How to Create an Envelope Icon in Photoshop
Download Source Files
In this tutorial, you’ll go through easy steps for creating a nice envelope icon. There’s a light use of the Pen Tool in the tutorial, but most of it uses Selection Tools to create this icon. The stamp is also explained in a simple manner. I am sure you’ll get familiar with some useful techniques as you go through!
Final Image Preview
Take a look at the icon we’ll be creating. Want access to the full PSD files and downloadable copies of every tutorial, including this one? Join Psd Plus for just $19/month. You can view the final image preview below.
Tutorial Details
- Program: Photoshop and newer
- Difficulty: Basic
- Estimated Completion Time: 25-45 minutes
Step 1
Create a new 512 pixel by 512 pixel document with either a white or transparent background. Since the envelope is going to be white, it’d be helpful to fill the background (Alt + BackSpace) with a shade of gray (9D9D9D). Drag a horizontal and a vertical guide at the center of the canvas for convenience.
You need to press Command + R to reveal rulers bar (if it’s hidden) from where you can grab guides.
Step 2
Create a new layer set named “envelope.” Select the Rectangular Marquee Tool (M) and on a new layer, fill a selection with white as shown. Name this layer as “body.”
Step 3
Double-click the new layer thumbnail in the layers palette and give it a Gradient Overlay.
Step 4
Create a new layer and name it “pattern.” Using the Rectangular Marquee Tool, fill selections alternately with the colors: #6092BD and #E8414. Make sure that the distance between all the sections is the same.
Step 5
Move the pattern towards the left so that it touches the end of the envelope’s body. Go to Edit > Transform > Skew and skew the pattern downward from its right end. Move it a few pixels up and remove the part that flows outside the envelope’s body using the Eraser Tool (E).
Step 6
Create a new layer and name it “shade.” Command-click on the “body” layer and stretch a black to white gradient as shown. Set the layer mode of the layer to Multiply and reduce its Opacity to 30%.
Step 7
You now need to put a similar pattern and shade on the opposite side of the body. To do so, first duplicate the “pattern” layer (Command + J). With the duplicate layer selected, go to Edit > Transform > Flip Horizontal and move it exactly to the right edge of the body. Do the same for the “shade” layer.
Step 8
Select Pen Tool and make a shape like one below. Name the shape layer as “lower.”
You can use further guides for exact alignment.
Step 9
Give the “lower” layer the following layer styles.
Step 10
Make a copy of the “pattern” layer (the one on left) and place the duplicate layer above the “lower” layer in the layers palette. Go to Edit > Transform > Rotate 90deg CCW. Move the pattern layer to the position shown.
Clear the extreme two incomplete sections of the pattern using the Eraser Tool (E). There’s room for one complete section in the pattern below. Select the Polygonal Lasso Tool (L) and make a selection covering one of the blue parts of the pattern. Right-click on it and select “Layer via copy” from the menu. Move it rightward so that you get a desirable result.
Step 11
Command-click on the “lower” layer, and on a new layer stretch a black to white gradient as you did in Step 6. The only difference is that this time, you stretch the gradient vertically up. After that, change the Blending Mode of the layer to Multiply and reduce its Opacity to 50%.
Step 12
Create a new layer and place it under the “lower” layer in the layers palette. Command-click on the “lower” layer and fill the selection with black on the new layer. Press Command + T and increase its height to 102%. Now go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur, type 0.7px and click OK. Reduce its Opacity to 40% and clear out its portion that flows outside the envelope’s body.
Step 13
Using the Pen Tool, make another shape like the one below and name it “upper.”
Step 14
Give these layer styles to the “upper” layer.
Step 15
Just like you added shade and shadow to the “lower” layer in Step 11 and Step 12, do the same for the “upper” layer. However, you should make these changes.
While repeating Step 11, reduce the Opacity to 10%. While repeating Step 12, increase the height to 103%, apply a Gaussian Blur of 1.2px and reduce the Opacity to 70%.
You’ll have something like this by now.
Step 16
It’s time to add a shadow at the bottom of the envelope. To do so, create a new layer and place it below all the layers constituting the envelope. Fill a rectangular selection with black on it. Apply Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur and then Filter > Blur > Motion Blur. Finally, reduce the Opacity of the shadow to 75%.
The envelope is done. Now you can add a stamp to it. You can find a lot of them on the web, but if you want to make a custom stamp, then follow these steps.
Step 17
Create a new 180 pixel by 180 pixel document with a white background. Select the Ellipse Tool (U) and make a circle of any color. Reduce the fill of the shape layer to 0% and give it a red stroke.
Step 18
Duplicate the shape layer and reduce its size to half.
Step 19
Click on “Vector mask thumbnail” of the smaller circle in the layers palette to reveal its path. Select the Type Tool (T) and move the cursor over the path. As the cursor changes, click and write whatever you want. If you want to increase the space between the text and the inner circle’s stroke, simply increase the size of the text using Command + T. You need to make suitable adjustments in the Character window for a desirable outcome, mine are shown below. Finalize the stamp by adding your logo at the center.
Step 20
When you’re done with the stamp, hide the background layer (click the eye aside its name in the layers palette) and press Shift + Command + E to merge all visible layers. For a more realistic result, the stamp needs a bit more work.
Select the merged “stamp” layer, then go to Layer > Add Layer Mask > Reveal All. Now open this image and place it over the stamp (name the layer as “fade”) so that it covers the stamp completely. Command-click on the “fade” layer and go to Select > Color Range, click OK after making the settings as shown below. By doing this, only the white part of the image will be selected.
With the selection loaded, make the “fade” layer invisible and click on the “stamp” layer’s Layer Mask Thumbnail in the layers palette. Fill the selection with black. Finally, right-click on the Layer mask thumbnail and select Apply Layer Mask from the menu.
Step 21
Grab the finalized stamp and place it into the “envelope.psd” main document. Reduce its Opacity to 35%.
Step 22
This step is optional, follow it for blending the stamp further with the envelope. With the “stamp” layer selected, Command-click the “upper” layer, then right-click anywhere on the canvas and select Layer Via Cut. This will cut the part of the stamp that’s inside the selection and will split the single layer into two layers.
Move the remaining part of the “stamp” layer below the “upper” layer’s shadow in the layers palette and reduce it’s Opacity to 30%. Delete the background layer and save the file as PNG.
Conclusion
You can reduce the size of the final image, if you want smaller sizes. The icon keeps its meaning even if you resize it to 32px by 32px, that’s 6.25% of the original size. However, for smaller versions like 24px by 24px or 16px by 16px, you will have to remake the icon specifically for those sizes.
Subscribe to the Psdtuts+ RSS Feed for the best Photoshop tuts and articles on the web.
Enjoyed this Post?
Subscribe to our RSS Feed, Follow us on Twitter or simply recommend us to friends and colleagues!
By Asher Abbasi
Join our newsletter!
Create a Tutorial, Get Paid!
Have something to teach the world? Want to earn money doing it? Tutorials, screencasts, and articles published here on Psdtuts+ are largely contributed by readers just like you! We'll pay you great money for good content. Find Out More
Being a bit of (okay, a complete) icon newbie, if you create an icon in Photoshop, what is the best way to get the different sizes?
I’m under the impression that creating an icon via Illustrator is easier as you can resize it as need be (though some effects don’t scale, right?).
I can’t imagine creating an icon in Photoshop for each size is all.
Great tutorial, thanks :)
You actually dont create one for each size you just create one size which is the 512×512 and the rest is up to the icon creation software.
you can use vectors if you want to resize it, or resize the image via the menu bar at the top.
Nice work. Congrats
great tutorial, thanks :)
most welcome :)
http://psd.tutsplus.com/tutorials/icon-design/how-to-create-an-envelope-icon-in-photoshop/fade.png
Dead link…
you can download the image from here:
http://i49.tinypic.com/2my291j.png
Beautiful icon…
i was reading your post (Photoshop’s Brush Tool – Basic Guide) and i could not under what you where trying to say please can you help me.
..awesome :)
Great useful icon.
Very nice tut great icon. Thanks!
This, like your chain tutorial, came out the day AFTER I needed it and came up with an alternative. Dx
i learned two techniques from this tut
really glad to know that :D
GOOD STUFF!
ya this is a nice icon )) but im getting tired of tutorials about icons…. by the way the size 32×32 lose alot of detail.
awesome icon :)
I learned some new techniques, thanks.
I would consider making the stamp a little darker, so that by the time it starts getting small you can still see it without much effort.
Finally, no perspective errors… I’m sure you’re glad to hear that after some of your other tuts lol. Congrats man!
Really glad to know you learned from it.Making the stamp darker would really improve the clarity of smaller versions and it’s quite possible even after you’ve completed the tutorial.
I am really glad to have this envelope free of perspective errors :D
Big thanks
quick-n-dirty, but nice
Really nice detail of the stamp..keep it up..
I love the use of subtle gradients… it makes designs B-E-A utiful
RO!['0_o']!BOT
Wow, that looks great. I’ll have to try something similar for myself.
Nice tutorial , and great icon. :)
Not bad, I like it.
Smart working!
I studied Physics before Communications, Asher. Nice to see a Engineer working so well with graphic design. Nice work, man!
cool icon
Thank you for this valuable post. It changed my approach
Nice tutorial Asher, really liked it.
That was a Great post. I liked it very much :)
Good work. Thanks.
Awesome tutorial. Thanks for that.
I like it although I would prefer if .psd tuts had some advanced tutorials to do with the pen tool
I am trying this right now and it isn’t clear where you say to make a layer that says “lower” (step 8), so I felt I had to assume a little there. I am also having a bit of a tough time with step six. It says to command click the “body” layer-I am not sure what that means. If you command click both shade and body you cannot give them a gradient. If you only give the gradient in one layer, it doesn’t show up like you have pictured. In step 3 you state “Select the Rectangular Marquee Tool (M) and on a new layer, fill a selection with white as shown. Name this layer as “body” … and there is not a specified size for this. I was also having problems making the rest of this layer gray(do I just fill the outside in gray?)
I am obviously a beginner, so if you don’t have time to answer questions, it’s ok.
Thanks.
keep up the good works
I personally think the envelope looks too square…
I really like the edges, the shading on the flap of the envelope, and the stamp.
The techniques for the folded parts are awesome.
Great job. Thank-you for sharing.
fade.png doesn’t exist, could you fix this plz ?
Use this till the link is fixed:
http://i46.tinypic.com/wri1di.png
Nice
nice !!!
wow ..
greet lesson ,,
thank’s
“^^
tku for the nice tuto
http://dc05.arabsh.com/i/00943/l4aeib0zhhtx.png
Delicious tutorial. I’ve always loved the way those envelopes look. I reckon a little bit of monochromatic noise or some kind of texture would help give it a less plastic feel but that’s easy enough for us to do ourselves and this is a damn good tutorial even without that.
Love the creation of that stamp…
The envelop is very nice and the process is will arrange.Thank you
Wow great tut.. really cool.
Finally found the tut I was looking for =D
i didnt really like this i think it is a very bad icon and i dont think you should post another one of these every again.
It’s very simple and nice lesson!
im having trouble with step 4 (complete newb) im having trouble making the blue and red strips the same size, i try to copy the first one i make and paste it, but it creates another layer, and i cant make every rectangle the same size just by using the rectangle tool
nice, finally i got here, thanks for sharing!!
very very very gooooooooooooooooooood
Very good lesson! Thanx! ^_^
Thanks Asher!
My name is Agustin and I used to do icons before but I slowly due to not practicing lost some of my skills and speed, this tutorial is slowly helping me brush my skills and become an even better icon designer then I used to be.