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Create the Glass Shelf Dock from Leopard OS in Photoshop

Create the Glass Shelf Dock from Leopard OS in Photoshop

In the new MAC OS X Leopard operating system, the application bar has a new, sleek look. This tutorial will show you how to create the Glass Shelf Dock used for the operating system.

What We Will Be Creating

For those of you not aware of what the Leopard operating system looks like, you can see it here. The image below will give you an idea of what we will be creating.

Final Result

Wallpaper

The background wallpaper we are going to be using is shown below. A larger version can be found here.

Wallpaper

Setting the Guides

Now that we have all the materials we need to get started, and we have an idea of what the Glass Shelf Dock looks like, lets begin to create our own inside of Photoshop.

Begin by Creating a New Document (I used a 1280×800px document) and placing the wallpaper into the Background Layer.

Make sure your rulers are enabled. If they aren’t, navigate to View > Rulers(Ctrl+R). Also make sure your guides are enabled at View > Show > Guides(Ctrl+;). Now lets drag guides out from the vertical ruler to 140px and 1140px. Then drag a guide from the horizontal ruler to 760px.

Guides

Creating the Shelf

Grab your Rectangular Marquee Selection Tool(M) and select the 1000×60px area in between your guides. Then set your colors as such:

#777777 Foreground color #777777

#555555 Background color #555555

Create a new layer. Then grab your Linear Gradient Tool and select the “Foreground to Background” preset gradient. While holding shift, drag your cursor from the top of the selection to the bottom.

Shelf Gradient

Create two more vertical guides at 170px and 1110px. Now lets go to Edit > Transform > Perspective and while holding shift, drag the top left corner to your 170px guide.

Perspective Tip

Holding shift will transform both sides of your object at the same time, so that they stay symmetrical.

Change Perspective

Adding Effect to the Shelf

Change the opacity of your Shelf Layer to 90% or 80%. Ctrl+Click on the thumbnail for the Shelf Layer to make a selection of it. Create a new layer. Then, grab your Pencil Tool and create a 2px line with the color #cccccc across the bottom of the selection and set the opacity of the layer to 85%. Then, above that, create a 1px line on a new layer with the color #000000 and set the opacity to 25%.

Hiding the Guides

We don’t need the guides that we created anymore, so you can either drag them off the screen or hide them by going to View > Show > Guides

Once again, Ctrl+Click on the thumbnail for the Shelf Layer to make a selection of it. Then, create a Foreground to Transparent Gradient about 30px wide on the left and right side of the selection on a new layer. Change the opacity to 10%.

Left/Right Glow

Creating the Glossy Effect

To add more effect to the shelf, lets add a curved gloss to it. Create a new layer and grab your Pen Tool(P). Make sure that your pen is set to paths.

Pen Tool

Before proceeding, you may want to read the tutorial Pen Tool Basics - Custom Shapes to better understand how to create the shape in the next step, since I will not be explaining how to use the pen tool step by step.

Create a path similar to the highlighted area below. Then, right click while you still have your pen tool selected and click make selection. Make sure feather radius is set to 0px.

Path Selection

Grab the Foreground to Transparent Gradient Tool and set your foreground color to #FFFFFF. Then, hold shift and drag the gradient from the bottom of the selection to the top of the selection. You should now have something like below.

Adding Icons

Bring in the first icon that you want to add and place it about halfway up the height of the shelf. Duplicate(Layer > Duplicate Layer…) it and flip it vertically(Edit > Transform > Flip Vertical). Drag it down until the top of the flipped version is touching the bottom of the normal version. Then, change the opacity to 25%.

Adding Shadow

Some people would stop here thinking that the effect is done. However, not only does the actual operating system have shadows for the icons, I would add them even if it didn’t. They help to create more depth and a greater effect.

To add the shadow, duplicate(Layer > Duplicate Layer…) your icon layer and drag the new layer under the original. Fill your layer with black Edit > Fill… Use: Black(Shift+F5). Then change the size of your icon using Edit > Free Transform(Ctrl+T). Drag the top middle box until the top of your icon matches the top of the shelf.

Once you have this accomplished, we need to blur the shadow. Go to Filter > Blur > Gaussian Blur and set the radius to 1.5px. Then change the opacity to 25%.

Completed Shadow

Repeat this process with more icons

Creating the Fading Rectangles

To create the fading rectangles, follow the same steps we used to create the shelf. Make a white rectangle and transform it using perspective. Delete sections of the rectangle, making them get smaller as they get farther away. Then lower the opacity to 25%.

Rectangles

Creating the Orb

Create an oval 10×4px using the Elliptical Marquee Tool. Then apply the following Layer Styles(Layer > Layer Styles).

Glows

The Final Result

We now have all of the objects and effects that we need to complete our design. Lets take a look at the final result.

Final Preview

Creating Something Unique

Experiment with your own styles, colors, and effects to create something that stands out and looks unique. Following a tutorial is one thing, but applying the techniques you learn to something original is on a whole different level.

If you’d like, feel free to grab the Glass Dock PSD to get a bet understanding of how I accomplished this look!

18 Comments

  1. Reply to this comment
    David Leggett

    Incredible Tutorial Tyler! Way to go on your very first tutorial with us at Tutorial9!

    We really do have some talented authors here! Keep it up mate!

  2. Reply to this comment
    Paul Walker

    Great tutorial, but there’s one little accuracy issue. The shelf is not actually transparent. If you look closely, you’ll see that the bit behind the shelf is a reflection of whats above it.

  3. Reply to this comment
    Tyler Bramer

    Thanks for that information Paul. In that case, simply make a copy of the background, flip it vertically, mask it to the same size of the shelf, and lower the opacity to around 10% or so. It would be placed right about the shelf layer.

  4. Reply to this comment
    CJ.H

    Great tutorial! The rollover images really help.

    I cant see myself ever using this, but its good to help me learn the little things.

  5. Reply to this comment
    LOSWL

    Excellent tutorial, love the attention to details :o)

  6. Reply to this comment
    Timothy

    @LOSWL:

    u can say that again, might be able to use this tutorial for flash design thanks dude :)

  7. Reply to this comment
    Tyler Bramer

    I actually made this with flash in mind, I figured someone would be inspired to create a navigation menu styled like the Leopard OS in flash.

  8. Reply to this comment
    Azerbaijan

    Salam Aleykum.
    Thx for the great created tutorial! Well done:)

  9. Reply to this comment
    delmar

    really cool stuff you added there

    keep it up

    thx

  10. Reply to this comment
    Oposinii

    Excellent tut.

    Thanks mate!

  11. Reply to this comment
    ashwin

    thank u very much this is awesome tutorial mate…u r da best

  12. Reply to this comment
    machead5678

    The tutorial is really good but I cannot start, the guides drop-down button is blacked out so I cannot access guides. Does anyone have a way to get them to work?
    I have checked that all of them are enabled.
    Kind Regards,
    machead

  13. Reply to this comment
    Faisal

    you have wonderful view
    thanks 4 tutorial

  14. Reply to this comment
    Dazle

    Machead.
    You might wanna try to turn on on extras and rulers in the view menu. Then you can drag new guides from the page rules on the top and left of your photoshop window. good luck. :-)

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