Photoshop tip: Double layer styles

Photoshop CC has a new option: multiple layers styles. You can now first add a ‘Stroke’ on the inside of a text layer, for example, and then add another stroke (in a different color) on the outside. Very neat, but did you know you could do this already in earlier versions too? The trick is to use Smart Objects. Type your text, add one of the two layer styles you wanted, for example a ‘Stroke’ on the outside. Next convert this text layer to a Smart Object. Because a smart object is a layer on its own, you can add layer styles to smart objects too, independent of whether you already added such a layer style to the text layer. So now you can add another ‘Stroke’, this time on the inside. By turning this into a new smart object again, you can add as many layer styles as you want.