Frame Your Photos

Tutorial by Harry Ellerton

Here's a quick and easy technique for placing your images into a stylish frame. I used Photoshop 6.0 for the demo, but you can use earlier versions with slight modifications. Before you begin, go to the following web site and download any of the free frame images for your own personal use: http://www.designtechnika.com/%7emarvilla/frames/frames1.html
   Note: These frames are zipped and are in Paint Shop Pro Frame format when extracted. Convert these frames using Paint Shop Pro to the Photoshop (PSD) format before use.

 

1) Open the downloaded frame of your choice in Photoshop. In the layers palette double-click on the background layer to make it a regular layer (Layer 0). For the sake of clarity, you may want to change this layers name to "Frame".

 

2) Using the Magic Wand tool, select the center area of the frame. Press the delete key. Your frame should appear similar to our example. (The checkerboard region indicates that this area is transparent).

3) At this point open the image you want to frame (To make things easier for this demo, I suggest using an image whose dimensions are slightly smaller than the frame you're using) . Select the entire image by using the Select>All command. Change to the Move tool and drag the image into Frame window. (Holding the Shift key while moving an image will center the image into the new window). The picture image will appear as Layer 1 in the Layers Palette. (You may want to change the layer name to Photo).

 

4) In the Layers palette, drag the picture image (Layer 1) under the frame image (Layer 0) just like our example. With Layer 1 (the image layer) active, open the Select>Load Selection command. Under Channel, make sure Layer 1 Transparency is chosen. Press OK. Now, open the Select>Inverse command. This will have the effect of protecting the image while letting you have the ability to manipulate the frame.

 

5) At this point create a new layer by clicking on the Create new layer icon in the layers palette or by using the Layer>New>Layer command. This new layer (Layer 2) should appear in the layers palette below Layer 0 and above Layer 1. (You may want to change the layer name to Mat). With the new layer active, choose Edit>Fill, using White with a normal blending mode at 100% opacity. Click OK.

6) In the layers palette, double-click the frame layer (Layer 0). The Layer Style dialogue box will appear.

7) Enable the Drop Shadow & Bevel and Emboss options.

8) Make Layer 2 (the mat layer) active. Again, as in step 6, call up the Layer Style dailogue box. Enable the Drop Shadow. I found that on this layer the Bevel and Emboss is best used when you set the style to Outer Bevel. Play around with the different options until you find a combination which works well with your photo.

9) This is the final result. However, you can do more.

10) With the mat layer (Layer 2) active, go to Filter>Texture>Texturizer. I chose a canvas texture.

11) Notice how the mat takes on a canvas texture.

12) With the foreground color set to green, I used the Paintbrush tool with the Color Mode set to Color Burn and the Opacity set to 70% to paint the canvas mat.

Comments, suggestions or questions.


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