Shadows add reality to the objects. For a lively presentation of any object, shadow plays an important role. If you are an online seller, you need to use the drop shadow service frequently. To fulfill this demand, you can learn the process by yourself or make it done by any service provider. Not only product, you can keep drop shadow text to make a style in your informatics.
Curious to know the process of adding a drop shadow to your product image? Here you go!
What is Drop Shadow?
In simple words, it is a process to add artificial shadow to a product or object. The main purpose of the shadow is to make an aesthetic effect to a product. Not only colors, rather shadows play an important part for hooking up the viewers. Relating the customers with desired products by image is difficult. Here, you can manage this tough task by adding realistic drop shadows in photoshop.
Deep-down the Shadow
Light forms shadow. As a result, the essence of the shadow is affected by the composition of lighting. The light you’re thinking will determine how dark your shadow should be and at what angle it should be placed. The intensity of light, the variety of light sources, the distance between the light and the product, and other options all play a role in the shadow’s appearance.
Hard light casts a darker, crisper shadow, whereas soft light casts a softer shadow. In addition, you must select the best angle for your image. Light is reflected differently by different interfaces. Examine your image carefully before adding shadows in Photoshop. Recognize the lighting used while photographing it. The main thing is to take care of the rhythm between the shadow and the object.
5 Steps to add shadow in photoshop
Step 1. Background removal
Remove the object that you need to add shadow. For removing the background-
- Open image
- Pick the pen tool in photoshop.
- Do the full clipping path of the object.
- Right-click on the mouse and click selection.
- Separate the image from the background.
Step 2. Adjust the canvas size
Resizing the canvas in photoshop is easy. The size reduction is a bit trickier than the enlargement.
- To begin, select the canvas proportion from the portrait list.
- Choose a segment and enter the canvas’s expected size.
- You can also define the canvas size using the Relative toolbar.
- Fill the new canvas with the real object.
- Multiply the blending mode to 100%.
- Choose the distort option to use tools for modifying as required.
- Do erase, cleaning, and fill back to 75%
Step 3. Locking transparent pixels
- Once you get the layer panel,
- Copy the layer using Ctrl+J
- Click on the original layer style to active it
- Open the transform tool by pressing Ctrl+T
- Click and hold the top middle point
- Drag the point down and set the angle of the shadow
- Click inside the transform and move to reposition
- Press Enter and lock the transparent pixels from the right sidebar
Step 4. Adding gradient in your channel
Gradients need a product to look more elegant and clearly visible.
- Open the gradient tool
- Click on the arrow next to the horizontal gradient bar
- Choose the third block, that is the black to white gradient
- Highlight the linear gradient
- Go to the bottom of the product and drag the line above the top
- Unlock the transparent pixels from right bar
- Change the blend mode to Multiply
Step 5. Blur the shadow
- First, blur the base.
- Go to Filter
- Choose Blur > Gaussian blur
- Adjust the radius according to your image size and resolution
- Open the rectangular marquee tool and drag out a rectangle to the top half of the shadow.
- Click on refine edge
- Change the feather a bit (100 px maybe)
For the upper part of the shadow-
- Go to Filter
- Click Blur > Gaussian blur
- Adjust the radius according to image size and resolution
- To delete the selection, press Ctrl + D
- Change the opacity to 80%
- Save the file
Final thought
To get a realistic view in a product image, shadow and reflection is the most effective thing in photoshop. From this article, you have understood how to put a shadow around an image in Photoshop. To learn by yourself, you can follow tutorials step by step. For you a professional service, you can choose Creative Clipping Path for bulk images.