Super Easy Neon Effect -

Photoshop Tutorial
Revisited
Another year, it's our 11th here over at Abduzeedo land
and we cannot believe it's been already over a decade.
We started as an inspiration and tutorials website,
especially Photoshop tutorial. Looking back it's crazy to
think that we created and shared hundreds of tutorials on
how to use Photoshop, Illustrator, Pixelmator and other
tools. For this year I decided to revisit some of the most
popular ones to see what could be improved. So to kick
things off I'd like to share a simple way to create a neon
light effect in Photoshop. It's very simple and the result is
even better than the previous one. I hope you enjoy it and
let me know what effect should we do next.

Photoshop tutorial
Step 1

Start with a simple layer and with Layer Styles add a

radial gradient. The colors here are quite important
because they will define the level of realism of your
design. It cannot be too saturated or too dark, otherwise
the Color Dodge effect won't work. I am using #303e4a
for the light blue and #151515 for the dark grey.
Step 2

Import the logo you want to use. I am using the outine

version of the Abduzeedo logo. Here's another important
thing, the thickness of the outline/stroke will affect the
realism as well.
Step 3

Now the Layer Style. Quite a few, but important things

changed to Layer Style since I wrote the Neon tutorial
more than 5 years ago. The most important thing for me
is that you can have multiple styles, for example, you can
have more than one Drop Shadow or Inner Shadow.
That's definitely super useful for light effects like this.

The first thing to do is to add a Color Overlay and use

white for the color. If you look at how neon works, pretty
much the center of the tube is very white and the color
gets more visible on the edges. That's what we will try to
replicate.

Step 4

So for the Bevel & Emboss. This part is just to give the
glass look to our form. It's not really necessary if you look
at how neon lights work, but again, it gives some more
depth. Below you can see the values.
Step 5

The Inner Shadow will start giving the realism we want.

The Color Overlay we use is the color we want our neon
light to be. I am using a nice Cyan color.

Step 6
The Inner Glow is the same thing, it wil reinforce the
blend of the blue with the white. Below you can see the
values.

Step 7

The Outer Glow will create the light effect or how the light
interact with the background and other objects. You can
see that I am using the maximum size and Overlay for the
Blend Mode with the same cyan color I want the light
effect to be.
Step 8

The drop shadows will create the blend of lights. You can
achieve that by using Vivid Light or Color Dodge. I am
using 2 Drop Shadows. The first one will behave like an
outer glow and the second one will be the light that gets
reflected on the background. It will be a bit below or
above depending on the angle you want people to see
the logo.
Step 9

Here's the initial result with simple Layer Style

Step 10

Now let's add a concrete texture for the background.

That will dark things up a little bit.
Step 11

Here you can add some little elements, like screws, wires.
It's fairly simple and they don't require too much detail.
Step 12

To connect the neon with the wire we need to add some

elements to create this idea that the neon is a bit far from
the wall. I just used a rectangle with Layer Style as you
can see below.
Conclusion

There are 2 more important things that you can do to

make it look awesome. After you finish your design,
select all layers and duplicate them. Right after merge
thoses in one layer and go to Filter>Blur>Gaussian Blur.
Use something over 20. Duplicate this layer. You will have
2 layers, make the one below to have Overlay for the
Blend Mode and the one on Top Screen @50% opacity.
That will create a super cool glow effect.

Your design is done you can now repilcate that for other
projects and even save it as a style.
Download Photoshop File

I'm a Brazilian product designer based in Oakland,

California currently working for Google as a Staff
Designer. I am also the founder of Abduzeedo, an award-
winning digital publication about design and a personal
project that has become the source of inspiration for
millions of designers and enthusiasts.