by Leyla

a new tutorial writer

I want to thank Leyla for allowing me to post her tutorial on my site; Leyla is a new tutorial writer, and she did an awesome job on writing this tutorial; hope to see more tutorials from Leyla in the future.  You will find my results of Leyla's tutorial at the end of the tutorial. If you would like to email Leyla with comments or questions about her tutorial just click here.

You will need the following items for this tutorial:

Any version of PSP (trial demo)

Gradient/Pattern here

Fonts here

Flower tube here

Misted Lady Tube here

 (Misted tubes courtesy of Mary, MC Creations)

Filters Unlimited (Optional-may use your own choice of texture)

Let's start on our tag!

1.  Open both your tubes in PSP, make copies of your tubes (Shift+D), then minimize them, keeping them handy on your workspace; put your gradient into your gradients folder, the gold pattern in your patterns folder.  I installed my fonts, but that is up to you.

2.  Open a new image transparent, 500w x 500h (allowing room to work).

3.  Set your foreground to your gold pattern and your background to a gradient, using the duotone dark blue gradient supplied or picking a color from your tube; angle 100, repeats 0, Linear.

4.  Layers/New Raster Layer.  Click on your text tool.  When the settings menu becomes available, set at "floating"; font Floor Tiles Pattern; Size 300; Stroke 2.0; Anti-alias; Sharp.  Type a small "f" (lower case) in the bottom left corner of your canvas.  Your result should show a gold border with your pattern filled in various box places with your gradient color.  Selections/Select None.

This is what you should have so far; at this point, you might want to save your template for future use.  Remember to save often.

5.  Layers/New Raster Layer.  Click on your text tool again (A).  The font is the same, but reduce the size to 72.  Click on your image and type a lower case "k".  Click apply, then Selections/Select None.  Change to your mover tool and move the diamond to the top left corner of your image.  Make sure the gold border of your diamond covers the gold border on the corner of your image outline.

6.  Layers/Duplicate.  Image/Mirror.  Image/Flip.  Grab your mover tool and move the diamond up and to the left and center in the empty box in the bottom right corner.

NOTE:  We are going to do some cropping before we are finished, so don't worry if we have some overhang in some places.

7.  Restore the Misted Lady tube and resize to 120%.  Edit/Copy; minimize tube on your workspace.  Make the image with your patterns active and Edit/Paste/Paste As New Layer.  Change to your mover tool and move your tube to the far right, covering the empty right hand side, just below the gold border.  Lower the opacity on this layer to 50%.

8.  Once again, restore the Misted Lady tube and Edit/Copy.  You can close this tube now.  Make the image with your patterns active and Edit/Paste/Paste As New Layer.  Change to your mover tool and move your tube to the far left, covering the left hand side, just below the gold border.  (I then went back to my first Misted Lady layer [should be Raster Layer 3] and lowered the opacity to 40; but this is a matter of personal preference.)

9.  Restore your flower tube; Edit/Copy.  You can close this tube.  Make your image with the patterns the active image and go to Edit/Paste/Paste As New Layer.  Grab your mover tool and position your flower tube in the bottom right hand corner according to your own personal preference.  Don't worry if you have a little overhang on the bottom.

10.  Go to your materials palette and change your background color to a very pale pink or use your dropper tool to select a pale pink from your flower.  Make Raster Layer 1 your active layer and floodfill with the pink color.  With this layer still active, go to Filters Unlimited/Paper Textures/Cardboard Box, Fine; use default settings and apply.

11.  Go to your crop tool and, placing your tool at the upper left corner of your image, drag the tool to cover your image, getting as close to your gold borders as you can without cutting into them.  Click on apply.

12.  Change your background color to your gold pattern.  Foreground color is set to null.  Layers/New Raster Layer.  Click on your text tool using these settings:  Floating; Font AL Sandra; Size 32; Stroke 0; Center; Anti-alias.  Type your text, then apply.  Image/Rotate Left 45 degrees; selections/select none.

13. Move or straighten the graphics on your layers to your liking.  Apply the following drop shadow to your Misted Lady, your flower and your text.  Effects/3D Effects/Drop Shadow using these settings:

Vertical 2; Horizontal 2; Opacity 100; Blur 1; Color #808080 (this is a very light gray; you can darken or change to black if you prefer).  Layers/Merge/Merge Visible.

14.  Add your watermark (alt + 0169 on the numeric keypad).  Layers/Merge/Merge All (flatten). Resize if needed; then go to File/Export/Jpeg Optimizer.  Your tag is now finished.

Below is my result of Leyla's tag tutorial; I used Flaming Pear's aetherize on mine once I was finished.

Email Leyla