shadows

Shadows

In the previous tutorial on making square fruit I mentioned that in a future tutorial I would show how I added the shadow behind the square apple. Well folks here it is.
In this tutorial I will show you the techniques of adding a shadow behind an object. This is very useful in adding to the realism of your projects. While there are several filters on the market that you can buy that accomplish the same thing, it is always good to know how to do it the old fashioned way. Fire up Photoshop and lets get started.
1. Alright select the image you want to use and extract it from its background so that it is on its own layer. I am using another apple that I made square.
2. Now create a duplicate layer of the object you want to put a shadow behind by dragging the layer with your extracted object to the new layer icon .
3. Set your background color to Black by pressing the “D” key and then the swap arrows in the right hand corner. Now make sure you have your object layer selected not the copy and press Ctrl+Shift+Delete Mac:Cmd+Shift+Del . This will fill only where there are pixels.

4. Now I like to lower the opacity of this layer to around 50% while I manipulate the shadow so it looks more like a shadow. Go to the Edit menu and select Free Transform.
5. Manipulate the handles (the boxes on the points of the square) until your shadow falls where you want it to be. Look at my example below to get the idea.
6. Now that shadow still looks really harsh. We know that shadows in real life do not look like that so lets soften it a bit. Go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur. I set mine to around 30 to achieve my effect but you’ll have to play with the amount depending on your image.
7. Now you have created a simple shadow effect.