Here is a tutorial for creatin nice glow effect in Photoshop.

Open a new document in Photoshop.  For this example I’ll go with the square canvas. Pick some darker shade of red for the foreground (I’ll go with #941414) and black for the background color.

Now select Gradient tool

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Click and drag from the center to the edge of the canvas. You should get something like this:

Duplicate the background layer (Layer / Duplicate Layer…) and set the blending mode to Color Dodge.

Now we’re going to make a texture for the background. Make a new layer (Layer / New / Layer…). Set the default foreground/background to black/white. Go to Filter / Render / Clouds. Set the blending mode to Overlay and transparency on 30%.

Go to Filter / Sketch / Chrome… and set these values: 5 on Details and 10 on Smoothness. You can always experiment with these values to get something that fits better with your picture. This will add a smoke effect to the texture.

Previous steps were there just for setting the background for our glow effect. Now pick the Pen tool.  We’re going to create S shape curve. To do so, make 4 anchor points, and then with the Convert point tool bend the lines, until you get S curve.


Create a new layer. Pick 3px thin, hard brush and choose a color (I’ll go with #ff9000).
Switch back to the Pen tool, right click on the path and select Stroke path… from drop-down menu. When the dialog box appears, in the Tool field choose a brush and mark Simulate pressure box. This will taper both ends of the S line. After that, again right click on the path and choose Delete path.

Now it’s time for the glow effects. Right click on “S layer” and choose Blending options. We’ll add two layers of glow. Since the line is thin, Inner glow is useless. Outer glow is valid, so we need something different for that second glow. It can be done with Drop shadow and some minor tweaks. Set Outer glow and Drop shadow with these (or similar) values (look picture below). After that, apply Color overlay for shiny glow middle section (color should be white).

Create a new layer and paste the layer style from previous layer (right click on layer and choose Copy Layer Style, then select new layer, right click and choose Paste Layer Style). Draw some additional lines as shown before. Try to add some diversity. Experiment.

Next thing we are going to do is to add some particles. Create a new layer, paste the layer style on it, choose 3px hard brush and start painting dots. They should vary in size and density. Bigger and more concentrated should be around the center of the glow. Again, try to experiment to see what fits in your picture.

Now, for some contrast, we’re going to add a cold color. Create a new layer, choose blue/white combination for the foreground/background and pick the Gradient tool. Make sure it’s radial. Click and drag in a corner of your choice.

Bring down the opacity on 50% and change the blending mode to Color. You can add the additional layers with a different color, but remember that you must select lower opacity comparing to the previous layer(s). Otherwise, every next layer will work against those below and then it’s not the same picture from the start..
That’s it. Try to experiment with all the settings considering color, glow and shapes.