Faux Embroidering: Abridged

Obviously, the news has been keeping me busy here the last few weeks. I promised you guys a tutorial on my process to achieve the embroidered look you see on all the winning IceHL logos. I have not had the time to write it but I didn't want to leave you hanging.

If you're a designer who knows your way around Photoshop or comparable software, these bullet points should be pretty easy to follow. If it's over your head, you'll just have to keep waiting until I can put together an actual tutorial.

There's no one way to achieve this look, but here is my workflow:

• Separate each color of your logo into its own layer. This can be easily done with the magic wand and fill tools. Then fill up any holes within your color layers.
• To each layer add a pattern overlay of angled scan lines (10-15% opacity) along with noise, beveling and a drop shadow to a degree that looks good to you.
• Draw vector lines near the edges of each color (black or white) using a dashed stroke to get the stitched effect. Set that layer to 20-25% opacity.

There are probably better ways to do some of this in newer versions of Photoshop. I'm actually using Paint Shop Pro 7 (and have been for eight years) to create the graphics for Icethetics. Enjoy!

If you need a little more direction or just want some different ideas, PuckDrawn has collected up a decent set of similar tutorials worth checking out. Also, feel free to add suggestions in the comments if you've discovered a better way or a better tutorial. I'm sure Icethetics readers would love to hear about it.