Simple Orbs Tutorial

The Simple Orbs Tutorial is a very simple technique , yet it could add some dramatic touches to your design. It is just one layer object but you can replicate it over and over, and change the sizes.

1.) First, create a document with a 200 x 200 image size, choose a white or black background.

2.) Next , we must create a circle 80 x 80 size , remember to have an equal circumference on the circle, we must hold down shift when making the circle, or you could just input the correct values in the property panel.

3.) Change the fill color of the circle ,  from Solid into Radial , ( take note, there must be no stroke color selected )

4.) Click the small image to open the color properties of the radial gradient.

5.) Now this is the tricky part , but once you are able to get the hang of it you would know it is actually easy. First thing you need to do is practice moving the color sliders, moving the sliders from the far left to right can greatly affect the look of your image.

a.) If you want to add a color to your gradient, you just simply point the mouse to an area where there is no color slider, ( check the orange circle for ex ) , you will notice a color slider will appear. You must move the color sliders as show in the image.

b.) The green circles are the color sliders, if you click them you can change the colors of your gradient.

Follow these values for the color sliders from left to right. Check the white circle below for referrence.

#FFFFFF

#66FFFF

#226C7F

#000000

c.)  The red circles control the opacity of your color slider , by default , there are only 2 opacity sliders , you can add more opacity sliders just like adding color sliders, by clicking on an empty area. These opacity sliders can make your color slider look from visible to transparent. Now we need to click the right opacity slider and set it to 20.

Now we have an image that looks like this =)

Now all we need to do now is change the background color into black.

6.) We need to change the layer blend mode of the orb from Normal , to Screen.

7.)

Now if you want to add more orbs, your just need to duplicate them over and over again as much as you like, this technique best works in darker backgrounds, try to scale down the orb if you want variety, for example we made a 80 x 80 circle, reducing the size to 20 x 20 could make it look different, experiment and have fun ! . Copy and paste the image, scale them down or up as often as you like. You can even put two orbs together and they look like they were fused as one

Do not limit yourself to the colors I provided in the tutorial , you can change the colors of the color sliders, or use Hue / Saturation Filter.

Here is the source file of the tutorial , just right click and save it to your desktop. Hope I was able to teach you guys,  comments are welcome !