I often run into these pixel graphics on the internet, and often times they are done painstakingly by hand. It pays off though, because they look great in the end. Here are some tips on how you can fake them on text, mainly using the Curves panel.

Start with your text.

Duplicate it. Hide the original layer.

Apply these Bevel and Emboss settings to the duplicate.

Make a new layer, hide the background layer (keep the original hidden), and press Control-E. This will rasterize the blending options. Now duplicate this layer and go to curves. Apply settings like the ones below:

Put this layer into it’s own folder. Set it’s blending options to “Screen”. Select the layer, and while holding alt, nudge it down for a few seconds. The result should look like this: (You will also have about 20 more layers in that folder)

Now trace it with the pen tool. With the text tool, click on the path and add text all around it.

Now hide the shape you put your text on.

Now show the original and change the color to whatever you’d like.

For the added bonus, with curves we can also pixelate other shapes. Draw some shapes with the pen tool.

Here I applied a Color Halftone filter. It is not required. However, make sure you rasterize your shapes and merge them into the same layer.

Now, apply a motion blur to this layer.

Go to curves and put in lots of sporadic dots like you have before, the result should look something like this:

Here’s my final:

If you want the actual text to have pixel traces inside of it, here’s another example.

First apply a Bevel and Emboss.

Now duplicate this layer. Hide the original. Hide the background, make a new layer and hit Control-E. Now go to curves.

Put this layer on top with “Screen” as the blending option and 20%-50% as the opacity.

Keywords: Adobe Photoshop tutorial, vector shapes, pen tool, pixel graphics, how to fake pixel graphics, text effect, adobe photo shop, add noise.