This post shows you how to use the drop shadow effect in Photoshop to quickly create a product shadow. This tutorial requires basic Photoshop knowledge.
What is a drop shadow? It’s a shadow that appear on the back of the product. So it’s great for vases like the one below, artwork or necklaces shot hanging.
Start with an image with a transparent background that is either a gif or PNG format. Having a transparent background tells Photoshop where the outline of the product is and where to create the shadow.
The image used below is a PNG file of a vase placed on a layer with a blue background.
Step by step instructions on how to add a shadow in Photoshop
1. Open the ‘drop shadow’ layer style: First, select the image layer. Then from the top menu go to Layer > Layer Style > Drop Shadow. Selecting the image layer tells Photoshop that you want the shadow created based on the image you selected.
2. Select your drop shadow settings: In the window that pops up, you see a bunch of settings. Here is what the different settings mean. In the dialog box, there are 5 settings you should pay attention to:
- For now, leave the Blend mode as ‘Normal’. In the next step, I’ll outline why selecting ‘Multiply’ is a better option.
- Opacity: this slider lightens or darkens your shadow.
- Angle: refers to the angle where the light is coming from. Moving the line within the circle will move the shadow to different sides of the image. For example, when you’re out walking, your shadow moves based on the position of the sun. This slider mimics that.
- Distance: refers to the distance of the shadow from the product.
- Size: refers to the size of the shadow.
- Leave the other settings at their default values.
To a large extent, these shadow settings are based on personal preference. Move these sliders around, select what looks best to you and go with that. If you have the same product in multiple colors, note down the settings you used and use the same settings for all your products for consistency. The second image below shows you a close up of the specific settings used to create the below shadow.
Here are the settings used for the above image.
3. Blend mode: The ‘normal’ blend mode gives you a shadow that has a tint of orange – the orange comes from the color of the product in the image. When it’s on a light background like the blue above, the ‘normal’ mode works fine. But if you change your background to a darker color, then the shadow in normal mode doesn’t look right. In that case, select ‘Multiply’ as your blend mode. ‘Multiply’ works on light backgrounds too so you can select this option all the time. But it’s more useful when you have a dark background.
Here is the shadow with blend mode as Multiply.
That’s it. Hope this post helped you understand the drop shadow option in Photoshop.
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