How to Do Custom Carving in Photoshop

If you want to make text look engraved, or "carve" a custom shape into a wooden pattern, Photoshop makes it easy. With a little positing and help from Photoshop's layer styles you can make an image look like you chiseled it yourself.

Instructions

1. Open any texture image in Photoshop. Stone and wood serve best but you can certainly use metal or plastic. Name the texture layer "Base." Make a selection in the shape of the object you want to carve (a plaque, a tombstone or a metal plate) and mask the texture layer.

2. Draw your carved shape with any of Photoshop's tools. It could be text or a shape path. (You could even import an image from another graphics program.) Place it on the layer immediately above the surface texture.

3. Hold down the "Command/Ctrl" key and click on the new layer's thumbnail in the layers palette to convert it into a selection shape. Make the base layer active in the layers palette and copy the selected texture pixels from the base layer to a new layer. Name the new layer "Carving." Hide or delete the unnamed shape layer; you're through with it.

4. Keep the selection active and add a "Levels" adjustment layer to the carving layer (Layer menu New Adjustment Layer submenu). The selection will mask the adjustment to the selected area only. Drag the midtones slider slightly to the right just enough to darken the carving texture and make it stand out from the original texture layer.

5. Apply the "Bevel and Emboss" layer style from the layer's palette "FX" pullout menu. Set the style to "Emboss" and the direction to "Down." Your text or carving will appear to be carved into the texture underneath.

6. Activate the carving layer shape selection if you want the carving to go all the way through the base layer (hold down the "Command" key and click on the layer thumbnail). Click on the mask thumbnail in the base layer (you will see the corners highlighted) and fill the selected area with black. Now the inside and outside of the base will be masked. Adjust the fill (not opacity) of the carving layer to 0 to make the carving appear to go all the way through to the back.