First Layout

Finished project

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Download these files. Extract these files to a convenient location, you will open and use them as you go along. While doing this tutorial, SAVE OFTEN, there's nothing more annoying than having your computer freeze up and losing your hard work.
Create a new file Create a new image.

File-> New. Decide how large you would like your layout to be, for this tutorial, I'm going to keep it smaller than what you might want for something that will end up printed. Feel free to make yours larger if you want. Set the units to Inches, I'm going to make this one 5" by 5". Set the resolution to 200. Don't worry about the background color, we'll be flood filling it later.

  
Sampling the background color Fill the image with a solid fill.

Open the glitterstripesilver.jpg image. Click on the Eyedropper tool Eyedropper tool. In the tool ribbon, set the Sample Size to 3x3. Move the cursor over the grey part of the glitter tile and click with the left mouse button to set this as your foreground swatch color. Click on the Flood fill tool Flood Fill tool and click inside the image to fill it with this color. Adjust-> Add/Remove Noise-> Add Noise. Check Gaussian and Monochrome, set the percentage to 10%. This will add some realism, making the background look more paper-y.

  
Make a selection Make a selection for a border treatment.

Layers-> New Raster Layer, change the name to "Border fill". Click on the Selection tool Selection tool. On the tool ribbon, set the Shape to Rectangle, Anti-alias UNchecked. Drag out a selection at the bottom of the image the size that you'd like the pattern fill to occupy. Selections-> Load/Save Selection-> Save Selection to Alpha Channel, give it a name, I'll call this one "bottom fill".

 See a screen capture of this step.
Fills and drop shadows Fill the selection.

Click on the Flood Fill tool. Change the Pattern fill button fill style on the foreground swatch from solid to pattern. Click on the swatch to bring up the Material dialog. Click on the Pattern Fill thumbnail image to bring up the chooser. Currently open images will apear at the top of the list. Find the glitterstripesilver image and click on it to select. Hit OK. Click inside the selection to fill with the pattern. Go to the layer control palette, click on the Background layer to make it active. Layers-> New Raster Layer. Name this one "border fill DS". Turn off the visibility of the selection marquee, Selections-> Hide Marquee. Effects-> 3D Effects-> Drop Shadow. Make the Offsets -2 and 0, leave the Opacity at 100%, set the Blur to 5. Hit the Proof button Proof button to preview the shadow. Hit OK to apply it. On the layer control palette, you will see a slider, drag this down to decrease the opacity of the shadow. Here I've set it to 40%. Turn the visibility of the selection marquee back on, Selections-> Hide Marquee. Click on the Mover tool Mover tool. Move your cursor inside the selection marquee. Using the right mouse button, drag the selection up to the top of the image for the second fill. I've pulled mine so that part of it is off the canvas because I want the top border to be narrower than the bottom. When you've got it placed the way you want it, Selections-> Load/Save Selection-> Save to Alpha Channel, give it a name. (You'll want to continue to save selections as you go along, it'll save you time later if you want to change something). In the layer control palette, change to the Border fill layer and repeat what you did before to fill this. When you apply the drop shadow, change the offset from -2 to 2, make sure you're on the Border fill DS layer. Selections-> Select None.

 See a screen capture of this step.
Photo pasted in with drop shadow Add a photo and drop shadow.

In the layer control palette, click on the top layer to make it active. Layers-> New Raster Layer, name this one "Photo". Open a photo that you'd like to use in your layout. We'll add a border to the photo before pasting it in. Image-> Add Borders. Set the color to white, the size will depend on your image, I'll add 30 pixels all around to mine. Edit-> Copy. Click on the title bar of your layout image to make it active. Edit-> Paste as New Selection. Don't worry if the photo is too big, leave a corner visible though so you can grab it. Select-> Select None. Click on the Deformation tool Deformation tool. A bounding box will appear around the photo, right click on a corner node and drag it until the image is the size you want. Left click and drag inside the image to move it around. In the center you will see a "handle", mouse over this until it turns into a curved arrow icon, drag on this to rotate the image the way you want it. Click on any other tool to complete the deformation. Effects-> 3D Effects-> Drop Shadow. Change both Offsets to 1 and the Blur to 4, checkmark the Shadow on New Layer box. Go to the layer control palette and reduce the opacity of the shadow layer to taste, I've used 70%.

  
Create the vellum overlay Add a vellum overlay.

I want a vellum overlay that appears to be over the photo, but under the pattern fills. We'll have to move layers to do this. In the layer control palette click on the "Photo Shadow 1" layer and drag it so that it's just above the Background layer. Drag the "Photo" layer so that it is above the "Photo Shadow 1" layer. "Photo" should be the active layer now, Layers-> New Raster Layer, name it "Vellum". Click on the Selection tool again, leave the settings the same. Drag out a rectangle for the piece of vellum. Click on your Foreground swatch and change the pattern to "backdrop", this is a pattern that ships with PSP8. Click on the Flood Fill tool and fill your selection with this pattern. In the layer control palette, decrease the Opacity of this layer to about 40%. Click on the layer below this one, the "Photo" layer, Layers-> Add Raster Layer, name it "Vellum DS". Effects-> 3D Effects-> Drop Shadow. Make the Offsets 0 and -1 and the Blur 3. Decrease the Opacity of this layer to about 40%. Selections-> Select None.

  
Add a glitter heart Add an embellishment.

In the layer control palette, click on the top layer, "Border fill". You don't need to make a new layer, the Deformation tool will do it for us. Open the glitterheartsilver.png file. Edit-> Copy. Click on the title bar of the layout image. Edit-> Paste as New Selection. Use the Deformation tool as you did with the photo to size the heart the way you want. Click on any other tool to complete the deformation. Effects-> 3D Effects-> Drop Shadow. Set both Offsets to 0, Blur to 5 and checkmark the Shadow on New Layer box.

  
Add a silver heart Add another embellishment.

Repeat the above step using the silverheart.png file instead of the glitterheart. The drop shadow on this element should be bigger and blurrier because it's a thick object that would cast more shadow. Make both Offsets 6 and the Blur 30 for it.

  
Finished image with text Add journaling.

In the layer control palette, click on the top layer, you won't need to add a layer, we'll be using the Text tool in vector mode and it will create the layer for us. Click on the Text tool Text tool. Set the Background color swatch to black and the Foreground swatch to null. In the tool ribbon, choose the font you'd like to use. Make sure that Create As is set to Vector and Anti-alias is checked. Click on the image and type in your text. The text will appear on the image as you type letting you figure where to place your carriage returns. If the text is far too large or far too small, highlight what you've typed and change the Size on the tool ribbon. Because the text is vector, when you finish typing there will be a bounding box around it, you can drag the nodes of the box to make your text fit. To move the entire block put your cursor in the middle and wait for it to change to a four-headed arrow, drag it where you'd like it. To make the text look more realistic, decrease the Opacity of this layer to about 90%.

You can print your image if you like, File-> Print. If you want to share your image online, you'll need to make it smaller. Image-> Resize to make it something more reasonable for viewing on a monitor. File-> Export-> JPG Optimizer to compress the file size down.

 See a screen capture of this step.