Optimize layer styles to a document's resolution

There are many awesome layer styles available over the internet. The majority of these styles are created for 72 ppi (pixels per inch) documents. There are also a few styles created for 300 ppi documents. What can you do if you want to use these styles but your Photoshop document has a different resolution? The styles will appear upscaled or downscaled. This  Photoshop tutorial will show you how to correct the problem with a simple calculation.

In the example to the left I created a new Photoshop document at 300 ppi. I added a text layer and applied the beautiful (& free) Baltic Sea Glass style from Shellyn Long. The style settings are optimized for 72 ppi documents. As you can see in the example, the style details have been upscaled considerably in my 300ppi document.

In order to solve this problem and optimize all style settings so that the effects look optimum on my own document, I need to rescale the style effects by a certain factor (x). To find the value of this factor I have to do this simple calculation:

x = (style resolution) / (document resolution) * 100

In my example this factor is 72 / 300 * 100 = 24. Hence I have to rescale this style's settings down to 24%. Here is how to do it:

Choose Layer > Layer Style > Scale Effects from the main menu, or right-click the "fx" button in the layers panel and choose "Scale Effects".

Enter "24" in the scale field and hit OK.

That's it.

Now the style details show up perfectly on my 300 ppi document.

Similarly, if the original style was created on a 300 ppi document but you are working on a 72 ppi document then you need to upscale the style by 417% (300 / 72 * 100):

Panos