Warping Text

Photoshop Elements lets you distort text easily using the Warp tool. You can choose from 15 different warping options in the Warp Text dialog box. In this dialog box, you can adjust the amount of the bend in the type, as well as the horizontal and vertical distortion.

Even after you've warped your text, it's still completely editable, and you can make additional formatting changes to it at any time. But because the warp effect is applied to the entire type layer, you can't warp individual charactersit's all or nothing. The Warp Text Style Gallery includes a few examples of the results you can get with this addictive tool.

To warp text

1.	Select a type layer on the Layers palette.
2.	From the toolbar, select a type tool (so that the type options appear on the options bar) and click the Create Warped Text icon (Figure 9.40). Figure 9.40. Click the Create Warped Text icon on the options bar to experiment with various type distortions. The Warp Text dialog box appears.
3.	Choose a warp style from the drop-down menu (Figure 9.41). Figure 9.41. You can select from 15 different text warp options and make additional adjustments for each.
4.	Choose either Horizontal or Vertical orientation for the effect (Figure 9.42). Figure 9.42. The Horizontal and Vertical orientation options create radically different results.
5.	You can also modify the amount of Bend and Horizontal or Vertical distortion using the sliders (Figure 9.43). Figure 9.43. In this example, the Bend slider helps to dramatically exaggerate the fish shape.
6.	Click OK to apply the effect.

To remove text warp

1.	On the Layers palette, select a type layer that's been warped.
2.	Select a type tool and click the Warp icon on the options bar.
3.	Choose None from the Style drop-down menu (Figure 9.44). Figure 9.44. To remove text warp, select None from the Style drop-down menu.
4.	Click OK to remove the effect.

Tip

• As you experiment with the various warping options, your text can undergo some pretty dramatic changes. For this reason, you might want to move your text around to see how it looks in different parts of your image. Luckily, you can do this without closing the Warp Text dialog box. If you move your pointer into the image area, you'll see that it automatically changes to the Move tool so you can move your text around while adjusting the warping effect.