Arms of the Angel PTU

Spend all your time waiting for that second chance 
For the break that will make it ok
There's always some reason to feel not good enough 
And it's hard at the end of the day 
I need some distraction oh beautiful release 
Memories seep from my veins 
Let me be empty and weightless and maybe 
I'll find some peace tonight 

In the arms of the Angels fly away from here 
From this dark, cold hotel room, and the endlessness that you fear 
You were pulled from the wreckage of your silent reverie 
You're in the arms of the Angels; may you find some comfort here 

Sarah McLachlan

This tutorial was written by me on August 21st, 2012. Any resemblance to any other tutorial or tag is unintentional and is pure coincidence. Please do not claim my work as your own and do not post to any other website, blog or forum without permission from me. It is written with the assumption that you have a working knowledge of PSP and its components. It was written for PSP 9.

I recommend that you read through this or any tutorial you are attempting before starting it so you will know what to expect and how to get organized.

As with any of my tutorials when a plugin is required, change only the settings I recommend and leave the others on the default settings.

What you will need to accomplish this tutorial is this absolutely stunning kit called Fifty Shades of Grey, by Designs by Stina...it's packed full of quality elements and beautiful papers, you can purchase it HERE at Designer Scraps.  Thanks Stina for the use of this amazing kit I will use again and again.  The art of the very talented Zindy Nielsen.  You can purchase this and the rest of the tubes at her site HERE.  Please support the arts and do not use her tubes without a license or share Zindy's tubes or this kit.  Plugins are Alien Skin Eye Candy 5/Impact and Xero.  The mask is one of mine, Trese Mask0042 you can find right HERE on this blog as well as the rest of my masks.  Feel free to use my masks in any of your tutorials if you are a tut writer, but follow my TOU and refer back to my blog.  Font is A&S Sarsasparilla you can find HERE to download.  Font for copyright is a Ceriph font...you can google pixel, ceriph or copy fonts and find hundreds of these fonts.

Let's get started...

Start a 700 x 700 new white image...you can resize in the end.  We're going to make our own frame...Copy and paste Ribbon 03 into your new image and resize it 15%.  Duplicate, mirror and flip it...duplicate again, rotate 90 degrees right (Image/Rotate/Free Rotate...be sure to uncheck rotate all layers.)...duplicate one more time flip and mirror it.  Line up your ribbons to look something like this...

And then hide your background layer in your layer palette and Merge Visible Layers. Unhide your background layer and then apply a drop shadow to your newly created frame.  Go to Effects/3D Effects/Drop Shadow and use these settings

Now copy and paste your tube beneath this frame layer, resize it 125% and fit it into your frame.  Use your Eraser tool CAREFULLY erase any of the tube outside the frame.  Copy and paste paper of choice and resize it 25%...do the same and erase any of the paper outside the frame. ( I used paper 10 )

Now, above your background layer add a new Raster Layer and flood fill with black.  Apply the mask Trese Mask 0042 and merge the group.

At this point use my image as a reference and begin to copy and paste the rest of the elements into your working canvas.  For precise sizing I always use my Raster Deform tool, I think in newer versions it's called the Pick Tool...resizing in this manner cuts down on the distortion that sometimes happens when resizing in percentages.  Your flowers don't have to be placed exactly where I placed mine.  Just distribute them in a variety of sizes and keep in mind that nature doesn't grow symmetrically, it's sporadic and wild.  For the elements that aren't exactly on the grey scale I wanted I colorized a bit.  You can do this by going to Adjust/Hue and Saturation/Colorize and use these settings:

Don't forget your drop shadows.  An important thing to remember about drop shadows is that the darker you palette is, the darker the shadow should be and vice versa.  Also, bear in mind how a shadow should fall in reality.

Also, for design purposes, when placing elements repeatedly in an image, it's best to have an odd number of these elements, it makes the image more interesting and flows better.

For your name set your Antialias set to Sharp for crisp edges on your font...type it and then go to Effects/Plugins/Alien Skin Eye Candy 5/Impact/Chrome and use these settings:

Now go to Adjust/Brightness and Contrast/Brightness and Contrast and use these settings:

Then give it a drop shadow....

Add your copyright.  For a neat and professional-looking copyright I use the fonts mentioned above.  Most work best at size 6 with your Antialias set to off.

Thank you for trying my tutorial. I hope you gleaned something from it to hone your skills and that you enjoyed it.  Please feel free to contact me with any questions you have about any of my tutorials and please let me know about any issues such as broken links.

Blessings,

Trese