The Sprague Lab

I’m back with the instructions for this week’s PS Friday, and boy did I do something cool this time. :D

 I actually recorded a video segment for part of PSF this week. Sorry if I sound tired.. I was up pretty late reveling in geekiness (and yeah, we beat up all the monsters, in case you wondered…).

So this week’s layout is right here:

 
Photoshop Friday #15 - click for larger

The coolest thing about it (well, in my opinion, anyway), is that the whole thing was done in PSE, including the big curving shape. AND just to test out my New Technology, I’ve recorded a video segment to show you how to put together that big curving shape, and then we’ll go through the rest of the instructions on the blog.

So you can be my Guinea Pig Experiment #35 (what happened to Guinea Pigs 1-34? Don’t ask…)

Video Demo for curving shape in PSE 

Click on the image below, and it will launch a new browser window with the video in it. I recorded the instructions for the curving element you see in this week’s layout.  (You will need a high speed internet connection to view it, okay? oh, and it might take a little while to start up, so be patient for up to a couple of minutes…) Ready? GO!

Okay, how did that work for you? Were you able to see it? Did it make sense? Did it take a long time to download?

Completing the Layout 

Alright, now that you have your curving shape, you can place your other layout components.

1. For my background paper (and most of the title), I used the A Boy digital kit from Jackie Eckles. Awesome stuff in there.
   
2. To match the accents in the background paper, I added a stroked line on the edges of my curving shape. I did this by Ctrl-clicking on the thumbnail of that layer in my layers palette, creating a new layer, and stroking the selection (Edit > Stroke Selection) with about 5 pixels of black.
   
3. I used 5 photos - one focal photo and 4 accent photos arranged as a grid. I placed them on layers behind my curving shape.
4. Then I created a new layer, placed it behind the photos, and added a white-filled rectangle marquee shape.
5. I rounded the corners of my top left and top right photos, and all four corners of my photo mat using a corner rounder brush with my eraser tool. I used a brush from Katie Pertiet’s Deco Scissors pack. Next week we’ll go over how to round corners, okay? :) 
6. I split apart the title strip from Jackie’s A Boy kit (which says “My Boy”), and in the middle I added some descriptive words over the curving strip in a rough typewriter font.

And that’s it! I hope you enjoy this week’s video! I’d love to hear what you think of it! :D

Have a great weekend!

-Jessica