How to Make a Simple ‘Shop Now’ Banner

We will be making these two banners for mobile and the web.

Getting the materials

Download the materials from GitHub (this is a direct link).

Images

If you don’t want to spend any money, make sure that your photographs are royalty-free (meaning it can be used commercially for free).

Royalty-free does not mean it’s free, it just means that you can use it commercially. So, when you purchase a royalty-free image, you can use it commercially.

Some great places to get royalty-images are Pexels, Pixabay and Unsplash. If you’re looking for some premium options Shutterstock, iStock and Deposit Photos are some great cheaper options.

Some general tips on the type of images you should choose,

1. Simple backgrounds (they’re easier to work with)
2. Has the main focus on objects (don’t choose images like landscapes)
3. Something that feels natural (don’t choose images that feel like a stock image)
4. Steer towards images with faces! (I find that it engages the buyer more)
5. Avoid overly filtered images, unless it fits your vision

Alright, let’s start!

Setting up workspace

Open photoshop and press Create new. Give it a name, use the settings from the image below and press Create.

I rectangle the most important settings.

You should get a screen like this,

This is what the window looks like when you launch Photoshop for the very first time

Let’s declutter our workspace by closing and adding some of the windows — Right-click on the hamburger menu and select Close.

Getting the Image Ready

Drag and drop subject.jpg to photoshop, NOT to the canvas.

Duplicate the Background layer by selecting it and pressing CTRL+J or CMND+J alternatively, you can drag and drop it on the plus button.

Another way to duplicate a layer is to drag and drop to the plus sign

Selecting the Subject

Photoshop has 3 major categories for selecting:

1. Shape select
2. Lasso select
3. Wand, Brush, Object select

Each tool’s shortcut key is the letter to the very right.
When more than one tool has the same letter hold SHIFT while holding the shortcut key to go through them.

When you press SHIFT+L for example, will carousel through the tools from top to bottom.

Shape select tools

Lasso select tools

Wand, Brush and, Object tools

Photoshop also has this nifty button in the Properties window, Select Subject and Remove Background. For this tutorial, I’ll be using Select Subject.

First, let’s adjust the contrast of the image so that it’s easier for Photoshop to recognize the difference between the background and Subject.
Go to Image > Adjustments > Brightness/Contrast…

Play around with the Brightness and Contrast. The trick is to adjust them so that the Subject is easy to distinguish from the background. Also, trust your gut. It doesn’t have to look pretty.

Click on the copy layer and click Select Subject. It shows what you select when you see the moving ants.

You might have to scroll down to see these settings if your window is smaller.

moving ants show what is selected

Select Subject does a fairly decent job, but it’s not perfect so we have to do some work ourselves.

When you have multiple subjects in an image, Photoshop might get confused and completely butcher the selection. So you’ll have to do it yourself.

We’ll use the magic wand tool because it’s just a solid colour we have to remove from the selection.

Use these settings

Types of selection you can make with a wand tool (similar to all the other selection tools)

Holding SHIFT while selecting will Add (+) to your selection.
Holding ALT while selecting will Subtract ( — ) from your selection.

Tolerance is how similarly it treats colour when selecting

Change the tolerance if it gets difficult to remove small parts. You can use the Quick Selection Tool if the wand tool doesn’t work. Make sure to check Enhance Edge. ✔

We’re still removing the background so we’ll use the remove selection.

Once you’re happy with your selection, select the Background layer and hit CTRL+J or CMND+J to copy your selection. Your layers panel should look like this.

To double-check your selection, let’s add a solid colour fill layer. A colour window will pop out and you can change the colour to anything. Make it black.

Use the Lasso Tool to select the parts missed. Once you’re done select the Background layer and press CTRL+J or CMND+J.

You can easily see the parts missed during selection.

Move the new layer above Layer 1 and press CTRL+E or CMND+E to merge it into the layer below.

CTRL+E or CMND+E to merge it into the layer below

Using any of the selection tools, keep doing this until your happy with the result. You can compare your selection with the original by hiding and showing the Background copy layer.

Once your done, leave it for a quick second and lets set up our Banners.psd.

Press the eye icon to show or hide a layer

Making the Desktop Banner

Add a colour background layer. Go to your Layers window > Press the circle at down nav bar > Solid Color…
Leave the colour as is, we’ll change it later. Rename the layer to BG or Background Color.

The Color Picker window on the right pops up.

Rename Artboard 1 to <Name here> — Web or Desktop.

Now, save your Photoshop file.

Copy Layer 1 from the image we edited earlier, using CTRL+C or CMND+C and paste it, CTRL+V or CMND+V into Banners.psd. Paste it again so you have 2 copies. One will be a backup so drag it outside of the artboard using the move tool (V).

Hide the layer you just dragged out of the artboard by clicking the eye beside its thumbnail, so you don’t accidentally edit it. Save your work!

Click the image subject in the artboard with the move tool (v). From the top properties nav bar, select Align horizontal and vertical centers.

Align horizontal and vertical centers respectively.

Doing this aligns the image to the centre of the artboard

Click the blue border around the image and make sure the link icon is selected (maintains aspect ratio). While resizing, hold down ALT or OPTN to keep your image at the center.

Holding ALT or OPTION while resizing will resize the image and keep it centred

Move the image to your liking and double click on the image or press the checkmark at the top navbar when done.

Click the checkmark once you’re finished resizing and moving your image

Header Text & Button

Now let’s add the header text and the ‘Shop Now’ button.

Change the default colour of the text.

Use text tool and click on the artboard to place some text

Your text settings at the top should be similar to this picture

To change the font you can also use the properties tab.

Now we’ll add the Shop Now button. First, we’ll add a rounded rectangle using the Rounded rectangle tool.

Click, drag and then release to your desired shape

Change the fill to white and set the border to none.

If you want to edit how round the corners are, select the rectangle and go to the properties tab.

In the properties tab, you can also change the radius of each corner

Next, add a Drop Shadow. This will give it a modern feel, so it doesn’t look too flat and boring.

Settings I used for the drop shadow

Add a text, ‘Shop Now’ and move it on top of the button. Now select both the text layer and rectangle shape and align it vertically and horizontally. This makes sure the text is in the center of the button. Group the rectangle and the text with CTRL+G or CMND+G.

Select the rectangle and text then press the vertical and horizontal align button at the top

Group the button and the header text and align vertically so it is exactly in the middle of the artboard.

Background Colour

To edit the background, double click the square (on the left of the link icon) in our ‘BG ’ layer and a colour picker will pop up. You can either colour pick or/and use the colour picker window.

You can easily change the colour anytime by double-clicking on the square again.

Image Adjustments

The image looks a little bright so let’s use the adjustments to tweak the image.

The different adjustment we can apply on our layers

First, click on your image and then click on ‘Curves ’ Your properties tab should pop up. Drag the Properties window onto the canvas so we can see the whole graph easily. Click the ‘Clip adjustment layer below button’ to make it so that our adjustments only affect the image below it.

You can add any type of adjustments from the adjustments tab. Make sure to click the ‘Clip adjustment layer below button’. Play and experiment with them and once you’re happy, save your photoshop file!

You can toggle the eye or click and hold the eye with the arrow icon to preview before and after

Press the clip layer below button to only affect the image.

Adding a Vignette

Next, we’ll add a vignette to our background to give it some depth.

First, select the ‘Elliptical Marquee Tool’.

Click and hold to pop up the different types of shape select tools

Then select around your focus subject and click the ‘Curves adjustment’ under the Adjustments window

You can move your selection by clicking and dragging within the selection.

Move the newly created adjustment layer right below the image

adjust how bright or light your vignette is.

Right now the mask is just a circle. To make the actual vignette we need to feather the edges. Click the mask layer from either from the ‘Layers’ window or in your ‘Properties’ window select the mask layer icon.

to select a mask from Layers window

To select the mask from Properties window

Feathering softens the edges

If you want to modify the shape of your vignette circle, use the move tool and go to the mask layer. You’ll see the transform border around the circle and now you can move and resize it.

If you don’t want to constrain the proportions, click the link icon. Alternatively, holding the SHIFT key will deactivate/activate constrained proportions.

When the link icon is selected it keeps constrained proportions.

Click on the mask layer, go to move tool and edit the vignette shape

Finishing Touches

Edit the feather, vignette, image adjustments, background colour, font, font style, and font size until your satisfied with what you have.

Here’s a timelapse of my finishing touches:

Making the Mobile Banner

Since we’ve established our style in the Desktop Banner, the mobile banner doesn’t need much work. Elements just need to be shifted, resized and moved so that it looks perfect on a mobile device.

Adding the Artboard & Assets

Go to your ‘Artboard Tool’ under the ‘Move Tool’.

Click and hold for the window to appear or hold SHIFT and press V to cycle through it

Click and drag a space in your photoshop canvas and under the ‘Properties’ window resize it to 1000 px by1000 px. Rename the artboard to ‘Banner -Mobile’

Next, copy the header text, button and BG layer into ‘Banner — Mobile’.

Select the header text, button and BG layer then hold the ALT or OPTN key while dragging the layers into ‘Banners - Mobile’.

Do the same to the original image, NOT the image from ‘Banner — Desktop’. Why? Because, the image in the ‘Banner — Desktop’ is a raster image. Meaning, that any resizing changes (especially enlargement resize) may pixelate the image. There are complex ways to avoid this but for now, the easiest way to keep its high quality is to copy the original image and resize from there.

Select the layers then while dragging the layers into ‘Banner — Mobile’, hold the ALT or OPTN key

Use the same method with copying the header text, button and BG layer to easily copy it into the ‘Banner — Desktop’.

Select the layers then while dragging the layers into ‘Banner — Mobile’, hold the ALT or OPTN key

Resizing and Aligning Assets

Next, we’ll use the same method we used before to resize the image. First, align the image to the center and middle of the artboard. Then, hold ALT while resizing the image (make sure the link icon is activated).

Align the image to the center and middle. Then hold ALT while resizing.

Reorder the layers so the image is directly on top of the ‘BG layer’.

Drag and drop above the ‘BG layer’

You can hold ALT while resizing layers to keep it centred.

Adding a Scrim

A scrim is a layer behind text or elements to make them easier to read or see.

First, we’ll need to make sure that our colour is black.

double click on the square and change the colour to black.

Create a new layer on top of the image.

Select the ‘Brush tool (B)’, and set on the top nav bar, select the brush looking circle. Here edit the size and set the ‘Hardness’ to 0. Then, lower the opacity to 10%-20%.

Brush on the layer until you can clearly see the text and button more.

Adding the Vignette

Since the screen on mobile is less wide than the Desktop banner, we need to create a new vignette shape. Like before we’ll use the same method.

Select the ‘Elliptical Marquee Tool’ and while creating the selection, hold SHIFT to make a perfect circle.

Use the same vignette values (or not, it’s up to what your creativity tells you)

Adjust the properties of the adjustment layer and mask.

Finally, center the vignette using the align buttons at the top navbar (make sure you’re in the move tool).

Exporting Artboards

Once you’re happy with your banners, Go to File > Export > Export As… to export your artboards individually. Once you’ve checked your images, click the blue Export button on the bottom right.

That’s it from me! I hope this helped! Stay safe! 😎😷