How to Design a Stylish Event Flyer

Despite living in a world that’s growing progressively more digital, printed event flyers are still a surprisingly common project to find on a designer’s desk or within their inbox. These flyers are often for parties, Q&A sessions, fundraisers, conferences, film screenings, and other events. In fact, just last week I was asked to design a flyer for a film festival. Believe me when I say that this is far from a complaint; it just goes to show you that—despite the advent of smartphones, the prevalence of tablets, and the meteoric growth of social networking websites—print promotion is still very much in demand. Print advertising is still a big thing, and learning how to create good advertisements via posters and flyers is still very useful design skill to have. There are thousands of ways to design a flyer. Depending on the nature of the event, you may need your design to be a bit more stylish compared to something more bland and boring. Ladies and gents, power up your Photoshop, because today we are creating a simple but eye-catching flyer using only text, texture, and of course, some Photoshop filters. Here’s a peek ahead at our finished flyer:

 

Step 1: Canvas

Creating a new document within Photoshop, change your dimensions to match the settings in the image below.

 

Step 2: Texture

Go to this website and download the grunge paper texture provided by Bashcorpo. Copy the image and paste it onto your canvas. You will need to resize the image by pressing Ctrl + “T” and scaling it so that it fills the entire whitespace. Don’t forget to press Enter when you are done scaling your image so that the changes can take effect.

 

Step 3: Erasing

Once you have your texture in place, go to your brushes and select a brush that will give you some cool edges when you erase. For example, I used some splatter brushes. If you don’t have splatter brushes, you can either download some or use some other unorthodox brush. As long as it’s not a standard circle brush, it will serve our purposes well.

 

Step 4: Color

Create a new layer, fill it in with #348ee1, and change the layer mode to Color Burn. You should now have a pretty blue color.

 

Step 5: Lines

Select the Rectangular Marquee Tool (or simply press “M” on your keyboard) and with the colors #348ee1, #34b2e1, and #37d9f6, create a vertical rectangular bar like so.

 

Step 6: Warping and Layer Modes

If you created your vertical colors in separate layers, you will need to merge them. If you created them in one layer, you can go ahead and start warping the image by going to “Edit” > “Transform” > “Warp.” Feel free to get creative; you don’t have to replicate the same bend that I did; just make sure the final image touches the corners.

 

When everything is to your liking, go to the layer mode and change it to Subtract, so that you have nice, rustic colors on your blue background.

 

Step 7: Circles and Splatters

Under a new layer, create a giant white circle in the upper corner of your overlapping the rustic bar of color. Using splatter or drip brushes, simply add white drops towards the bottom of the circle until you get something close to the image below. Once again, if you don’t have splatter or drop brushes, any textured brush that adds drips, scratches or marks will do.

 

Step 8: Selecting and Deleting

Using the magic wand, click the newly created dripping circle, then select the rustic bar layer and press Delete. Once this is done, hide the layer with your white dripping circle so that you have a cut out of where the image used to be. This is where we are going to put the date of the event.

 

Step 9: White Box

Create two white boxes using the Marquee Tool, making the smallest box on top. This is where we are going to put the name of the venue presenting the event. Try to get your box as centered as possible. As you can see, I am beginning to add some stroke options around the elements of my designs; this will help it stand out from the background.

 

Step 10: Adding Text

With the color #880f00, I typed my text and centered it in the middle of my white boxes. In order to get the desired effect, I used the Blending Options and selected the Drop Shadow and the Stroke options. The font that I used is called Poplar Std for those who want to know.

 

Step 11: Finishing Text

Finish adding in the rest of the text for the event, making sure to utilize the remaining space. Try using two vastly different colors to create a nice contrast; I used maroon and white for mine.

 

Step 12: Logo

If your event has sponsors, make sure to add their logo to the flyer, as it is a great habit to get into for print advertisements. In general, you’ll want to add your sponsors at the bottom of the flyer so that they don’t distract viewers from the pertinent information. After you are all done with your flyer, the only thing left to do is get your design printed and distributed.

 

Conclusion

Depending on your event, the design I created in this particular tutorial may not suit your needs. In order to figure out what type of flyer would best benefit your event, take in consideration the venue and the target audience. For more business type events, keep it simple and try to use only text and perhaps some gradients. Flyers for more informal things like can include use stock images, textures, gradients, and glowing elements to make them stand out. Here are a couple of examples of flyers I’ve done for several different events, just to show you a wide variety of flyer designs.

I hope you enjoyed it!

Do you get frequent requests for flyer design? Do you have any designs of your own to show off? Do you find yourself doing more or less print work compared to the past?

Create a Stylized Ice Cream Cone in Photoshop

Practice is the perfect way to hone your Photoshop skills, and I’m sure we’ve all had enough practice with common, rudimentary tasks such as cropping corporate head shots, building margin and padding into document designs, and adding drop shadows to punchy marketing copy. Instead of practicing the same old tasks, let’s try a more unusual one that doesn’t hit your desk (or your inbox) every day. This tutorial is primarily an exercise in Photoshop’s Pen Tool (after all, we unfortunately can’t eat the ice cream once we’re done). We’ll be using various Pen Tool filters and layer styling to hone your Pen Tool prowess. 
Let’s have a look at our final result:

Step 1

Create a new document with a 600px width and a 700px height in Photoshop.

 

Step 2

Set #e3a55d as your foreground color. Now, select the Pen Tool, click on the “Shape layers” option from the options bar, and draw the cone shape shown below.

 

Click on this cone layer and go to “Layer” > “Layer style” > “Blending options.” Use the settings provided below. You can also open the layer style window by double clicking on the cone layer.

 

 

 

Step 3

Next, we’ll create stripes for the cone biscuit. Firstly, select #f5c28a as your color and then pick “Hard round brush” with 3px size. Now, select the Pen Tool, choose “Paths” from top options bar, and draw a slightly curved line like the one below. After that, right-click and select “Stroke Path” > “Brush.” Then, press “Delete” to get rid of the path.

 

Double-click on this new line layer and use the settings below to cast a shadow.

 

Step 4

Now, we need few more copies of this line. To do this, take the Move Tool over the line and press the Alt key. You’ll notice double arrows; now simply drag the line a bit. Repeat this step to get the desired copies of the line.

 

Collect all of the stripe layers into a single group, duplicate this group, and go to “Edit” > “Transform” > “Flip horizontal.” After that, press Ctrl + “T” to activate the Free Transform Tool. Tilt these duplicated stripes group to form the crisscross pattern common to waffle cones.

 

Merge both “cone stripe” groups together. You can do this by selecting the groups by holding the Shift key, then right-click to open the options window and choose “Merge layers.” Once you are done, click on the merged layer and then press Ctrl + the thumbnail of cone layer. Now, click on the “Add layer mask” icon found at the bottom of the layers panel.

 

Step 5

Now, we’ll move ahead to create different flavored (and different colored) ice cream scoops. Select the Pen Tool with the “Shape layers” option to draw the shape as shown below. Use #ffeb8a as the color for this.

 

Double-click on the scoop layer and use the settings below to add Inner Glow to the ice cream.

 

Step 6

Next, draw some shadowing and highlights over the scoop using the Pen tool. You can approach this step roughly and imprecisely to get the proper imperfections for ice cream. I’ve used #fec22b for shadows and #fbfec6 for highlights. Once you are done, right-click on the scoop layer, choose “Copy layer style,” right-click on rest of the shape layers, and select “Paste layer style” to apply the same inner glow effect on them.

 

Step 7

Merge all the layers that comprise the scoop of ice cream, then go to “Filter” > “Artistic” > “Palette Knife.” Use the following settings.

 

 

Step 8

Duplicate the scoop layer, turn it black using “Color Overlay,” change the blending mode of this layer to “Multiply,” and then reduce its opacity to 40%. Place this layer below the original scoop layer; drag it a bit downward and go to “Filter” > “Blur” > “Gaussian blur.” Use a 1.5px value for the Gaussian blur. You can erase unwanted shadow area.

 

Step 9

You can create more scoops using the same technique from steps 5 through 8. Add as many scoops as you dare. Reducing the overall size of each new scoop will make the cone look balanced.

 

Step 10

Now, we’ll create chocolate syrup over the ice cream scoops. Draw the shape shown below using the Pen Tool with #753700 as your chosen color.

 

Step 11

Double-click on the newly-added chocolate syrup layer and use the following settings for “Satin.”

 

 

Step 12

For additional toppings (and additional Pen Tool practice), we’ll create sprinkles over the chocolate. Set any bright shades as your foreground and background colors, I am using red and yellow. Then, use these settings within the brush panel.

 

 

Apply the brush as shown below. Carefully drawing your brush over the ice cream should result in an even, multicolored sprinkling of… well… sprinkles on your ice cream.

 

Step 13

Next, we’ll create a cherry to place at the top. Set #ce6d80 as your foreground color. Select the Ellipse Tool to make a circle. Then, use “Add anchor point tool” to add anchor points and adjust the circle shape as below. Once you are done, duplicate this layer, reducing the size of the new duplicate slightly using the Free Transform Tool, and changing its color to #d6030c. Now, select the Elliptical Marquee Tool and fill it with #710000 to form the depressed area on the top of the cherry. After that, go to “Filter” > “Blur” > “Gaussian blur” and use the value of 1px to apply a blur effect.

 

Step 14

Use the following settings to add an Inner Glow to all of the layers comprising your cherry.

 

Now, draw a cherry stem using your Pen tool with #c9c770 and #b9824a as your colors.

 

Step 15

To give the cherry stem some texture and character, click on the green stem layer and apply the following layer style settings.

 

 

Use these settings for Inner Glow on the brown cap at the very top of the stem.

 

 

Step 16

To create few highlights, select the Soft Round Brush Tool and apply it on a new layer. Change the blending mode of this layer to “Soft Light.”

 

Merge all layers forming cherry together, and reduce the cherry’s size as needed using the Free Transform Tool. Place it nicely over the ice cream at an angle. Erase the lower edge of the cherry to give the impression (no pun intended) that it’s embedded in the ice cream.

 

 

Step 17

Collect all of the layers forming your ice cream cone into a new group, and duplicate this group. Now, merge the duplicated group. Reduce its size and arrange it at an angle using the Free Transform Tool. Now, use the same technique from step 8 to create shadow for the ice cream cone. My shadow is shown below.

 

Step 18

Now, we’ll create a subtle background. Set #e7e7e7 and #ffffff as your foreground and background colors, respectively. Create a new layer and fill it with #e7e7e7 using the Paint Bucket Tool. Then, go to “Filter” > “Render” > “Fibers.”

 

Step 19

Next, go to “Filter” > “Distort” > “Glass.” Use the following settings for it.

 

Step 20

Lastly, click on the appropriate icon to “Create new fill or adjustment layer” found at the bottom of the layers panel, and select “Curves.” Use these settings to adjust the tone.

 

That’s all guys. Hope you enjoyed the tutorial, polished your Pen Tool skills, and learned something useful. Don’t forget to share your thoughts, and possibly your ice cream as well. Have fun, and enjoy your ice cream!