This month's LEAP with @FarrahJobling is working with shadows. Most of the shadows I create on my pages are simple shadows, however for some objects I want to do something more advanced, for example with, string, flowers on stems and branches, and objects that are hanging over the edge of other objects. For this tutorial I'm using items from the July Mixed Media Monthly - You are made of Stardust. The method I am going to show you is the same in all 3 versions of Affinity (Publisher, Designer and Photo). I am assuming that you are already familiar with the simple shadow techiques in my previous tutorial here. 1. Select the object 2. Duplicate the object by copy and paste. Ensure that it's pasted directly above the original object on the layers panel. 3. Select the lower object, and open the Layer Effects Dialog. 4. Set-up a simple shadow with a large offset value. 5. Untick the "Fill knocks out shadow" box. 6. Set the fill opacity to 0% 7. This is now the object's shadow layer 8. Keeping the shadow layer selected rotate it. 9. Move the shadow position slightly. Repeating steps 8 and 9 until you get the effect you like. Practice will make this easier to get right first time. 10. ctrl select both the object and it's shadow and group them together {ctrl g}. This will ensure that if you move or resize the element later the shadow will be included.
Thank you for the tutorial. Awesome technique that is actually very easy to master. Sometimes it is worth adding a little gaussian blur to create a more realistic effect.
Thanks for sharing, Angela, for those that use Affinity. The same idea for those looking at your tutorial can be done in PS/PSE & PSP if the shadow is also on a seperate layer can be rotated exactly per your explanation. Thanks again for sharing!
