Step 1:
Okay, so I’ve got my logo. It’s there. It’s shaded. Everything.
But wait. That clearly isn’t one solid colour. It’s go some levels on it.
So I decide what I want. So I want each layer separate and raised? If so I just redo what I was already doing. But no, I want them in one pressed element. Therefore, I’ve got to do seams.
Step 2:
Alright, so I start with the same thing as last time. The easiest way to do a circle is to only do a quarter of it, then copy that to the other four sides, and recolour as needed. Here’s the start.
Step 3:
That was easy enough. Now for the inside lines. Since the inside top of the red circle is technically the underside, it gets shadow. The other side gets the light.
Does that make sense? Well, that’s what the pictures are for.
Keen observers will notice I made the inner circle a bit smaller. It looks better that way. You can mess around with whatever you like, whenever you like. I recommend it, even. Make a copy of they layer you are working and go nuts, that way if it looks good you can use it, but if it doesn’t, you still have your old work.
Step 4:
Alright, you’re gonna want to copy that line and flip it, sure. But don’t do anything crazy. You don’t want to merge this just yet.
First take that corner, copy it, and place it just inside. That’s one pixel over and one down, for this. Sometimes it won’t be so easy, and you might end up having to draw another line. You can still usually copy it, if you don’t mind moving stuff around after. Again, use your own judgement.
Step 5:
Has this made sense so far? I’m not sure. Let’s do what we just did for the final circle.
Step 6:
But it looks weird, right? A little spotchy? We’ll have to fix up where the dark and light meets. They aren’t corners, this is a circle. Do it however you want. I used some mid tone lines right where they meet.
Like I said, mess around until you think it looks good.
And then, add whatever shadows you want. Since I’m being lazy for this tut I used a drop shadow and an outer glow, set to multiply. The outer glow’s size is only at 3, drop shadow’s at 1, distance of 2. You don’t need much, and in fact I recommend subtlety when using layer styles. Even better, you could just do the shadows yourself. That’ll make them exactly what you want, and it’s really not that difficult, as long as you remember to copy your layer first.
This sort of technique can be used on lots of stuff, such as:
Cut-outs. For this you’d just inverse the light and dark line, and put the shadows inside instead of out.
Crazy techy stuff. I just go nuts on this. Put it wherever. It makes even not so well done slabs of blank metal suddenly look better.
Actual seams. You know, like in clothes and stuff.
The Greylands 