Grunge Valentine's Design

Resources:

Grunge Texture from stock.xchng

BenBlogged Grunge Brushes from benblogged.com

Solid Ink Splatter Brushes from qbrushes.net

Jellyka Castle’s Queen Font from dafont.com

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This will be the finished result:

Click on the image for full size view

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Open a new file 1500 x 1500, 72px resolution

Open the Grunge Texture

Image>Image Size – set the width to 1500px, auto height, click OK

Select>All

Edit>Copy (Ctrl + C)

Make your project active

Edit>Paste (Ctrl + V)

Reduce the layer opacity to around 60%

Create a new layer

Select the Custom Shape Tool

Select Heart Card shape

Foreground colour is not important as we will be adding a gradient overlay

Drag out a heart, then using the Move Tool, move it to the centre of  the canvas

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the following Gradient Overlay and Bevel & Emboss settings:

Create a new layer

Select the Brush Tool and the BenBlogged Grunge brush set

Set foreground colour to black

Using a selection of the brushes and reducing the size of each, apply a grunge effect over the heart – don’t worry about going over the edges of the heart

Duplicate the layer

Ctrl + T to transform the object and rotate the new layer and move it as required:

Right click on the top layer in the layers palette and click on Merge Down

Ctrl + Click on the thumbnail of the heart layer in the layers palette to select the pixels

Make the grunge brush layer active

Select>Inverse

Hit the delete key

Reduce the layer opacity to around 75%

Turn off the visibility of all other layers except the heart and the grunge effect layers, right click on either of the visible layers and click Merge Visible

Create a new layer

Select the Custom Shape Tool

Select Arrow 3 shape

Click on the small arrowhead as shown below and apply these settings:

Click once on your canvas to produce a large black arrow

Duplicate the layer twice (so you have 3 arrow layers)

Turn off the visibility of the 2 copies and make the original arrow layer active

Using the eraser tool or your preferred method, erase the arrowhead and flight

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the following Gradient Overlay settings:

Restore visibility to the first arrow copy layer

Using the Eraser Tool or your preferred method, erase everything but the arrowhead

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the following Gradient Overlay and Bevel & Emboss settings:

Restore visibility to the second arrow copy layer

Using the Eraser Tool or your preferred method, erase everything but half of the flight as shown below:

Duplicate the layer

Ctrl + T to transform the object

Right click in the box and click on Flip Vertical

Move this half to line up with the original:

Right click on the layer and click on Merge Down

Create a new layer

Select the Rectangular Marquee tool and apply the following settings:

Click once on the canvas to create a selection

Fill the selection with any colour

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the following Gradient Overlay settings:

Create a new layer

Turn off the visibility of all layers except the rectangle and empty layer

Right click on either of the visible layers and click on Merge Visible

Restore visibility to all layers

Duplicate the rectangle layer

Ctrl + T to transform the object

Right click in the box and click on Flip Vertical

Move the rectangle below the original

Press the Enter Key to accept the transformation

Select the Move Tool and using the arrow keys, line the two rectangles up perfectly:

Right click on the top layer and click on Merge Down

Reduce the opacity of the layer so you can see the black flight underneath it

Ctrl + T to transform the object and reduce the size so it fits nicely on the flight:

Press the Enter Key to accept the transformation

Ctrl + Click on the thumbnail of the black flight layer to select the pixels

Make the rectangle layer active

Select>Inverse

Hit the Delete Key

Restore the visibility to 100% and delete the black flight layer

Select the Eraser Tool and a soft round brush, size 27

Reduce the Flow to around 36%

Make the flight layer active and erase where the flight meets the arrow:

Make the arrowhead layer active and repeat as above:

Turn off the visibility to all layers that don’t make up the arrow

Right click on any visible layer and click on Merge Visible

Restore visibility to all layers

Make the arrow layer active

Select the Rectangular Marquee Tool

Drag out a rectangle that selects about half of the arrow

Edit>Cut

Edit>Paste

Make the flight-half of the arrow layer active

Ctrl + T to transform the object

Rotate and move it to the desired position

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the following Drop Shadow settings:

Drag the arrowhead layer below the heart layer

Ctrl + T to transform the object

Rotate and move it to the desired position

Create a new layer above the heart layer and below the flight-end of the arrow layer

Select the Ellipse Tool and drag out a small ellipse as shown below:

Ctrl + T to transform the object

Rotate and move the ellipse into place as shown below:

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the following Bevel & Emboss settings:

Make the flight-end of the arrow layer active

Select the Eraser Tool and a soft round brush, size 27px

Round off the end of the arrow:

Create a new layer above the background texture layer

Set foreground colour to red #AE2727

Select the Brush Tool, Solid Ink Splatter (675 pixels) brush set

Apply splatters as required around the heart

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the default Bevel & Emboss settings:

Right click on any layer and click on Merge Visible

Select the Text Tool and Jellyka Castle’s Queen Font, size 250pt, foreground colour black

Type ‘Be’

Right click on the layer in the layers palette and click Rasterize Type

Duplicate the layer

Double click on the layer in the layers palette to bring up the blending options and apply the following Color Overlay and Bevel & Emboss settings:

Make the original text layer active

Select the Move Tool and using the arrow keys, move the layer 1 pixel down and 1 pixel to the right

Repeat these steps for the word ‘Mine’

Turn off the visibility to all layers except the 2 ‘Be’ layers

Right click on either visible layer and click on Merge Visible

Turn off the visibility of this layer

Restore visibility to the 2 ‘Mine’ layers

Right click on either visible layer and click on Merge Visible

Restore visibility to all layers

Using the Transform Tool (Ctrl + T), rotate and move the text layers into the desired position.

Double click on either of the text layers to bring up the blending options and apply the following Outer Glow settings:

Repeat for the other text layer

The finished project. Click on the image for full size view