photoshop branding iron

[John Mensinger]

That’s pretty tough to visualize realistically…I mean…is there anyone who actually has first-hand experience with branded bone?

I figured some sort of effect must be possible, so I took a quick and dirty shot at it using these steps:

Set type in black.
Warp to contour of skull.
Make 2 additional layer-copies below, rasterize, then hide them.
Change the text color of the top copy to a reddish shade, (I used R:166 G:7 B:7).
Apply Layer Styles:
Inner Glow
Outer Glow
Bevel & Emboss
Color Overlay
Satin
Stroke
As contained in the attached style.
Turn on the underlying black copies and apply Gaussian Blur to each. (Setting will vary depending on size/resolution of your image.)
With one of the blurred, black copy layers selected, run the Liquify filter and smudge it upward using the Forward Warp brush, (the top tool in the Liquify toolbox).

Here’s where I stopped:

Here’s the layer style preset: 361_brandedskull.asl.zip

John M:
All of the vim with none of that annoying vigor.