In this lesson, step by step, you will learn how to create an animated button with a backlight effect from scratch.
Final result
First, create a new document with a size of 800×600 pixels.
For the background, the author decided to use dark gray color, as he is most suited to other design elements. Set this foreground color and click Alt +Delete or Alt +Backspace, after that the background will be filled.
Now let’s do the guides. This will help us position the shape in the center of the document. If you do not see the rulers on the top and left side of the workspace, press the key combination Ctrl +R and they will appear. Pull out the guides. If you have a menu View (View) enabled Snapping (Snap), then the guides when moving horizontally and vertically themselves will “cling” in the center of the document.
Now we are ready to start creating the button. Activate the tool Ellipse
(Ellipse Tool) and make sure it is in Figure
(Shape).
To create a perfect circle from the center, hold down the key combination Shift +Alt Position the tool cursor at the center of the intersection of the guides and draw a circle.
Add a gradient to the created shape. Double click on the shape layer to bring up the layer style settings. In the window that appears, select the style Gradient overlay (Gradient Overlay) and click on the gradient bar to open its editor. Now we can customize the colors.
The left gradient slider in the editor will be responsible for the color of the bottom of our shape, and the right for the color of the upper part. As a result, the lower part of the circle will be slightly lighter than the main background color, and the upper one, on the contrary, will be slightly darker.
The first figure is completed, we will deal with the second. Duplicate the circle Ctrl +J and clear the layer styles on the copies that were copied from the original. Just right-click and select an option. Clear layer style (Clear Layer Style).
Now change the color of the second shape. Double-click on the figure layer and set its color to 262,626, which will be a little lighter than our background.
Once you have set up the color of the shape, you need to reduce it. Use the key combination Ctrl +T to call free transformation and reduce the circle while holding the key Shift , for proportional reduction.
Now we need to create a “window” through which we will see a moving glow on the button. Do this with a tool Arbitrary shape
(Custom shape), cutting a hole in the copy of the shape we made earlier.
And so, activate the tool. Arbitrary shape (Custom shape).
In the top toolbar of the tool, select the shape shown in the screenshot.
If you do not find this figure in your set, then you need to click the settings button in the right corner and in the drop-down menu select the option Everything (All).
After that, a pop-up window will appear with command options. Choose To add (Append).
Once an arbitrary shape is chosen, we need to subtract it from our circle. Do it this way. You can set the option in the top menu Subtract front figure (Subtract Front Shape) and in the appeared window enter your settings for the subtraction shape.
The second option is to simply draw this shape from the center while holding the key Shift to preserve the proportions, not bringing it to the very edge. In the top tool settings menu, the option should also be set. Subtract front figure (Subtract Front Shape).
Of course, now add layer styles to the shape that will add depth to it. It will be Stamping (BevelEmboss) and Shadow (Drop Shadow).
We come to an interesting point in the lesson – creating a glow. There will be two of them – one important thing that will be seen in the “window”, the second will act as a reflection on the back of the figure. First create a glow – a reflection. Duplicate the main, lowest shape again. Ctrl +J and clear the layer styles created duplicate, which are copied from the original, as they did before.
Open the layer style window and set Fill opacity (Fill Opacity) at 0%. This will hide the visibility of the shape, but leave all the effects of the layer styles visible.
Add style Gradient overlay (Gradient Overlay).
This gradient will be slightly different than what you previously created. Start by giving him style Radial (Radial).
Open the gradient editor and set the left engine, which will be responsible for the main color of the glow, the value 00a8ff, and to the right black color and set the opacity of the black engine to 0%. This can be done by clicking on the upper slider, after which it will be possible to edit the opacity.
Right now you are probably thinking: “Well, where is the gradient?” It’s simple – he is hiding under the top figure. Some of you may not know that gradients can be moved anywhere without closing the layer style window. Place your cursor directly on the document and drag the gradient to the top right corner with the mouse.
You can also control the scale of the gradient, if you want to reduce it slightly. Close the gradient editor, scale the gradient to about 75% and move it to its final location.
We now turn to the main glow, which will be displayed in the “window”. Duplicate the glow layer Ctrl +J, that you created earlier and using Ctrl +T reduce it to the size of the top figure. Holding the keys Shift and Alt, you can scale the shape proportionally to the center.
Edit the gradient. In the layer style window, open the gradient editor. First return Opacity (Opacity) 100% of the right engine, and then change its color to dark blue with a value 00193e. Add one more slider between left and right by hovering over the gradient bar. Its position is about 30%. Set the middle engine to light blue. 76cdff.
Now change the gradient blend mode to Lightening basics (Color Dodge). And just like last time, move it to the desired location.
And now let’s start creating animation!
We will animate two layers and each one separately – the main glow in the “window” and its reflection. It would be easier to combine them into a smart object, but because of the different blending modes of these layers, it will not look great. Therefore, we transform each layer of the glow into a separate Smart Object (Smart Object) of which we will create an animation.
Right-click on the first created layer with a glow and select the option in the menu Convert to smart object (Convert to Smart Object).
Now also transform the second layer with a glow into a smart object. You will notice that the previously applied blending mode for the gradient will lose its effect, but you can easily change this by setting the layer to the same blending mode. Lightening basics (Color Dodge) right in the layers palette. That is why we convert each layer separately.
Well, now the animation itself. To open Time scale (Timeline) Double-click on its palette at the bottom of the program workspace. In the event that your scale is not visible, open it in the menu Window (Window).
Press the button Create timeline for video (Create Video Timeline) and all your layers will be loaded into the timeline. Selected in it will be the same layer as in the layers palette.
Let’s start with the glow-reflection. When you select this layer, you can expand the list of options that can be animated.
We are going to animate the option. Perspective (Transform), which includes rotation. Click the stopwatch icon next to the Perspective option to create the first keyframe.
After the first keyframe is created, drag the current time indicator (indicated by the blue slider) slightly to the right on the timeline. This will be halfway through our animation, where we are going to make the first turn.
Call free transformation Ctrl +T and in the top settings panel enter an angle of 180 degrees. So we turn the glow-reflection layer for the first time.
As soon as you confirm the transformation, a part of the animation will be made and a keyframe will automatically be created. You can see the animation in action by moving the blue slider to the beginning. Do not worry, if your animation is uneven when you move the slider, as soon as the slider’s path is completely independently traversed, everything will become OK.
Now we will do the same for the second half of the rotation of the animation. Again, drag the current time indicator (blue slider) slightly to the right in the timeline. Call free transformation Ctrl +T and in the top settings panel as last time, enter the value of the angle 180 degrees. Confirm the transformation.
Animation of the glow layer – reflection complete! Now do the same with the main glow in the window.
To set the duration of your animation, in the right corner of the timeline, move the slider (set the end of the work area) to your last keyframe.
In order for the animation to play constantly, not once, in the right corner of the scale, open the settings menu and turn on the option Play loop (Loop Playback).
The animation is ready! Now the finished animation can be rendered as a video, but we better save it in gif format for use on the Internet. Save it through the menu File – Save for Web (File – Save for Web). Select a gif for the file. At the bottom of the settings window, you can also select repeat options, either continuously or once. In our case it should be Constantly (Forever).
That’s it, the lesson is over! Good luck!
