Product photos are the most substantial factor in verifying the essence of a product in online shopping. Therefore, the more aesthetically an image appeals, the greater the clients’ addiction to the product appears.
In this instance, effects like drop shadow continue to glorify and affix a whole new dimension to photography, leaving an overnight response in the Online Business world. However, although many people know about drop shadow, without sufficient confidence and proper direction, many may not know how to add a drop shadow in Photoshop.
Creating a Drop Shadow in Photoshop
Shadow is a specific effect that helps an image replicate underneath itself to generate an impression. It also helps to lift off the surface of the background and change the dimensions and outlooks of the photos.
So, in simple terms, a drop shadow is a process of creating a shadow behind an object.
That makes it look more polished and professional. However, this task may seem very intricate and time-consuming at first glance. Still, it is very much possible to become proficient in shadow editing only if you try patiently for a short time with a strong interest. Let’s dive into the deep and learn how to add natural shadows in Photoshop.
Change The Background
There are different ways to add natural shadows. If you want to make your product images look natural and professional and pop out from a screen display, then adding a shadow to a product on a white background can be an excellent option for you. Of course, you can also modify the background tones based on the characters of the photos you require to attach. However, it is indispensable and essential to alter the background to combine the shadows suitably.
Isolate your object from the background
At first, you need to insert the image you aspire to attach a natural shadow to. After that, open up the layers palette and cut down the image by applying tools like a background eraser or magic wand. Now, separate the product images from the background and place them on a unique and attractive background to look more appealing.
Create the layer with an adjustable background
Separate the object in your photo and place it in a new layer in Photoshop by penetrating the Layer’s palette. Rename the newly created Layer like drop shadow layer style to avoid any confusion. Now you will discern an eye icon near the background layer option.
By clicking this icon, you can control the background visibility. Turn the visibility option off, and you will get your object against a transparent background. You can also choose a background color from the drop-down menu. And you are solely at your liberty to customize the colors.
Adjust your canvas size
Working with the canvas in Adobe Photoshop means working with the entire area, including shapes, sizes, images, and all the other objects given. You can always swap the elements inside the canvas but can never traverse the canvas margin. Instead, you will necessitate changing the area of the canvas.
While expanding the canvas size, you will not confront any issues but be wary while reducing them. It may cause the disappearance of the images or objects inside the canvas. However, it will not delete but rather hide the elements inside the canvas.
Follow the given procedure to change the canvas shape:
- First, choose the canvas size from the image menu.
- Pick a unit and insert the expected size of the canvas.
- You can also use the Relative checkbox for specifying the canvas size.
- Place the original object on the new canvas.
Finally, change the blending mode from multiply to normal and fill to 100%. Then, go to the distort option and use tools like a rectangular marquee to modify as required. When the modification is done, work on erasing and cleansing shadow edges as necessary. Then get back to the multiplier mood and fill back to 75%. Hopefully, you will notice a change you were expecting.
Create an Alpha Channel
After giving your product shadow an anticipated shape, you are required to converge on making it more realistic. As we notice in reality, when a shadow goes far from the object, it becomes more volatile and blurry. The Alpha channel comes into play to counterfeit that. With the use of Alpha channels, you can make your photo look more swarming and professional than ever.
Check out the dialog box by opening the channels palette. Then, click on the palette table to pick a new channel. After that, create a different channel dialogue box and rename it alpha-1. Make sure the colors indicate the selected areas.
Add a Gradient within the Your Channel
Attaching a gradient with your alpha channel will assist you in making your object more elegant and understandable, especially when one part is closer than the other to the light source. But things get a bit more complex when it comes to multiple light sources, and each contains different colors. Thus the experts need to play their role to get things going.
- First, select the Alpha 1 channel by entering the Channels palette.
- Enable the visibility for all the channels by clicking on the eye button given near the background option.
- Using the Gradient Tool, set the foreground color to black and the background color to white at the bottom of the palette.
- Check if the gradient is set to black-to-white in the options palette and the gradient type is one-dimensional.
- Finally, draw the gradient to the selected part of your shadow, and you will see a red gradient over your image.
Adjust the Opacity
One of the best ways of blending your image with the background is by adjusting the opacity. An entirely opaque layer indicates that the object is fully visible, and everything underneath it is obscured. It reduces Or increases the opacity and impacts the transparency of the Layer. For example, 1% opacity of a layer means it is nearly transparent, while a layer with 100% opacity is entirely opaque.
Adjust the opacity of a layer
- Select the Layer.
- Go Style tool from the tools sidebar.
- Enter the value of opacity percentage. (from 0%-100%)
You can always increase or decrease the layer opacity whenever you want to, making things easier and more exciting for you.
Refine the edge
Refining Edge is a fabulous tool to background remove and deal with complicated edges. The refine edge tool selects hair, branches, or any part of an image with edges, especially complex ones. To refine the edge, follow the instructions given-
- First, go to the menu bar of your photoshop and select your file.
- Right-click on the object and select refine an edge. If you struggle to find the option this way, go to the select menu and pick refine the edge.
- You will notice a white background underneath your object.
- Now follow the arrow button to check all the options available for making some effective changes to your object. Here, you will find the options like,
- Use Marching Ants to select the animations for the visible images.
- Try-On Black and On white to choose the background color.
- Black & white makes the selection white and the background black.
- On Layers to help you visit the Layer.
- Reveal Layer to show the whole Layer without any masks etc.
- Go to the brush drop-down menu and select the adjustable shape and category of the brush. To be as perfect as you need.
- Adjusting the value of the Radius slider will make your object more natural and original.
- The Decontaminate Colors checkbox will help you to adjust the contrasting color background.
So, it is clear that the edge refining tool can undoubtedly help give your object and shadow a shape in photoshop.
Add a Layer Mask
One of the most basic functionalities of Photoshop is a image masking. The use of a layer mask will bring you extreme control over transparency. For example, you can use these masks to make an image visible or invisible.
To get immense control over your blur setting,
Under Select > Add Vector Mask choose from the Shadow layer box and ensure that the radio option is tested.
Now, by creating this, you will get the darkest area of the gradient. Now click select > select inverse and go inverse.
After that, click the Layer mask button, and while using the shadow, it will look a little faded and more realistic.
Distorting the Shadow in Photoshop
Your shadow should be so realistic that it can blend people with the background atmosphere. And for doing that, every single detail should crave perfection. Therefore, positioning is one of the most crucial sections in photo editing and the visual representation of something of value. It also gives a proper idea of how to add a natural shadow in Photoshop.
- If you want to reshape and move the object into position, you must use Photoshop’s Distort command. To do that, choose Transform from the edit menu, and then choose Distort.
- Now you will get a black-filled area. Drag this area diagonally and use the top transform handle to reshape the black part. Try to make it as perfect as possible to get a more natural and realistic vibe than the real image or object.
- Depending on the demand, you can also work with the bottom part of the image by dragging the bottom corner handles.
To be a perfectionist, you can use other methods.
- Insert your selected image and choose whatever shadow setting you need to have.
- Create a layer using the fx symbol from the layer option and click on the wave from the top toolbar.
- Apply adjustable measures on the elements to make it look perfect.
- Make sure the size of the shadow makes sense and looks natural.
Consider the light source and fade the shadow away
Check if there is any unwanted light from any side of the shadow that weakens the shadow. Adjust all the lights and then focus on your shadow. Make your shadow fade so that it doesn’t look like something appeared by force.
To make it more perfect and natural, you need to give a blurry effect to the shadow. For that, go to the Channels palette and select the color channels.
Make sure that the shadow layer is activated by entering the Layer’s palette. You will get a dialog box here. And make any changes you want with the blur option. For example, make the blue focal distance zero, and radius high, leave all other parameters unchanged, and click OK.
If you want to create the shadows again, create a new layer. First, make use of the Brush tool to paint in the shadow. Now transfer the Layer Blend Mode to Multiply and adjust the opacity to match the nearest shadows.
How to add a Drop Shadow to Text in Photoshop
So far, we have been talking about how to add a drop shadow effect in Photoshop on an image. But what if it’s not an image, but rather a text file. No worries, now we will talk about how to add a shadow to text in Photoshop.
Adding a drop shadow to the text
First, Open your document>toolbar> type tool. You can also pick a color from the color swatch.
- Add or type the texts you want to add the drop shadow by selecting the type tool.
- To change the font and size of the type, use the character panel,
- Select the type layer> click on the fx icon at the bottom of the palette> choose drop shadow from the menu to access the drop shadow panel.
- You can have a look at the preview by holding and dragging the panel by the top bar.
- You can also change the shadow depth and keep it the way you want to.
So, as we can see, adding drop shadows in a text in Photoshop is very easy. It doesn’t take more than a few steps to attach shadows to the text or add a drop shadow in photoshop.
Final Word
In the e-commerce system, the impression of a product depends on the photograph displayed against it. Therefore, people always feel attracted to the products with the most appealing photos.
So, to grow your business, you need to show them precisely the things they want to see. And effects like drop shadow can play a big role here in impressing the consumers.
Drop shadow makes the images praiseworthy and incredibly attractive to entice the buyers. So knowing how to create drop shadow in photoshop may work as a ladder for your e-commerce business to reach the acme of success.
