Open new canvas, 600 x 600, white background, 72 ppi.
Create a new layer and using the polygon lasso draw out your crystal
shape. Double click when finished drawing and the shape will become a
selection. Do not deselect.
Step 2:
Fill with a dark color (note: you can practice using
different colors. On a later replication of this I actually found a
medium color produced a better effect. This of course depends on the
hue etc). Again, do not deselect.
Step 3:
Go to Select/Modify/Contract and enter 6 pixels (this
depends on the actual size of your 'crystals').
Step 4:
Go to Select/Feather and enter a value of 5
(again, this depends on the size of your 'crystals' and it is something
you can experiment with).
Step 5:
Select a lighter shade of the color you used as a fill
the first time. Using the paint bucket fill the selected areas.
Step 6:
Right click on the layer and duplicate. Apply a
gaussian blur (I used 8, again something to experiment with). Drag
the copy layer beneath the original layer.
Step 7:
Double click on 'crystal' layer to open layer style
options. Choose Bevel & emboss - Inner Bevel/Chisel Soft.
Depth 100, Size 10 (again something to experiment with). Change the
gloss contour to cone, uncheck global light, and the altitude has a value
of 7.
Again you can experiment with contours (I later used
'rolling stone descending' - see second example below). Lower fill opacity
to 42.
Click ok. Change layer mode to Screen.
Step 8:
Duplicate the crystal layer. Go to Edit/Transform/
Rotate. Rotate the new layer and see how it interacts with the
original layer.
Voila! You can play around
with different effects and different backgrounds. Another example
below shows how using the 'rolling stone descending' contour affected the
image - personally, I prefer this contour.
