How to Create a Magician’s Hat in Photoshop
In this tutorial, you’ll learn how a magician’s hat can be designed in Photoshop. The tutorial involves a simple use of the Pen Tool and other Shape Tools. It shows a distinct use of different blending modes and focuses on other lighting techniques. Shadows are also explained in the tutorial and we’ll reveal some great beginner techniques. Let’s get started!
Final Image Preview
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Tutorial Details
- Program: Photoshop CS or Newer
- Difficulty: Beginner
- Estimated Completion Time: 30 to 50 mins
Step 1
Create a 450 px by 450 px document with a white or transparent background. Drag out two guides at the center of the document (for your own convenience). Now use the Pen Tool to make a shape like the one shown below.
Name this layer as “body.” Make sure you place this layer and all layers constituting the hat in a single layer-set (call it “Hat”).
While creating an irregular shape like the one above, it’s hard to keep symmetry on both sides. The easier way is to create half of the shape first.
Now grab the Path Selection Tool (A) and click on the shape. Press Command + C to copy the path and then press Command + V to paste it on the same shape layer. The copied path will be selected spontaneously.
With the Path Selection Tool (A) still selected, go to Edit > Transform > Flip Horizontal and move the path rightward until you get the required shape. Click and drag a selection to select the two paths simultaneously then click the Combine button located in the Options bar.
Step 2
You can now add some reflections to the “body” layer. To do so, duplicate the “body” layer (Command + J) and reduce it’s fill to 0%. Go to it’s Layer Style and give it a Gradient Overlay.
When you’re done with the settings, don’t click OK. Before doing so, move the gradient leftward so that you have something like that shown below.
Step 3
With the duplicate “body” layer selected, go to Layer > Add Layer Mask > Reveal All. Grab the Gradient Tool (G) and drag a black to white gradient as directed.
Step 4
Duplicate the “reflection” layer and go to its Layer Style. Move the Gradient leftwards while applying the following changes.
Step 5
It’s time to add a shiny band on the hat. Create a shape of any color using the Pen Tool.
The band should not be flowing outside the hat’s body. Command-click on the “body” layer and go to Select > Modify > Expand, type 1px and click OK. With the “band” layer selected, click the Add Layer Mask button.
Step 6
Give the “band” layer the layer styles shown below. Move the gradient rightward before closing the Layer Style window.
Step 7
Duplicate the “band” layer and remove all its layer styles except the Gradient Overlay. Reduce its fill to 0% and make the following changes to the Layer Style. Note that this gradient is placed leftward.
Step 8
It’s time to make the top part of the hat. Use the Ellipse Tool (U) to make an ellipse like the one shown below and name it “top.”
Give it these Layer Styles.
Step 9
Duplicate the “top” layer and place the duplicate layer below the “top” layer in the layers palette. Move the duplicate layer 7px down then give it these Layer Styles.
Step 10
Make another copy of the layer and reduce its fill to 0%. Just make these changes in its Gradient Overlay settings.
Step 11
With the Ellipse Tool (U), make a black ellipse over the “top” layer.
Give the layer these Layer Styles.
Step 12
Now you need to add shadows at the required places. Create a new layer below the “top” and it’s duplicate layers. Command-click on the “top” layer and move the selection a few pixels down, then fill it with black. Go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur, enter 5px and click OK. You’ll clearly notice that the shadow is flowing outside the hat’s body.
To fix it, Command-click on the “body” layer and with the “shadow” layer selected, click on the Add Layer Mask button in the Layers Palette (as you did in Step 4). Set the Opacity of the layer between 30% to 50%.
Step 13
A shadow can also be placed beneath the base. To do so, fill an elliptical selection with black on a new layer, reduce the Opacity of the layer to 30%. This layer must be placed below the “body” layer. Go to Filter > Blur > Radial Blur, make the settings as shown in the image below before clicking OK.
Step 14
On a new layer, fill an elliptical selection with black and set the Opacity of layer to 50%. Go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur, enter 2.5 px and click OK.
Step 15
The hat is done. You can now add a wand to the hat. Create a new layer set (name it “Wand”) and hide the “Hat” layer-set by clicking on the eye to the side of it’s name in the layers palette. Use Rectangle Tool (U) to draw a rectangle and give it a Gradient Overlay.
Step 16
Add two strips at the end of the wand while giving them a Gradient Overlay of purple shades.
Step 17
To reduce the flatness of wand, add anchor points to the strips using the Add Anchor Point Tool. Move them some pixels up. Along with that, add an ellipse at the end of the lower strip as shown.
Step 18
Duplicate the “Wand” layer-set and press Command + E to merge the duplicate set into a single layer. You can now hide the original “Wand” layer-set.
With the merged “wand” layer selected, go to Edit > Transform > Rotate and rotate the wand 75 degrees CCW. Place it in a suitable location.
Conclusion
A shadow of the wand, falling inside hat’s body, can also be added to complete our image.
If the final image appears too bright or dark on your monitor then you can add a Brightness/Contrast adjustment layer to the final image. To do so, open the final image in Photoshop then go to Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Brightness/Contrast, use settings that please you.
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By Asher Abbasi
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Hey Asher,
Its really great to see your tuts here ;)
MA’SHALLAH
thanks a lot brother
I really love the hat, but not the wand… Nice tut. ^__^
Sorry but perspective is wrong!
I was going to say that too! The band on the hat “destroys” the perspective!
OK that’s my bad.
However the tutorial deals with more important things than perspective issues.
Great techniques.
Great tutorial. keep up the good work
ahahah very nice!
Thanks ENVATO!
Another nice tutorial Asher :)
Not terrible but, not great either.
- The brim of the hat is way out of proportion with the rest of the hat
- The satin band on a top hat generally meets the brim
- The highlights on the top hat should curve with it
don’t want to seem harsh but the perspective is really wrong…
Nice Tut. Thanks
Really neat tutorial. Great use of gradients!
VERY GOOD TUTORIAL!! =D
Oh this is pretty, I love these types of designs, especially when they are produced within photoshop.
perspective of the hat is ok, but the stripe looks wrong
Why wouldn’t you do this in illustrator? Doesn’t seem to make sense to generate a vector looking graphic and not have it have all the pluses of being a vector. Just saying.
If it was an Illustrator tutorial, this wouldn’t be a PSD TUTS site, do you agree ?
You can have a vector icon in Photoshop if you use Pen Tool and Shape Tools for every part of the hat ,which has been done in the tutorial.
The second one from you. Nice.
Detailed. Thank you
Even though the perspective is wrong, I still think it looks nice. I like all the use of gradients to achieve the lighting.
whats up with these past bogus tutorials? were are the aesthetically pleasing compositions? stop selling out PSD tuts, lets go back to accepting stellar tutorials and not mediocre ones…..
sheesh
Why so harsh? PSD tuts is not “selling out”. They “pay out” for each tutorial they use.
Great job, Asher!
thanks
@jonny V – I don’t see you coming up with any tutorials, why cant you just take what you have , and ignore stuff you don’t like. People like you make the world a crappier place to live in
great
thank you
When try to rotate the wand the grandiant is not working correctly it stays linear over the wand hope you can clarify this situation
Before rotating the wand, merge the “wand” layer-set into a single layer.To do so, just select the set and press Ctrl+E.Rotate the merged layer and it will work fine :).
Wouldn’t that hat be considered more of a bowl?
Ya, sorry, and with respect to the author, this one’s a little underwhelming. The perspectives are off, the band is in the wrong place and not curved properly, the gradients don’t follow the outlines. Really a disappointing effort.
I see, i need study more the CS family! 8)
Great work and nice tuto!
I don’t know why so many people are bashing this tut, are you judging his artwork or his actual techniques? Because the techniques, gradients, procedures, etc. could be very useful to some people. So what if the perspective isn’t perfect, it has nothing to do with the skills he’s teaching. Get over it because this is a good tut, very detailed. Thank you.
thanks bro for clarifying :)
I hope other people follow the tutorial and learn the techniques instead of just viewing the final result and giving comments on it.This is a tutorial site, not a graphic showroom ;)
+1
+1
Its nice tutorial………
Wonderful tutorial. Thank you very much.
I come from China,I enjoy your opuses,thanks so detail about every part.
Another nice tutorial !!! Thanks bro. :)
Thanks a bunch for sharing your time and talents.
and yout got money for this?
Muuy bueno… felicidades…
not bad
Nice tutorial !
grayt
Good tutorial :)
super.
It’s really Great artwork buddy
Keep up the good work :D
Cool ! A mgician Hat ! Nice tutorial …
Thank you very much for the excellent and useful subject
Greetings
No offense to all the negative commenters but you are the exact reason some people won’t even try to show their work, not even to get feedback. Asher is only trying to show, the people that don’t know much about the software, how to accomplish certain effects and styles using his techniques. That’s it! Negative criticism won’t take you anywhere, in fact, others will stop asking you for an opinion for being such harsh people.
I do see what many of you are talking about, perspective, band being in the wrong place, gradients, lighting, etc., but in my personal opinion that’s something that I would fix myself. What matters here is the technique, many of us would’ve done it in a totally different, and maybe, a more difficult or time-consuming way. The point is that we’re not obliged to use what we see here, it’s up to us to create something that will satisfy our needs.
I apologize if I’ve said anything that might’ve offended anyone.
Realy nice tutorial, i need more tutorial like this
Ok folks….no one seems to argue that perspective and other things aren’t the best in this tutorial. And a lot of people say “well this is a tutorial to teach users how to use the tools, etc”.
But why are we only teaching how to use tools? Isn’t perspective, proportions, etc also a part of creating graphics and using photoshop properly? Why just crank out a tut to show use…..can’t we also make it aesthetically correct?
Why not both?!
I agree. Being able to use fancy techniques and gradients is all well and great, but if the basic drawing skills are lacking then the end product will only suffer.
That being said, the tutorial was thorough and well done.
thank for tutorial
In video please?!
Nice work…
not gonna lie… i went into this tut not knowing anything about photoshop… i was able to follow this step for stop.. now i know much more than i started with.. which is exactly why i came to this site… thx!
Realy Thanx nice tutorial
we need more tutorial like this
very nice tutorial!!!
Nice tut – I think it does a great job of clearly outlining the steps and techniques, and also I find that the design is very appealing, which frankly I find more important than whether the perspective is exactly right. Nicely done tut.
really good tut.
I think it is more important learning techniques than saying perspective.