How To Create Blings By NiteOwl ©NiteOwl'sRoost 02-06-08© ©NiteOwlsRoost/NiteOwl0512/02-06-08© Please ... in appreciation of the time it took me to write and prepare this tutorial...leave my name attached to it as it's author. Feel free to share it with others so that we ALL may learn, but do not claim it as your own creation, nor place it on any web site without my permission. You may NOT place this on a CD that is offered for sale. This tutorial was written by me and any resemblance to any other tutorial is purely coincidental. Thank you:)))! I wrote this tutorial in response to questions I get about how I do my blings. I have tried to keep it simple and use enough screenshots so that anyone will be able to create blings by following this tutorial. You will need: Paint Shop Pro I used PSP 9, but am sure it could be done in other versions as well. Xenofex II A Ding of choice or a Shape you've made. You may download the ding I used here. This ding was made by Kat at www.katsfunfonts.com. Be sure and visit her site for some awesome dings. Okay, let's get started. Be sure and save often. Double click on your ding to open it and then minimize it. It will now be available for use in PSP when we need it for the bling shape. Open a new transparent image 400 X 400. Now flood fill it with a dark color so your bling will show up well. I use #4000040 for mine, but black or any other dark color will work just as well. Set your Foreground and Stroke Properties window to white. Click on your text tool and use these settings: When the text window comes up, type the ' a ' key on your keyboard. Now go up to Objects-->Align-->Center In Canvas. You should now have this: Now, Click on Layers-->Convert to Raster Layer. Open your layer palette and click on the chain link beside that layer: You do this to make sure you don't have a 'jumpy' bling when you get through. By locking the layers, if you accidentally move one, then they all move together. I just love that little feature of PSP. Now, while you are working with the Layer Palette, click on your ding layer and duplicate it 3 times. This will give you a total of 4 ding layers. Click on the eye beside the top 3 layers to turn them off, then click on your first ding layer to make sure it is activated. Your layer palette should look like this: Before we go any further, let's save our work so give it a name and save it to a file. We will be using it from that file in Animation Shop. Now we are ready to start 'blinging'. Click on: Selections-->Select All Selections-->Selections-->Float Selections-->Selection--Defloat. You ding should now have floating 'ants' around it like this: Leave it selected until you have 'blinged' all four layers. It is now time to apply the Xenofex II Constellation Filter to the first ding layer: Here are the settings I used: (Be sure that you check the circle to make the selection transparent.) Click OK. I now have this: Turn off raster 1 layer and turn on copy of raster 1 layer. Apply the Xenofex II constellation filter again and the only thing you change is the Random Seed. Just click on it one time. Repeat this step for the next 2 layers. You should now have all 4 layers blinged. Click on the eye beside each layer to open them and deselect. Save it and you have now made your first bling. If you want to see how it looks when it is animated, follow my tutorial here: How To Use Premade Blings http://niteowlsroost.com/Using_Pre-made_Blings_For_Tags.html **A Hint for Colored Blings** When you are blinging colors or patterns, change your Overdrive setting to zero or to suit your taste. The further left it is, the more color you will have. The further right it is, the less color you will have. **A Hint for Trailing Blings** If you want to 'trail' one, you must have plenty of original layers. I normally start with about 15-22 layers. You do it just like you do the 4 layer one, except that you keep repeating the filter for every layer, changing the Random Seed each time. Always keep an extra layer that you haven't blinged at the top of your layers palette just in case you don't have enough layers when you start 'trailing' the bling. When you think you have enough of them blinged, you turn off all layers but the first layer and either take your eraser tool or your lasso tool and start removing part of the bling. I normally start at the bottom and remove most of the top part on the first bling, leaving only a small fraction of the bling on the first layer. Leave the first layer turned on and turn on the next layer. Then all you do is increase the amount of the bling left at the bottom and decrease the amount you are taking off until you get the full bling at the end. By leaving the previous layer you did turned on, it will allow you to see how your bling trail is progresssing. I normally have 4 or 5 full bling layers at the end to make the animation smoother and so the whole bling animation will show longer before it starts trailing again. Here is a trail I made of the one we just completed. Right click and save the picture, then open it up in Animation shop and you can see the frames (layers). It should give you a good idea of what I am saying: **General Information** Some tubes may be blinged...it is just a try and see for each tube, but some of them turn out quite pretty. You will learn that just about every bling has different settings. Most of the time I always use a size of 2.0. But you might like something else. You will develop your own style as you practice. The best advice I can give is to practice and practice some more. The more you do it, the more you will become comfortable with your blings and the quicker you will learn what you like. I warn you...they are addictive;))). I hope the tutorial was easy. I always try to put enough pictures in to make it so. Now, go have fun making those blings and thanks for trying my tutorial. If you have questions or you want to join my Bling List, you may contact me here: NiteOwl0512@aol.com Be sure and put the tutorial name in the subject line so I will know your mail isn't spam mail. Thanks! NiteOwlsRoost/NiteOwl0512/2008 |
