Frame Tutorial

Deb's Photo Impact tutorials and more

Framing a Graphic In Photo Impact
I have done this in version 6.0.

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	The first step is to right click on this image and save it to your hard drive. (Right click and click on it and click on save image as...)
	Now open Photo Impact, browse to the image and open it. (Click on the opening folder icon in the tool bar.)
	Now that your image is open, click on Edit, expand canvas. It is marked with a one here.
	A dialog box will open, like this. Click the box beside "Expand sides equally, and then type 30 in the box marked left. All the boxes will fill in with the number 30. In the white square beside expand, right click and choose a color not around the sides of your image. I chose the first color to the left here, a bright blue. Click OK.
	You have expanded your graphic and it should now look something like this: (larger of course and perhaps with a different background color. Color is unimportant at this point.)
	Now we are ready to select our expanded section to fill it with our desired gradient. Click on the selection tool. When you click on the tool and hold the button down for a second or two, a box will pop open with more choices listed. Click on Magic Wand Tool.
	After you change to the magic wand tool, you will see this bar, that we call the attibute bar change to show these tools. Check your similarity. The number here controls how many similar colors are included when the magic wand slects pixels of a certain color. If you get areas where the selection "bleeds" into the graphic like is shown in the second image to the left, you need undo, lower this number, and make a new selection with the wand. Experiment to find the best setting for your graphic.
	Now, using your magic wand, click on the expanded area on your grapic so that it alone is selected. In this example, I only show a small corner of what your work will look like at this point, but you can see that the selection marquee is around both the outside of the white area and the inside next to the graphic. The two marquees are marked with arrows. From here on, you should leave this area selected. This last is very important.
	Look again at the edit menu, the third image on this page. You will see that I have marked with a 2 the word fill... Click on edit, then click on Fill... A dialog box opens. Click on the gradient tab, and then click in the box with the little gradient picture next to the words magic gradient. I have marked it with an arrow.
	Another box will open titled pallette ramp. Look through the various gradient types marked with arrows in the illustration. Click on the one I have outlined in red, which is mode 14. Under the gradient circle, there is a button marked edit.
	Click on it, and yet another box will open titled Palette ramp editor. For this image I have chosen the gradient with brown tones numbered 007. It is outlined in blue. So click on gradient number 7, and close all three boxes by clicking the ok button in each one
	Your graphic is now outlined in the brown gradient. Note that the selection marquee should still be around it.
	Now go to the button gallery in your easy palette. Find thumbnail A27, and right click on it. Click modify properties and apply.
	Click on the tab marked Bevel. Set your options as I have mine here. I have outlined the bevel type I chose. This bevel will not be visible until you use the scroll button to look at the other ones available. See arrow. Click the ok button. Right click and click merge all. Congratulations! Your graphic is now framed. If you wish, you can stop here and use this graphic as is, however you wish. Save it as a jpg with the image optimizer.
	If you want to make stationery, contintue as follows. Use the transform tool to resize the image so that it is smaller and more suited to stationery. Right click on your graphic, and click copy. Use the directions in this tutorial to finish your stationery and optimize it.
Kathy Olsen's Outlook Express Tutorials	Rather than do a tutorial of my own on the stationery wizard, I'll leave you in the capable hands of another stationery creator. Kathy has wonderful tutorials on the wizard, adding background sound, and adding a scrolling script to your stationery.