Photoshop Tutorials (PSE & CS)

I'm re-releasing all the tutorials I've created as .pdf's, in one complete bundle:

Here's what you get:

This is a collection of ten tutorials, written and illustrated for scrappers, photographers, designers, or anybody who needs a good reference set for techniques. I use Photoshop CS+ (not CS6 yet) and some Photoshop elements--the easier techniques are perfectly compatible with Elements; the more advanced ones use tools that Elements does not have. 

These tutorials are easy to understand, very well illustrated with screen shots, and contain all kinds of tips on little things that are often frustrating, including troubleshooting why something didn't work as planned. You can print them out, or follow along onscreen. 

Here's what you'll learn: 

1. Working with Templates: 10 pages, Beginning Level. Learn about some of the basic functions of Photoshop, including simple ways to use layers, clipping masks, basic shadowing, and changing colors. Included: 1 layered .psd template. 

2. Drop Shadow Basics: 7 pages, Beginning Level. Learn how to use the special effects dialog to give your layouts depth and realism. 

3. Extraction with the Magnetic Lasso: 7 pages, Beginning Level. Learn how to remove certain types of elements from their backgrounds in a relatively painless manner. 

4. Changing Colors: 7 pages, Beginning Level. Learn how to change the colors of your embellishments or papers. 

5. Making Simple Papers: 9 pages, Beginning Level. Learn how to make your own simple dotted or striped papers. Included: 2 sample 12x12", 300 dpi. papers. 

6. More on Drop Shadows: 11 pages, Intermediate Level. Learn how to make more complex shadows by actually manipulating the shadow itself. 

7. Introduction to Masks: 13 pages, Intermediate Level. Learn how quick masks and channel masks work, as well as how to extract using these methods. CS only. 

8. More on Masks: Layer Masks: 11 pages, Intermediate Level. Learn how to approach gradient blending, spot retouching, and easy recoloring. CS only. 

9. Making (and Using) Brushes: 11 pages, Intermediate Level. Learn how to make brushes from photos, how to change brushes, and how to save them. 

10. Extraction with the Pen Tool: 12 pages, Advanced Level. Learn how to use the pen tool effectively to extract complex shapes from a photograph. CS only.

Here's a screenshot from the Making Simple Papers tutorial, for example:

And here's what Ona made using the tutorials (with my Once Upon A Time kit):

It's a great deal, and even if you've been scrapping a while you can still find out some cool tricks! Most of the skills are interchangeable between programs (Gimp, PaintShopPro, etc.)--as long as you're using the same tools, they all function pretty much the same. 20% off this weekend, so it's a good deal!

Masks & Overlays

Did a couple of fun things today. One was creating some masks to clip paper to so it would look like torn, hand-made paper, and another was creating some brushes from overlays to use as grungers.

The masks are pretty easy--on a separate layer of the paper document, or in a new document, draw a basic shape. You can either use these as accents (like I did with the faded purple paper in the first layout and the flower paper in the second), or as photo mats, like the bigger-sized one in the first layout, so make the shape according to the use. Then, fill it with black, or a grunged, fairly dense, texture. I used various brushes (chalk in one case, and the queen anne's lace brush of mine in another) to "feather" the edges of the mask--you can be kinda crazy, or keep it subtle, as you please. Once you have this shape down (save it!) place it in a layer beneath the paper you're trying to use, and ctrl+alt+g/clip it the top layer to the bottom one. Ctrl+e/merge the top layer to the mask, and now you have the shape ready to be dragged into your other document. Easy! As you'll see, I used this method twice in the first layout, once for the striped paper, and once for the faded purple paper.

(click for larger image, credits, and journaling).

In this second layout, I had fun trying to replicate Kate Teague's scratched wood texture which was present on her alphabet. I created the little circles from some paper in her same kit (the April Freebie on 2Peas), then made a layer beneath all that for the "border". Then, I used an overlay from Denise Liemert at Digital Scrapbook Pages (a site I just found last night while looking for elements--I have the hardest time finding stuff because I don't really know how to use it, I suppose! I did get those wildflowers in the first layout there, though). I just cut out a circle from the overlay and pasted it in a new layer, then hiked the contrast to have an uneven brush with some white and pure black in it. I hid the bottom layer with the complete overlay on it, selected the part I wanted to work with, and then clicked on "Create New Brush" under the Edit menu (if you don't select just the area you want to work with, it's likely that at 300 dpi that particular menu option won't even be available, since Photoshop has an upper size limit with which it can make brushes). Then, I just selected that as my brush, went in and grunged up my border layer, and was pretty pleased! I also used the same brush on an overlay that I created for the photo, which lent it some nice texture, as well as reduced the brightness to match that of the kit elements.

At some point, you'll need to actually save your new brush. Don't forget to go to Preset Manager (also in the Edit menu, a bit lower). In the new window, select all the brushes you'd like in one set (I have a Textures set, for example, so I load those before saving the new one and just add it to them), and save your set--I have my own folder of brushes, or you can save it in the regular Photoshop folder. Make sure you credit the designer each time you use the brush, though! I actually added the designer's name in the brush label so I wouldn't forget whose it was...

A Bit of Fun: Overlays & Stickers

I was delighted to win the random $5 that 2Peas awards if you participate in their "Use mostly 2Peas Stuff" challenge, or the Garden Girl's Weekly digital challenge, and I won it twice in a row so I had big bucks to spend! I finally broke down and got Rhonna's gorgeous swirl brushes (V3 & V4) -- I keep on hoping that I'll create my own, but then I get bitten by the actual scrapbooking bug and use up all my time making layouts instead of supplies!

Anyway, I couldn't quite figure out where I wanted to use these, but the overlays recently on sale at Designer Digitals made me wonder if I could make my own, so I did, with the V3 brushes! Actually, it was easier in this case to use the .png files because I needed to do a lot of rotating (man, do I ever wish there were a shortcut for rotating brushes in Photoshop!). So, just on a blank layer, I used each png twice or three times, and made something that had fairly wide blanks (I hadn't figured out what I was going to use it for, though--besides coloring with bright colors).



Once I'd gotten it done, I decided to use more 2Peas stuff so I could enter it in next week's challenge (greedy, ain't I?), and so I used papers from 2 of Rhonna's kits (Color my World, freebie, and Flower Patch). To get the papers in the shapes, I followed several fiddly but easy steps.
1) You want to use the magic wand (tolerance = 1, contiguous) to get the exact shape, but a lot of times there were only dots on one end. So,
2) draw in lines wherever you need to to make sure the shape is closed
3) magic wand the shape
4) target your background layer (or any made-up layer with a uniform color to make it easy to see)
5) copy the shape
*****5.5) ctrl+z (undo) all your drawing marks until you're back to your original overlay!!!**********
6) open the paper you want to use
7) paste the shape on a new layer and drag that layer under the paper layer
8) ctrl+alt+g (or ctrl+g in PSE? Make a clipping path, in any case) so that the paper conforms to that shape
9) ctrl+e to merge layers
10) drag the shaped paper layer into the original document, under the overlay. I then moved the shape 5 nudges down and 5 left to make it a little more interesting. The key is: don't forget to undo everything before you proceed! I did the same copy-shape-thing with the photo, too. Also, make sure you don't save your papers in the wrong shape!

I then filled in a few of the smaller lines with light blue (distressed it a bit), then drew paths for the text on the curvy lines that were long enough and would let the text be visible. And there you go, swirly fun!

Then, today, I tackled the task of trying to scraplift Dagmar (lenasmommy) over at Designer Digitals. I chose her adorable "Little Witch" layout because I loved the combo of black and white photo with lots of bright colors, and the use of patterned papers in a way that I can emulate =), and the darling little illustrations. Mine isn't quite as designerish as hers, but I still think it's pretty cute (mostly because of Allen, however!).



There's nothing too tricky here, but I did have fun picking up a couple of clip-art photos and turning them into stickers, primarily by using the photocopy filter (black foreground, white background--if you have other colors in your color picker, that's what it'll use, which could be fun to play around with also!). For the dalmatian the only thing I really had to do was complete the outline of the dog, select the exterior, reverse select, create a new layer, expand the selection by 10 pixels, then fill with white. For the fireman's helmet I actually had to redraw the thing because it had quite a bit of detail, but it was the same procedure. One little trick--put your fill colors on separate layers so you can go back and change them later with no problem...

And finally, just a little taste of Spring (everything from Katie Pertiet's "Little Red Bird" kit at Designer Digitals):



(PS -- I'm perplexed by the fact that this layout got a seemingly inordinate amount of feedback, since I liked it OK, but it wasn't one of those that leaves me with stomach clenched, knowing I've nailed it. I guess until I can figure out popularity indices, I'm not going to go too far!)

Manipulating Layer Effects As Pixels

Recently it seems that I barely have time to squeak out a layout before my son wanders in, so I never have time to blog about them...

This one is a rather quick one that I did to commemorate his newest haircut, which actually shows his ears. His longer hair was cute too, but he was starting to look like a hood'--and I'm sure I'll have enough of that during his teen years!

When I finally found a photo I liked, his eyes were looking a little bruised, and dodging (using the dodge tool, that little lollipop-looking thing that makes pixels a shade or so lighter) didn't really take care of the problem satisfactorily, so I performed a Filter-->Distort-->Diffuse Glow on it. Now he looks like an angel. =)

The title work came together rather quickly in terms of placement, but I felt it needed something, so I did end up using a 3-pixel stroke of light blue around it. Then I didn't like how that cut the words apart, so I created layers for all the effects. To do that, use the "hide/show all others" by right-clicking on the eye next to the layer in question. All the others will disappear. Then, right-click on the layer effect symbol on the left-hand side of that layer, and choose "create layer". Actually, if you have all the layers where you're trying to do this highlighted at once, it'll create a separate layer for all of them. In fact, it creates a separate layer for *each* effect, such as one for the drop shadow, one for the outline stroke, one for the emboss, etc.

I only had the stroke effect on the title, so it created three layers, one for each of my words. I then nudged each of the stroke layers down and over a couple of pixels, leaving the upper connection between the words until I liked what I got. I did a little selective erasing where the connection was being cut off between the words by the stroke, too.

This creation of layers for the effects is quite handy; I've used it in a couple of different situations. One is to manipulate drop shadows so they look a touch more realistic--it's pretty easy to lasso the portion you want to work with, go to Edit-->Transform-->Warp and do what you need to to the shadow, and click on an another tool to get the apply dialogue, say yes--and now your shadow is not quite so even, and more as if real light were falling on the object.

You can also manipulate the drop shadow when you're trying to get a vellum effect. To make vellum, select a shape, fill it with white at 30-40%, then give it a drop shadow. Whoops! The whole thing fills with grey--what's up with that? Never fear: create a layer for your effect. Then go to the original vellum layer and select your shape, then move to the shadow layer and *delete* that portion of the drop shadow. Ahhh, much better! Now your vellum is still pristine white, but you can get a drop shadow too...

Oh, the layout! I really got side-tracked on this one. =) By the way, the swirly white things? Eraser.

By The Way...

If you (oh you, my few and far between beloved readers) ever have any questions about how I did anything, please ask! I'm not always sure I'm not just repeating myself...

I did want to quickly post a small preview of Shannon's kit, so you can see how differently it comes out (I'm referring to the Spring Awakens layout in the previous post):



As you can see, there's a whole lot you can do with a kit--the entire flavor has changed (well, I think so anyway). I used the pinked paper a couple of ways: as a shape, to cut out the frame for the layout; as an overlay for both the flower pictures, and as the central mat. The parchment paper is what the frame is made of (changed to purple), and it's overlaid on my picture frames, too. The clouds paper is overlaid on the kraft paper--that's what's giving it some texture; I reduced the opacity wayyyyy down so you couldn't really recognize the clouds. I changed the colors on the ribbons by using the selective color slider, which allows you the freedom of only changing a certain range of colors at a time, instead of colorizing the whole thing (though it'll allow you to do that, too). What else... Oh, used selective coloring on the button, too.

I don't download many kits, because once you have a certain kind of something, you can change it in so many different ways as to produce entirely different effects--no use clogging up your storage space with a bunch of similar things!