Written by Steve Patterson. In this Photoshop text effects tutorial, we're going to learn how to turn text into gold using Photoshop's Layer Styles. We'll even throw in some sparkles at the end to make our gold letters really shine.

Here's the effect we're going for:

Let's get started!

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Step 1: Open A New Photoshop Document

Open a new document in Photoshop by going up to the File menu and choosing New..., or by using the keyboard shortcut, Ctrl+N (Win) / Command+N (Mac). I'm just going to use the 640x480 preset size. You can use whichever size you like for your width and height, and then click OK to create your new Photoshop document:

Step 2: Fill The Background Layer With Black

Press D on your keyboard to quickly reset Photoshop's foreground and background colors, which sets black as your foreground color. Then use the keyboard shortcut Alt+Backspace (Win) / Option+Delete (Mac) to fill the Background layer with black:

Step 3: Set Your Foreground Color To White And Add Your Text

Press X on your keyboard to swap your foreground and background colors so white becomes your foreground color. Select your Type tool from the Tools palette or by pressing T on your keyboard. Choose a font from the Options Bar at the top of the screen, then click inside the Document Window and enter your text. I'm using "Times New Roman Bold" here to keep things simple if you want to follow along. I'll enter the word "GOLD":

Step 4: Resize Your Text With The Free Transform Command

The text is too small at this point, so with the text layer selected in the Layers palette, use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+T (Win) / Command+T (Mac) to bring up Photoshop's Free Transform box and handles around the text. Hold down Shift+Alt (Win) / Shift+Option (Mac) to have Photoshop constrain the text proportions and resize the text from the center as you drag out any of the corner handles to enlarge the text:

Press Enter (Win) / Return (Mac) when you're done to accept the transformation.

Step 5: Duplicate The Text Layer

Use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+J (Win) / Command+J (Mac) to quickly duplicate the text layer. You should now have three layers in your Layers palette:

We're going to be working on the text copy layer throughout the next few steps.

Step 6: Add A Gradient Overlay To The Text

With the text copy layer selected, click on the Layer Styles icon at the bottom of the Layers palette:

Select Gradient Overlay from the list:

This brings up the Layer Style dialog box set to the Gradient Overlay options:

We're going to set the colors for our gradient, so click directly on the gradient preview area (circled in red above) to bring up the Gradient Editor.

Step 7: Select A Lighter And Darker Gold Color For The Gradient

When the Gradient Editor appears, click on the left color marker to select it, and then click on the Color swatch to choose a color for the left side of the gradient:

This brings up Photoshop's Color Picker. You can use whichever gold colors you prefer, but if you want to follow along, I've entered a color of R:247, G:238, B:173 which gives us a light gold color (I cheated and sampled the color from a photo of a gold coin):

Click OK to accept the color and exit out of the Color Picker. Then, back in the Gradient Editor, click on the right color marker to select it, and then click back on the Color swatch:

When the Color Picker comes back up, enter R:193, G:172, B:81 to give us a darker gold color (also sampled from the gold coin):

Click OK to exit out of the Color Picker once again, and click OK to exit out of the Gradient Editor as well.

Your text should now look like this:

Don't exit out of the Layer Style dialog box yet. We have more to do.

Step 8: Change The Gradient "Style" To "Reflected"

Back in the Gradient Overlay options in the Layer Style dialog box, click on the down-pointing arrow to the right of the word "Linear" and change the Style of the gradient to Reflected:

This will add the darker gold color to both the top and bottom of the text, leaving the lighter color in the middle:

Step 9: Select The "Bevel and Emboss" Options

Click directly on the words "Bevel and Emboss" in the layer styles menu along the left of the Layer Style dialog box to switch to the Bevel and Emboss options. Make sure you click directly on the words themselves, not just in the little box beside them, otherwise the options won't appear:

Step 10: Change The "Technique" To "Chisel Hard"

In the Bevel and Emboss Structure options in the middle of the Layer Style dialog box, click on the down-pointing arrow to the right of the word "Smooth" and change the Technique to Chisel Hard:

Step 11: Change The "Gloss Contour" To "Ring Double"

In the Shading options below the Structure options, click on the down-pointing arrow to the right of the word "Gloss Contour" and select Ring - Double, which is on the bottom row, third from the left:

Select the Anti-Aliased option as well to prevent our text from getting the "jaggies".

Here's the text at this point: