In this tutorial you will learn how to create the classic glass orb as seen all over the web.

Create a new document. I decided to use 300x300px.
Fill the background black.

Create a new layer (Keyboard short cut CTRL + SHIFT + N )

We need to create a elliptical selection. Get the marquee tool Make sure the elliptical marquee is selected.
While holding down the SHIFT key, draw a selection in the middle of your canvas.

We need to create a elliptical selection. Get the marquee tool Make sure the elliptical marquee is selected.
While holding down the SHIFT key, draw a selection in the middle of your canvas.

We need to fill the selection. You can use any colour you like. I chose white, so that it stands out from the background. The colour you choose is not important, as we will be adding a layer style over the next step and this will make our circle, look more like the orb it's meant to be!

While the ORB BASE layer is selected, press the LAYER STYLES button from the layers pallet. This will open up the layer styles dialogue box.

Select GRADIENT OVERLAY.
use settings as in the image below. For the gradient you can use any colour you like, but make sure it goes from dark to light. I chose some blue colour's for this example.

Next select INNER GLOW, and use the settings as in the image below.

Next select BEVEL AND EMBOSS, and use the settings as in the image below.

Next select SATIN, and use the settings as in the image below.

And Finally we add a STROKE. Use the settings as in the image below.

Your orb should now be looking similar to this. Obviously if you chose different colour's for your gradient, your orb while be slightly different.

We are now going to add the finishing touches to our orb. Create a new layer and call it HIGH LIGHT

On the HIGH LIGHT layer, we need to create another elliptical marquee. So grab the marquee tool again .
And we need to create a selection that is approximately 2/3's the size of the orb. Use the image for guidance.

We now need to get the GRADIENT TOOL.

And we need to edit our gradient. Click on the gradient that is on the menu bar, and it will open up the gradient editor. (the gradient show in the image may be different colour's to the one you see, but that is ok, clicking it will still open the editor)

Select the same gradient that the cursor is over in the image below. (Foreground to Transparent)

Set your foreground colour to WHITE. While holding down SHIFT, Draw the gradient from the top of the selection to the bottom. Use the image for guidance..

Your orb should now look much like the one in the image below.

We are nearly finished. All we need to is press CTRL+D t drop the current selection.

Go to FILTER > BLUR > GUASSION BLUR.

You can have a play around with the settings here to make sure the orb looks right for your size / colour. You can see the setting I used in the image below

You can see the finished orb below as well as one which I improved by adding a few things such as reflection, logo and i made it slightly smaller.