Welcome to Tracy's Graphics "Everything's Rosy" tutorial. This has been written primarily for use with PSP X although it is fairly easy to muddle through with earlier versions *winks*

First of all, you will need to download my supplies. You can find those by clicking HERE. Oh and before I forget, remember to SAVE your work every so often just in case!

The tubes supplied are ones that I have collected around the net and through various groups. File names and copyrights have been left intact. We will be re-coloring and working on some of them, but I thought it better to show YOU all how to do that instead of doing it for you!

1. Unzip the supplies file you just downloaded and place all of the supplies on your PSP desktop. Minimize them all except for mc981.pspimage for now as they will get in your way otherwise.

2. Ok, open up a new transparent image 400 pixels wide, by 400 pixels high.

3. Make a copy of this by pressing Shift+D. Close out the original. Delete the copyright layer on this tube by right clicking on "raster 2" your layer palette and highlighting delete.

4. Re-size this tube. Click on Image>Resize. When the box opens up, select pixels and 304 wide by 400 high. Make sure that bicubic is selected also near the bottom. See below:



5. Now we are going to play with this tube a little before going any further. Select your freehand selection tool. Select point to point, add(shift) and ensure your anti-alias is checked and feather is set to 0.

6. Zoom in on your tube. I zoomed in so it was 1000% of its original size. TIP: I use the plus and minus signs on the numeric keypad to zoom in and out quickly, although this can cause PSP& to lock up and crash, so use be warned!

7. Carefully go around the iris (colored part of the eye). When you have done one, hold down the shift key and select the other one.

8. Now go to Selections>Load/Save Selection>Save to alpha channel. Name it eyes so you can find it easily. See below:



9. De-select (Ctrl+D). Now using your freehand tool with the same settings. Select her lips (make sure you leave a little gap in the center or you will color her teeth also LOL). Do NOT de-select yet!

10. Ok, now I want you to add a new layer to your tube. Set the blend mode to "Color". Decide on a color for her lips. Select your flood fill tool. Now you may need to play about until you get a color you are totally happy with, but that's ok, just get it the way you want it ;-) Flood fill your selection. If you want yours to match my ones, then select #D95162. I then slid the opacity down on this layer for a softer look. I chose 42%. De-select (Ctrl+D) See below:



11. Now go to Selections>Load/Save Selections>Load From Alpha Channel. Load your "eyes" selection. Pick a color for your eyes. I used #4F7BD9. You can a new layer and fade the opacity on that to one of your choosing, or you can flood fill on the same layer as the lips like I did. See below:



12. Now merge your layers visible and copy (Ctrl+C).

13. Now go to your blank canvas. Click on it to activate. Paste your tube into your canvas (Ctrl+E). Position it on the right of the canvas. Rename this layer lady. See below:



14. Now find the tube KaraT2799. Make a duplicate copy (Shift+D). Close out the original. Delete the layer entitled Ebene3.

15. Copy (Ctrl+C) then paste it as a new layer (Ctrl+L) onto your canvas. Use your mover tool to position it over to the left of the other tube. Then click and drag this layer below the one with the lady. I named it roses to help keep track. See below:



16. Now find and open up bowwithplaid_gh.psp. Duplicate (Shift+D) and close out the original. Re-size but change to smartsize for this one. I did mine at 45%. Then went to Adjust>Sharpness>Unsharp Mask using these settings:



17. Now copy (Ctrl+C) and paste into a new layer (Ctrl+L) on your image you are working on. Rename this layer bow. Reposition to the top left corner.

18. Now the fun begins. Beige doesn't go to well with grey and pink etc. So, we will change the color of this pretty ribbon with a couple of easy steps. Go to Adjust>Hue Saturation>Hue Saturation & Lightness. (Shift+H). Use the settings shown below:



See how pretty that is with the blue of her eyes?! Now of course, you can change your ribbon to mathe the eye color, or choose whatever color you wish. Mine is just a rough guideleine!

19. Ok, moving on. I want to add a little depth to the bow, so I am going to apply a drop shadow. Go to Effects>3D Effects>Drop Shadow. Set your Vertical to 1, your Horizontal to 2, the Opacity to 75% and the blur to 5.

20. Open up the tube named SilveryKey_TubedByGini_09.07.06.tub. Make a duplicate (Shift+D) and close out the original. Delete the Tubed By Gini layer and re-size the tube to 45%. Go to Image>Canvas Size and increase the canvas to 250 by 250. Also make sure the center square is pushed in on the tiny keypad at the bottom left. 21. Go to Image>Free Rotate. Set the rotation to 45 Left and apply. Now you need to apply the same unsharp mask settings as before.

21. Copy (Ctrl+C) and paste into new layer on your image (Ctrl+L). Position the key so it is just on top of the bow but below the knot. Rename that layer key. You should now have something that looks a bit like this:



22. Now zoom in again on your work. Select your Freehand Selection Tool again using the same settings as before. Select the part of the tube, see below:



23. Hit delete a few times to clear that part of chain. De-select (Ctrl+D). Now drag your key layer below the bow layer. Add the same drop shadow as in step 19.

24. Now open up the file ribbon_beigetransparent_gh.psp. Make a duplicate (Shift+D) and close out the original copy. Go to Adjust>Hue Saturation>Hue Saturation & Lightness. (Shift+H). Use the same settings as before so it matches the bow. Now copy (Ctrl+C) and paste that into a new layer on your image (Ctrl+L). Run that ribbon along the bottom edge leaving a small gap at the bottom. Rename this layer ribbon. It should now look something like this:



25. Now open up the file HS_Elements_Stitches01.pspimage. Make a duplicate (Shift+D) and close out the original copy. Delete the Heartfelt Scraps by Melissa layer. Now using your freehand selection tool, carefully select the smaller row of cross-stitches. Copy (Ctrl+C) and paste as a new layer onto your image (Ctrl+L). Line it up across the top edge of the ribbon so it looks like it is sewn into place. Then paste another one (Ctrl+E) along the bottom edge of the ribbon. It should now look something like this:



26. Now add a new layer, then click and drag it right to the bottom of all the others. Flood fill this with a color of your choice. I used white for a crisp look, but pale pink or grey work well also ;-).

27. Now select your roses layer and slide the opacity down to about 60%. Add your creator's copyright or watermark to a new layer. Then merge all layers visible.

28. Pick a color from your image (I chose one of the shades of blue from the bow). Go to Image>Add Borders. Choose a symmetrical border of 2. The repeat this process, but change the width to 10 and the color to white. The add another 2 pixel wide border of blue.

29. Using your magic wand tool (anti-alias off and feather set to 0), select the white part of the border. Now go to Effects>Texture Effects>Blinds and apply the following settings:



30. Now you are ready to add your text. I chose one of the shades of pink from the roses to contrast against the blue ribbon but you can choose any color you wish! I used the font Sand in block capitals for the background font and then I switched colors to blue (the same blue as the border) and changed the font to 2 Peas Scratchy Toad. Again, you can choose any font or fonts you like for this project.

31. Merge layers visible and compress it as a jpg on low compression to preserve the quality. You should now have something that looks a little like this:



I hope you enjoyed my tutorial. I would love to see the different variations you can come up with!

©Web Graphics & Tutorial were created on Friday 28 September 2006 and are the idea and copyright of Tracy's Graphics. They are not to be re-created, translated into other languages, uploaded to another server, e-mailed through any groups, copied or altered in any way, nor are they to be linked to. If this tutorial is seen on any other website other than mine http://www.tracysgraphics.com, then it is stolen!!