You can apply the layers and work around with offset though the beauty is partially gone. To make the layer bigger and cut the sides is not convenient with seamless textures.

With styles you can create great and subtle effects if you take for example a alpha layer with corrosion elements play with the different effects and blend it in via the fill option (just under opacity) and opacity itself, can give you a great grungy effect.

Cheers

1. Many of the layer-style elements discussed in this guide would be more effectively explained if irregularly-shaped layers were used instead of full-size, rectangular layers. (e.g. Satin is understandably hard to appreciate when applying it to a rectangularly shaped layer. On curvaceous forms, it can be very powerful.

2. Where the real power of layer styles rests is in the *combination* of various layer effects. This guide takes each effect one-by-one—which is important for beginners to be sure. That said, learning to combine various effects within a single layer style by using various combinations of blending modes for each effect—that’s where it’s at.

3. Comments about the need to keep layer styles subtle are severely misguided. If you’re working on a subtle image, and want subtle effects—then sure, keep them subtle. If you’re working on an image of a giant robot clown with lasers shooting out of his eyes (sorry, that’s the best I could come up with!), then you’ll probably find a lot of use for bold, complex, over-the-top layer styles.

When I learned about Layer Styles, I began approaching my work (graphic design, not photo-editing) in a whole new way. Now, I create most of my elements in Illustrator (as basic, black or white vector objects) and paste them in to Photoshop as Smart Objects. In PS, I can then add and edit layer styles to those elements. The great part is that this workflow is entirely non-destructive, except for a handful of raster elements in my PS documents. For the most part, I can even scale-up my designs if the need arises—without much need for re-editing. I can’t recommend this approach enough.

Cheers…

Jeprie is right. You can individually break the layer effects and create new layers. Those layers just become clipping masks to the primary layer and you can edit it anyway you want. I utilize that option frequently.

Also, I think you missed out a few important aspects of the layer styles. It is not just the effects that you can apply but also play with the lighting, shadows and Contours.

If you check ‘Use Global lighting’ then, every style for that layer will use the same lighting source. On the contrary, if you uncheck it, you can meddle with the lighting source and shadows without disturbing the other layer effects. This is very useful while applying Bevel, Satin and Dropshadow effects.

Also, you never talked about the Anti-aliasing filter (which makes the curves smoother and removes boxy pixels from the boundary of the layer effects). Anyways, this is not that important :)

While using Layer styles, it is very important that you give attention to the smallest of the details because one slight error can leave a very bad impression on the image you are working on (it might lose its realism)

Anyhow, that was indeed a comprehensive guide and a must read for every beginner in Photoshop. Thanks Callum

Also, you said– “It’s up to you to unleash your creativity once you have learned the fundamentals of using layer styles in Photoshop.” Don’t you think that’s a bit of an overstatement :) Just kidding….