Photoshop Type - Creating Warped Text 2

Horizontal and Vertical Distortion

There are two other options in the bottom half of the Warp Text dialog box - Horizontal Distortion and Vertical Distortion. These two options can be a bit confusing because while the Bend value controls the intensity of our chosen warp style, the Horizontal and Vertical Distortion options are completely independent effects. What makes it confusing is that Photoshop forces us to choose a style from the Style option before it gives us access to the Horizontal and Vertical Distortion sliders, but the distortion effects have nothing to do with the style we chose and in fact, we can use these sliders even if we effectively turn the warp style off.

To show you what I mean, I'll leave my warp style set to Arc, but I'll set my Bend value to 0% by dragging the slider to the mid-way point:

Leaving Arc selected but setting the Bend value to 0%.

Even though I have Arc chosen as my warp style, with Bend set to 0%, the style currently has no effect on my text because no bend is being applied:

A Bend value of 0% effectively turns the style off.

I'll drag the Horizontal Distortion slider to the right to set the value around 80%:

Increasing Horizontal Distortion to 80%.

This creates somewhat of a 3D perspective effect as if the text is moving closer to us from left to right, but all it's really doing is squishing the letters towards the left and stretching them towards the right. If you're trying to create a true perspective effect, you'll get better results using Photoshop's Free Transform command:

The result of applying horizontal distortion to the text.

Like the Bend option, we can set the Horizontal or Vertical Distortion options to negative values as well by dragging the slider to the left. I'll drag the Horizontal Distortion slider to -80%:

Lowering the Horizontal Distortion to -80%.

This gives us the same pseudo-perspective effect but in the opposite direction:

A negative Horizontal Distortion value flips the direction of the effect.

We can get similar results from the Vertical Distortion option except that the effect will be vertical rather than horizontal. I'll set the Horizontal Distortion option back to 0%, then I'll increase Vertical Distortion to 25% by dragging the slider to the right:

Increasing Vertical Distortion to 25%.

This gives the text a familiar "Star Wars" look, but again, it's not a true perspective effect. The Free Transform command would still produce better results:

The text with 25% Vertical Distortion applied.

As we saw with the Horizontal Distortion option, we can flip the result by setting Vertical Distortion to a negative value. I'll drag the slider to -25%:

Lowering Vertical Distortion to -25%.

This time, we get an upside down "Star Wars" effect:

The text with Vertical Distortion set to -25%.

It's unlikely that you'll want to use the Horizontal and Vertical Distortion options very often, and as I mentioned, they're completely independent of the warp style you've chosen. In most cases, you'll simply want to choose a warp style from the Style option and then adjust the intensity of the warp using the Bend slider while leaving the Horizontal and Vertical Distortion options set to their default values of 0%.

Making Changes To The Warping Effect

Once you're happy with the results, click OK in the top right corner of the Warp Text dialog box to close out of it. If you then look in the Layers panel, you'll see that the icon in the Type layer's thumbnail has changed to indicate that warping effects are being applied to the text on that layer:

The Type layer now displays the Warp Text icon in the thumbnail.

As I mentioned at the beginning of the tutorial, one of the great things about these text warping options is that they're not permanently applied to the text. We can go back at any time and change any of the warp settings, including the warp style itself. To do that, make sure you have your Type layer and the Type Tool selected, then simply click again on the Warp Text icon in the Options Bar:

Clicking again on the Warp Text option.

This re-opens the Warp Text dialog box where you can make any changes you need. I think I'll change my warp style from Arc to Flag, then I'll set my Bend value to 25%:

Changing the Style from Arc to Flag and setting Bend to 25%.

Just like that, I get a different warping effect applied to my text and all I had to do was choose a different style from the list. You can go back and make changes as many times as you like, so be sure to try out all 15 warp styles to see what effect each one will give you. You'll find that some are a lot crazier than others. To cancel the warping effect and switch back to your normal text, simply choose None from the Style option:

The same text with the Flag style applied.

And there we have it! That's how to create simple text effects using the Warp Text options in Photoshop!