When the older generation were young, and needed to create a school design or anything that involved cropping letters, we often cropped them first from an old newsprint, before proceeding to work with a colored paper. So this is pretty much what I wanted to create here — a newspapers cropped draft!

Let’s begin with making a new canvas and fill it with any solid color, our choice was #2b362b:

Design a 3D Newspaper Cropped Text Effect - PS Tutorials Lorelei Web Design

To give it a bit of depth, while the background is still selected, go to Layer Styles (Layer >> Layer Style >> Gradient Overlay) and apply the following settings.. This will give a lighter spot in the middle of the canvas that normally gives nice depth.

Design a 3D Newspaper Cropped Text Effect - PS Tutorials Lorelei Web Design

Now, find online or scan any newspaper pager. We couldn’t find one big sheet so we combined ours from a several ads in the local newspaper. Place the newspaper on the canvas.

Design a 3D Newspaper Cropped Text Effect - PS Tutorials Lorelei Web Design

Using a huge Cooper Black font, type your word on top of the newspapers layer. If you are using a different font, however, be sure to work with BOLD letters because the whole effect is based on the boldness of the typography.

Design a 3D Newspaper Cropped Text Effect - PS Tutorials Lorelei Web Design

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Now it’s a little bit tricky for those of you who are still beginners, so please pay attention..

  1. While the typed letters are still selected, hold the CTRL key and press on the layer with the word “News” in the layers panel, this will load a selection around your letters.
  2. Go to Selection >> Modify >> Expand, and expand the selection by about 3-4 pixels. If your font is too narrow, you might want to use a bigger number.
  3. Press Shift + Ctrl + I, to reverse the selection.
  4. Press Delete.

You are now left with 2 layers, cropped from newspapers letters and the typed letters layer, which you can now delete. (or hide, but you certainly not going to need it anymore!).

This is what you have left:

Design a 3D Newspaper Cropped Text Effect - PS Tutorials Lorelei Web Design

Using the Lasso Marquee Tool, crop each letter individually, and once selected, press Ctrl + T to start transforming. Align them in any fashion you want, but do not overdo this effect if you don’t want to end up with  a messed up canvas..