs are also organized by which OpenType features they support, such as: Alternates, Ornaments, Extended Ligatures, Numerators, Denominators, Style Sets, Monospace Digits, Ordinal Numbers, and a lot others.

A. Font category | B. Script | C. OpenType Features

• The Glyphs panel automatically finds alternatives for the first selected character in a piece of text.
• Glyph slots with a solid black rectangle in the lower right corner indicate that there are options for that particular glyph. These options can be viewed in the pop-up menu. To open it, click and hold a slot, or Alt- or Option-click it. Drag the mouse pointer over a glyph variant and release it to paste it into the active layer.

Glyph slot with a solid black rectangle in the lower right corner

Glyph options

Glyph Details

• The slider at the bottom of the dialog box allows you to increase or decrease the size of the glyphs in the panel.
• The Font menu is an expanded menu containing the same items found in the Character and Options panels. However, font search is not supported.
• When multiple fonts are in a selection on a Text layer, the Character, Options, and Glyphs panels do not display the font.
• You can work with the Glyphs panel without initializing a text layer.

As you add glyphs to your document, they are automatically added to the recently used glyphs row at the top of the Glyphs panel. Recently used glyph string:

• can contain up to 25 various characters. When the 25 character limit is exceeded, new glyphs are added to the left and previous glyphs are removed from the right.
• contains the same characters. The symbols do not change when the program is launched at different times.
• preserves the style of the glyph and does not take into account its style in the Options, Character, and Glyphs panels.
• determines the point size, color, and other values ​​of the glyph according to those in the Character and Options panels.