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In this tutorial we will be making this “Dark Stare” tag, designed by HauntedGravity. This tag was made with some pen tool techniques, use of the smudge tool, burn tool, several renders and filter effects such as high pass. We will show you the brush technique used to create curly lines shown in this signature. We hope you enjoy this tutorial, if you have any questions please use the comment system below.

1. Create a new file, we used size 400 pixels by 200 pixels. Find a good wallpaper to work with:

2. Paste your wallpaper in the canvas and place it on your canvas:

3. We’re going to use the pentool to create some nice lines on our canvas. Grab the pentool, and select these settings on the toolbar:

With these settings we will use paths to create our lines. The advantages of using paths over shape layers is that we can reuse it at a later time if we need it some more.

4. We need to set some brush details. Select your brush or press B, then click on the brushes panel (Toggle Brushes Panel) in the right top corner.

In the brush settings, select a 5, 6 or 7 pixel sized hard brush. Set the angle to 8 to 10 degrees, and set its roundness to 1%.

5. Use the eyedropper tool to select a color on your canvas. Select the Paths window on your layer palette, and right click on the path, and select stroke path:

In the dropdown menu, select your brush.If you’ve picked a good color in step 5, you should have a nice result:

6. In the paths window, create a new path by clicking on the New File icon in the right corner. Repeat the same step on the other side of your focal. Our result:

7. We’re going to smudge the sections around our focal point. Make a new layer (Layer > New Layer, or SHIFT + CTRL + N), and go to Image > Appy Image. Grab your smudge tool, and start smudging. You can pick the smudge settings you like best:

8. We’re going to create another line with the pen tool with a lighter color. Right click > Stroke path, select your brush, and press ok:

9. Repeat the same step on the other side, make sure you add some variation but you keep following the flow of the lines:

9. We’re going to add a bubbly cinema4d render. You can find plenty of cinema4d renders in our Resources section. Erase the section around your render. Set its blending mode to Lighten, and keep the opacity high. This layer was kept on 100%. To illustrate what our layer looked like, heres the layer on a transparant background:

the result of this effect:

10. Add another render, and keep duplicating the layer. Move it around everytime and erase parts you dont like. Remember to set the layers blending mode to Lighten. These are the layers set on a black background so you can see its effect:

after duplicating and moving:

Blending mode changed to Lighting and 100% opacity:

11. We’re going to add an effect cinema4d into our canvas. This is our layer shown on a black background. Erase this layer around the focal point:

Set this layer to Lighten (this image is shown in a rather low quality because its saved as a .GIF file):

12. Make a new layer, and apply the image (Image > Apply Image). Grab your burn tool, and burn near the side to add some depth:

burning the sides of the canvas:

13. We’re adding a little lighting to the top of the signature to increase depth. Use your brush tool, and make a white spot where you want to add some depth.You can set this layer to Lighten or keep it. This is the layer with a black background to show you what it looks like:

on the background:

14. Make a new layer, and apply the image (Image > Apply Image). Select Filter > Other > High Pass, and keep the default settings:

default settings:

result of the high pass filter:

15. Set this layer to Soft Light, keep the opacity on 100%:

16. If you feel like canvas needs some work on lighting, create a new adjustment layer. Layer > New Adsjustment Layer > Gradient Map. Set this to Luminosity, and reduce the opacity. Our opacity was set to 30%!

Gradient Map:

Gradient map result:

17. The following step is optional. We’re going to use the Topaz filter. You can find more information about Topaz in this article. First, select Topaz Denoise/EQ, then select Filter > Topaz Vivacity > Topaz Sharpen. You can play around with the filter until you’re satisfied.

18. Apply the image on a new layer, and grab the burn tool once again. Burn the edges and sections that you’re not satisfied with.

our result:

19. We’re basicly done at this step, all you have to do is add a border. This signature has a wide black pixel border on the side:

20. Add text, sharpen or burn whatever you like, and you’re done!

Please show us your result in the comments below! If you like we will feature your signature result in this post. (if you need a host, check out uploadstop.)