Cerulean Beauty FTU

Cerulean Beauty

By plucking her feathers, you do not gather the beauty of the flower.

Rabindrath Tagore

This tutorial was written by me on September 25th, 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 the stunning art of Barbara Jensen which you can purchase on her site HERE on Thursday September 27th, 2012.  Please support the arts and DO NOT use Barb's tubes without a license.  Supplies I have uploaded for you HERE.  Plugins are Alien Skin Eye Candy 5/Impact, Xenofex, Eye Candy 4000, and Xero.  Font is Angular and can be found HERE.

Let's get started...

First we need to get your brushes into PSP for use.  It's just a couple easy steps.

 Open the files I provided into PSP.  They're in .png format, you can also use .jpegs.  For each brush go to File/Export/Custom Brush.  Name your brush and click Ok and it's installed in PSP ready for use.

Start a 700 x 700 new white image...we will resize later.  Copy and paste the frame shape in supplies into your new canvas.  Put it on the left side and then duplicate and mirror it, duplicate flip, and once more duplicate and mirror.  See my image for size and placement.

Now, beneath each frame draw a box beneath the open parts of the shapes with the cerulean blue from the tube.  Then copy and paste your tube above one of the frames.  Make her to fit her face into one of the boxes and then grab your Magic Wand with a 5 Feather and select the open area of the box and then go to Selections/Invert and hit delete.  Duplicate her face and mirror enough to fit into each box.

Next, for each face first select the box with your Magic Wand again, same feather.  Go back to the face and go to Effects/Plugins/Xero/Illustrator and use these settings:

Do this for each face and then on each face go to Effects/Plugins/Xero/Porcelain and use these settings:

Add a new Raster layer on the top of your canvas and using my image as a reference apply the small floral brush.  Add a new layer for each brush as you will need to use your Raster Deform tool to tweak each one to fit on the frames.

Begin to copy and paste the elements into your canvas.  You can use my image as a reference for size and placement.  Give each a drop shadow, including the frames using the settings below: Effects/3D Effects/Drop Shadow...

Copy and paste your tube, size her to fit and then apply the same Porcelain Plugin as before.  To soften the edge of your tube at the bottom, grab your Selection tool with a Feather of about 70 and select a small area and hit delete.

Add a new Raster Layer above your Background layer and apply the floral background brush I supplied, add a new layer for each brush so you can tweak them to fit around your design.

Now copy and paste the bling element above the tube faces in the boxes.  Merge the bling layers together and duplicate twice.  Hide the two top layers and be sure you're on the original bling layer and go to Effects/Plugins/Xenofex/Constellation and use these settings:

Hide the layer you just applied this to, unhide and select the middle bling layer and go to Effects/Constellation and use the same settings only hit the Random Seed button once.  Repeat for the last layer.  Then on each layer add a small dark drop shadow so it stands out.

Add your name then go to Effects/Plugins/Alien Skin Eye Candy 5/Impact/Chrome and use these settings:

 Duplicate your name and then go to Adjust/Hue & Saturation/Colorize and use these settings:

Grab your Selection tool with a 70 Feather and select the lower part of your name and hit delete a time or two for the gradient effect.  Merge the two name layers together and add a drop shadow.  Duplicate your name again.  Next go to Effects/Plugins/Eye Candy 4000/Corona and use these settings:

Once again select the lower part of your name with your Selection tool and same feather and hit delete to delete the Corona on the lower portions of the top name layer and then merge the name layers together.

Add your copyright and we'll animate, resize and save.  Take care that the copyright is legal and legible.  For a neat and professional-looking copyright I use a pixel, ceriph or copy font.  You can google and find literally hundreds of these fonts.  Most work best at size six with your Antialias set to off. 

Now open Animation Shop (AS) by going to Edit/Jasc Software Products/Launch Animation Shop.  Go back to PSP.  Make sure the two top layers of the bling element are hidden and then hold down CTRL + SHIFT and hit C to copy merged.  Go to AS and hit CTRL + v to paste a new animation and go back to PSP.  Hide the bottom bling layer and unhide the middle.  Hold down CTRL + SHIFT and hit C to copy merged and back to AS.  This time hold down CTRL + SHIFT and hit L to paste after current frame.  Repeat for the last layer.  Check your animation by going to View/Animation.

Resize and save as a .gif and you're done.

Thank you for trying my tutorial.  I hope you enjoyed it and maybe learned something.  Please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns about any of my tutorials.

Blessings,

Trese