Watercolor Text Effect in Photoshop

For this tutorial we will be using a canvas or paper background and Titin Script from Font Bundles.

1 – In Photoshop create a new document or open the one with the background you wish to use.

2 – Click the “Create a new fill or adjustment layer” button at bottom of the “Layers Panel” and choose “Hue/Saturation”. Give the Saturation a value of - 25.

3 – Right-click on top of your adjustment layer and select “Create Clipping Mask” to clip the layer to the canvas image.

4 – Create a new layer on top, name it “Texture” and fill it with the color of your choice. In this case we used #268596. Right-click on your “Texture” layer and make it a “Smart Object”. Make sure the background color is white in your adjustment layer.

5 – Go to Filter > Render > Clouds and hit OK.

6 – Then go to the “Filter Gallery” and apply the following filters making sure that you click the “New Layer Effect” button at the bottom right of the “Filter Gallery” menu to create a new filter every time:

Brush Strokes > Spayed Strokes: Stroke Length: 12,Spray Radius: 7, Stroke Direction: Right Diagonal.

Brush Strokes > Spatter: Spray Radius: 10, Smoothness: 5.

Artistic > Dry Brush: Brush Size: 2, Brush Detail: 8, Texture: 1.

Artistic > Underpainting: Brush Size: 40, Texture Coverage: 40, Texture: Canvas, Scaling: 100, Relief: 0, Light: Top.

Dry Brush: Brush Size: 10, Brush Detail: 10, Texture: 1.

Click OK.

7 – Go to Filter > Sharpen > Unsharp Mask and leave the values (Amount: 50%, Radius: 1.0 Pixels, Threshold: 0 Levels).

8 – Set your foreground color back to black and type your text. We used Tintin Script with a size of 230 points. Then Command/Control-click on your text layer or go to Select > Load Selection making sure you are in your text layer and click ok to select your text.

9 – Hide your text layer and select your “Texture” layer and click the “Add Layer Mask” button from the bottom of your “Layers Panel”.

10 – Select the “Brush Tool” (B) from your Toolbar, open the “Brush Panel” or go to Window > Brush and choose the Chalk 23 pixels tip. Change its settings to the following values:

Shape Dynamics:

Scattering:

Transfer:

11 – Right-click on your text layer and “Create Work Path”. Choose the “Direct Selection Tool” (A) and then “Path Operations” in your upper menu, choose “Merge Shape Components”.

12 – Select the “Texture” layer thumbnail and set the foreground color to white and choose the “Brush Tool” (B) again. Hit the “Return/Enter key” to apply the brush to the stroke and then click “A” and Return/Enter again to delete the path.

13 -Change the “Texture” layer Blend Mode to Linear Burn. Double- click on the layer to invoke the “Blending Mode” panel and apply an Inner Glow with the following values:

14 – Your text should look like this.