While working away on one of the projects I’m doing in my free time I’ve stumbled upon some really incredible Photoshop design mockups. Which are basically Photoshop files that others have gone to great lengths to prepare to receive any design on items like business cards, letterheads, pens, mugs, and various other commercial items. Just pop your 2D design file onto the right layer and BAM, they give you a mockup as if you had all the materials printed/manufactured and professionally photographed yourself. I had known these existed for some time but assumed they were mostly for rough concepts to present to clients (since most clients like the peace of mind that comes with seeing something real). But WOW these far from roughs! I found some incredible work on websites like Design Burger and by many others who offer many of their files completely free!
I dug through a lot of these files looking for just the right ones to use to mockup my project. I found some great candidates but I couldn’t help but wonder: How professional is this? Without a doubt they look superb, and how many would actually notice anything beyond the designs anyway? Still I was worried these may not be the best choice for portfolio work, which is my ultimate goal with the project. So I thought a middle ground may be possible that would still save the trouble of printed or paying for other expensive production. Create my own blank Photoshop mockups. Surprisingly they are pretty easy to do, at least with the method I discovered. They rely largely on the perspective filter to correctly lay the 2 dimensional file onto a 3D plane. The rest is a bit of texture filters and color shapes matching the original photo. The examples I’m posting here are really rough but they illustrate how with some time put in it would not be difficult to produce some unique and design friendly mockups for a project.
The original photo:
Added color:
Added designs (just random stuff):
The potential is there for sure. I look forward to trying this out more, a simple tutorial that can help anyone try it out: Click Here
As a bonus some of the awesome mockups I found with a graphic from the very project that lead me to them.
