the youngsters at my church sometimes arrange special friday evening events (like a concert with local bands, movie nights using our huge screen, etc) and they just call them "tgif". i tried to make a poster for one of those events and didn't make a very good job of it, but i came up with a nice text effect while trying. i wanted to post it this friday but i was too busy, and then i forgot about it but i was just reminded, so here it is.



(disclaimer: i suck at proof reading my own texts! this pdf is probably full of typos that i've missed and also i've seen the layout changed when i exported it as a pdf, so it's not very elegant. if there's anything you have problems understanding because of this, please tell me so i can change it!)

Very nice AnMal

he4rty: thank you!
yeah, setting the dynamics is tricky the first few times - at least i thought so! here's some instructions i "stole" from an old thread (sorry, don't remember which one) and used as reminders in the beginning:
Click on the dynamics button (this one:), and in the opened window click on the button in down right corner:"Open the dynamics selection dialog". You will see a new tab on the top right of GIMP screen called "Paint Dynamics" and click on the second button down: "Craete a new dynamics". You will see a new tab that is the "Paint Dynamics Editor" and you can rename this new dynamic as you like.
once you have that new dynamics open you can check the boxes you see checked in the screen shot. hope that helped you some way!

AnMal: That was a great tutorial... I learned a lot from that!

The only real problem I had was that when I set the cloud layer (on the top of the stack) to divide it took the color from the text, and left it white (the Color Gradient layer was below it in the stack). I ended up using Overlay, but my effect is more muted.

I was a little vague on the last step too... I ended up not erasing any motion blur lines there.

jas45: it looks good this way too, but do you have the xcf so i can take a look? i've gone through the tutorial once myself and it works fine for me, but that may be because i already know how to make it - if i can see where you had problems it's easier for me to see if the tutorial needs to be rewritten.

AnMal: Thanks. I'm attaching the xcf... it was over 5 mb so I had to zip it.

It was around midnight last night when I did the tutorial, so if you find mistakes it's more likely to be my lack of concentration than your directions. I plan to do the tutorial again today to be sure I understand the reason behind everything you did, and I may come closer to your results then.

Thanks again for making this tutorial... it was very educational for me, and I'm sure it helped others as well. One thing I need to devote time to is 'Dynamics'. I didn't have trouble following your 'reciepe' directions, but I don't completely understand the effect of everything I entered. I guess there is no better way to learn than just playing with the settings and seeing the result.

Nice Tutorial AnMal, A before and after image of the paths adjustment would be helpful though, Here is my result.

Jas, I had the same problem, I ended up changing my intial text to grey 808080.

he4rty: nice job! thanks for trying the tutorial. i'll see if i can put in a before and after picture of the path. if you had the same problem as jas45 it's probably due to a mistake in the tutorial, i'll go through it and see where things go wrong!

jas45: thank you! i must have made a mistake somewhere in the tutorial, your xcf will be a help in correcting it.

AnMal: One solution that gives similar results to yours, is to change (or leave) the blend mode for the "Color" layer at normal.

jas45: no, that won't work. i see on your xcf that you made a cut out from your colour gradient layer (maybe by using the selection from path), if you use the overlay mode you shouldn't need to make that cut out. and even if you make the cut out you will miss the nice sort of shimmer effect from the motion blur layers if you set it to normal.
but i have some good news . i managed to find my mistake - it's a missing screenshot that messes things up for you and he4rty. when you make a layer mask on the motion blur 2 layer you gradually blacken out certain parts on the mask by stroking with a black to transparent gradient. i tried to explain how much you needed to blacken out, but the explanation is complete nonsense without the screenshot. this means the layer masks you and he4rty made left too much of the text white, meaning opaque, which in turn means you didn't get the full effect of the colour overlay. i have now located my original screenshot for the tutorial and will edit it. i've also made before and after screenshots of the edited path like he4rty suggested.

AnMal: Yes, you are right that I kept the selection when I stroked the gradient. I debated that with myself when I did the tutorial, but finally decided (incorrectly, it turns out) that you had intended the gradient to be only within the selection.

Thanks again for the tutorial and for your help.

jas45: you've been a great help yourself, thank you for your patience with this tutorial .

I ended up with pale text also. It would have been nice if you'd mentioned about putting in guides.

Molly, I think yours is pretty good. At least you managed to keep the color in the letters.

If the tails were shorter, I think you would have the tutorial image.

Thank you Jas. I didn't know what I was doing but when I saw your layers and changed mine all around, it started to make more sense. I will do another one but I do like the look of the reflections flaring out more, rather than a straight line, unless they are blurred lines.

O and molly:thank you both for trying this out! sorry, i was too busy yesterday to revise the tutorial, i just found the mistake. the revised version is now in the first post, it has the missing screenshot and three more for extra clarity. molly, i think yours looks very good, the glitter is just lovely. O, the guides were only in my screenshot because it was easier for me to explain things if i could refer to them - i didn't say anything about putting in guides in the tutorial because there's no real need for them. the important point is that the gradient strokes black out a major part of the white text in the layermask.

AnMal: Thanks for the revised tutorial with the extra screenshots. Now that I see what you were after on the layer mask, I can't believe that I did not get it just from the verbal description. I guess that is what they mean by “a picture is worth a thousand words”.

However, I am still getting text that is too pale when I use Overlay for the Color Gradient layer. I get a pretty good effect if I set the Color Gradient to Multiply (see pic), but clearly I still don't have something right. Anyway, at my stage, it is more about learning than results. I am attaching my xcf – this one is only finished to the point of showing the pale text so as not to complicate things any more than necessary.

Thanks for any advice you can give me.

This is with Color Gradient layer set to Multiply



And this is with Color Gradient layer set to Overlay

nice effect, Anmal

but i had my problems with this tutorial as well

it would help a lot if you explained what we are actually going to do, instead of saying, do this, do that

EDIT: changed the "shouting"