texture_edge_text.indd

infinite and scalable textures.

[ from Digital Anarchy ]

cool ʻedgyʼ text

Make your text look as if itʼs carved

in stone. Funky text treatments, just

as youʼd expect from us.

a TUTORIAL for

Edge Anarchy from

the Texture Anarchy suite

edge anarchy : cool edgy text

01- load the preset

To work with this tutorial, you will need our texture

preset and a starting image. A ʻpresetʼ is a pattern

that we have already created for you to work with.

The preset and image are on the Digital Anarchy

website, at the following location. Please copy

or type this location into your browser (Internet

Explorer, Safari) to download the ﬁ le: http://www.

digitalanarchy.com/tutorials/texture_edge-text.zip

Unzip to get two ﬁ les. The image ﬁ le ʻanarchy.psdʼ is

the Photoshop ﬁ le that you will add edges to.

The other ﬁ le, called ʻedge-text.prsʼ, is the preset

ﬁ le. Copy the preset (.prs) ﬁ le into the Edge Anarchy

folder in your Photoshop application folder. That

location is: Photoshop\ Plug-Ins\ Digital Anarchy\

Presets\ Edge Anarchy. [ ﬁ gure 2 ]

* We have pictured Macintosh folders here, but the

path is the same for Windows.

The best way to use Edge Anarchy with text is to make

sure the text is thick. This is because Edge Anarchy cuts

into the image to create a border. It is even better

to use an oversized font, create the eﬀ ect, then use

Photoshop to scale down. Text eﬀ ects donʼt work

at smaller point sizes, because the characters get too

thin and eaten away.

In this tutorial, we are going to take a close look at Edge

Anarchy and some of its key parameters. We used Futura

Bold, which is a nice, thick san serif font. [ ﬁ gure 1 ]

[ ﬁ gure 1 ]

[ ﬁ gure 2 ]

edge anarchy : cool edgy text

02- apply the filter

Open up the ʻanarchy.psdʼ ﬁ le

in Photoshop. This image will be

our starting point, and is made of

rasterized text over a solid black

layer. [ ﬁ gure 3 ]

Apply Edge Anarchy through the

menu Filters> Digital Anarchy> Edge

Anarchy). This will bring up the Edge

Anarchy interface, with all its bells

and whistles.

Letʼs explain what some of the bells

do, and weʼll get to the whistles later.

In the upper right corner, click on the

Preset Manager. This is the icon that

has a square within a circle. [ ﬁ gure 4 ]

Scroll to the ʻedgy textʼ category.

There are three textures: Text Start,

Cut Marble, and Marble Finish. Select

the ʻText Startʼ preset, then click the

OK button. [ ﬁ gure 5 ]

03- set edge size

First, letʼs adjust ʻEdge Sizeʼ by

scrubbing on that value until you

reach 30%. [ ﬁ gure 6 ]

This controls how much the texture

eats into the original image. Edge

Size works in conjunction with the

settings Falloﬀ Gradient and Cutout

Texture, but it is the main component

for determining how much of an edge

youʼll create.

Notice that as the Edge Size is

increased, it eats away at more of the

image and will eventually erode the

entire image. [ ﬁ gure 7 ]

[ ﬁ gure 4 ]

[ ﬁ gure 3 ]

[ ﬁ gure 7 ]

[ ﬁ gure 5 ]

[ ﬁ gure 6 ]

edge anarchy : cool edgy text

05- set edge type

There are two types of Edges that can be set by the ʻEdge

Typeʼ parameter. Gaussian produces a rounded edge

and is more suitable for images. Voronoi produces a

square edge and is FAR more suitable for text. To change

between types, just click on the Edge Type box. [ ﬁ gure 7 ]

Since we are using text, change Edge Type to Voronoi.

Youʼll notice that the text takes on a harder edge

immediately and is considerably less eroded than with

Gaussian. Our Gaussian example has much rounder sides

and doesnʼt hold the text together anywhere near as well

as the Voronoi example. [ ﬁ gure 8 ]

Why ʻGaussianʼ and ʻVoronoiʼ instead of Round and

Square? Because weʼre always trying to teach people new

words... weʼre looking out for you! Then again, perhaps

itʼs just because weʼre programmer geeks and donʼt have

enough sense to name things Round and Square.

06- resize cutout texture

A few notes on how textures aﬀ ect the text image. There

are two texture wells, ʻCutout Textureʼ and ʻTint Textureʼ.

[ ﬁ gure 9 ]

The ʻCutout Textureʼ is the more important one. It creates

the bump map that determines how the text/image will

be eroded away. A ʻbump mapʼ is an image that erodes

and shifts another image. The higher the contrast in the

bump texture, the more erosion youʼll see in the image it

is aﬀ ecting or displacing.

[ ﬁ gure 8 ]

[ ﬁ gure 9 ]

[ ﬁ gure 7 ]

edge anarchy : cool edgy text

In a bump map, black and white act as extreme

values. The more blacks and whites, the more

erosion and displacement. If there are more neutral

grays, the overall eﬀ ect will be less severe.

Scale the ʻCutout Textureʼ up and down. To do this,

hover your cursor over the texture well until transfom

controls appear. Select the right-most icon, which is

Scale. [ ﬁ gure 10 ]

As you scrub to the left, the texture will get smaller,

and youʼll get more detail on the text. [ ﬁ gure 11a ]

Scrub to the right to decrease the texture size and

detail. [ ﬁ gure 11b ]

You can also use the Pan and Rotate transform tools

to reposition the texture. Since the textures you are

applying are procedural – based on mathematical

algorithms – there is no pixelation or ʻstair-stepsʼ.

07- change falloff gradient

The other texture well is ʻTint Textureʼ. This

determines how the textureʼs color blends with the

color of the original image. The prominance of the

Tint depends mostly on the Falloﬀ Gradient.

ʻFalloﬀ Gradientʼ sets the blend of the tint and bump

map with the colors of the original text/image. It also

sets the transparency of the edge. [ ﬁ gure 12a ]

Click on Falloﬀ to see the gradient. The preset is

at halfway point, leaving an even mix of Tint and

original color. [ ﬁ gure 12b ] Letʼs move the points

further to the left, so the text color will be more

inﬂ uenced by the Tint texture. This causes the

coloring of the text to take on the texture color.

[ ﬁ gure 12c ]

[ ﬁ gure 12a ]

[ ﬁ gure 10 ]

[ ﬁ gure 11a ]

[ ﬁ gure 11b ]

[ ﬁ gure 12b ]

[ ﬁ gure 12c ]

edge anarchy : cool edgy text

Keep the two middle black/white points close

together to produce a solid edge. [ ﬁ gure 13 ] If they

are far apart, leaving mid-gray tones, the edge will

slowly fade out to transparency, which is not what

we want.

If we move the gradient points further left and

increase the Edge Size to 80, you will end up with

an even more eaten-away image. [ ﬁ gure 14 ]

Alternately, you can load in our ʻCut Marbleʼ preset

to get this image.

08- change gradient again

As an experiment, move the Falloﬀ Gradient points

to the right end. [ ﬁ gure 12 ] Everything disappears!

Not quite... If you set Edge Size back to 20%, the

image reappears. By setting the Falloﬀ Gradient so

far right, we were only using the Cutout Texture

itself to create a displacement. We had reduced the

inﬂ uence of the Tint to basically nothing.

This results in a silhouette of sorts with the Cutout

distorting the text, but not giving it any sort of

depth or coloring. [ ﬁ gure 13 ] It is very useful when

dealing with images for which you want to create a

distressed but non-textured edge.

[ ﬁ gure 13 ]

[ ﬁ gure 12 ]

[ ﬁ gure 13 ]

[ ﬁ gure 14 ]

In summary, by moving the Gradient points left, we increased

the inﬂ uence of the Tint Texture. By increasing the Edge Size,

we allowed more of the original image to be aﬀ ected by both

the Tint and the Cutout Texture.

The combination leads to a sharp, stylized, 3D-ish eﬀ ect. You

can apply the ʻMarble Finishʼ preset to see this ﬁ nal eﬀ ect.