UPDATE - FREE PHOTO/IMAGE EDITORS & GRAPHICS PROGRAMMES

Digital photo rendered sepia in Live Photo Gallery – copyright Susie Jefferson

For anyone in love with blogging, scrapbooking, photography etc, there is always that point where you realise you need or want to alter your images (whether your own artwork or photos, or copyright-free images from the web).

Which means you need an image editor and/or graphics programme, plus online storage. Preferably simple to use, and free.

Here's my review on Computery with a run through of the new programmes out there. Please go here to read it.

TRANSPARENT BACKGROUNDS FOR IMAGES & TEXT

I had an email from an online friend, very frustrated because her images wouldn't show up as transparent background. So I've written a new tutorial to tell you how to do it.

Too often, Blogger turns the backgrounds white - so I've explained how and why, and the solution!

 This tutorial also shows you a down-and-dirty way to extract an image from its background, and also how to layer multiple images and text.

I hope it helps!

FABULOUS PHOTOSHOP TUTORIAL

Great news - Amanda of Kevin&Amanda is writing Photoshop tutorials!

Here's the first of a series.

Even if you don't use Photoshop, you should get a lot out of the tutorial no matter what graphics programme you have.

Other great tutorial links (all levels, different styles):
The Pioneer Woman
Photoshop Lady
Misty Cato
Creative Nerds
Tutorial9
Shimelle Laine

DARLING PINK SATURDAY

It's been quite a week - I had to completely reboot the computer (twice) as it somehow developed a time lag inbetween typing something, and seeing it appear anything up to half a minute later. Very disconcerting!

Still, there's nothing like a good clearout, and the old machine is now skipping around like a newborn lamb, October or not... so I've been playing with Photoshop again! I created a couple of Halloween headers and blog backgrounds (see the post further down) and for all the Pink Saturday ladies, I have done these two pictures which you might like to add to your blogs.

These are quite large but can be added to a sidebar as a picture, then you can tell Blogger to reduce the size to fit.

Or keep it large, and pop it in the main body of your blog. Just right-click to copy to your own computer.

I hope you enjoy them!

Click this link to visit Beverly's blog How Sweet the Sound to read the rest of the Pink Saturday posts.

SIX x 6 x SIX

Jennifer at Maidenshade has nominated me for the 6 x 6 x 6 game!


Teardrop logo copyright Maidenshade


This is what it's all about:

• Go to the 6th folder of your pictures
• Find the 6th picture and tell a story about it
• List 6 other bloggers you’d like to see participate (NO obligation)
  

The 6th folder in My Pictures is my Blog folder, and this is the 6th picture in it.

I needed something as a header for my website (just finished rewriting it yet again). So I needed something fairly wide, not too tall. And how to name it? The old site was susiejefferson.com and the new one is 1stfloorflat.co.uk... so I wanted to combine the two. So here you are, courtesy of Photoshop.

The hand itself is a digital clipart outline of a palmistry diagram, from which I made a tape transfer, collaging it over acrylics, tissue paper and old sheet music in an altered book, which I then cutaway from its background via Photoshop, layering the text on top. Here's the result.

Now for 6 people to nominate ... this was so hard! So, in no particular order as I love and admire them all ...


Dawn







Itkupilli






Gillian Allen






Angie





Corinne Stubson


June MacFarlane




And now to tell them they all got volunteered...

MAGGIE TAYLOR

Take a look at this fabulous artist - Maggie Taylor.

Artwork copyright Maggie Taylor













All her work is in Photoshop, using vintage images and her own photos of ephemera and backgrounds.


Artwork copyright Maggie Taylor













I also think praise should also go to her web designers, Connie Hwang and Jarrod Ryhal, as Maggie's site is phenomenal!

Take a look in her Extras section for interviews, thought processes etc.

FABULOUS DIGITAL ARTIST

Copyright Freubel

What do you think this is?

An altered book?



Wrong - this fabulous piece is a complete fabrication - a piece of digital art by Rian of Freubel-Art (a Dutch artist).

This piece has been built up, layer by layer, right from the background texture! I thought this book was real - I can't tell you how impressed I am (and how badly I want to be able to do quality work like this myself!)

Go and see her blog for free collage sheets to download, which she has composed herself. This lady is very talented, very special, and has a unique view (a little Dali-esque, a little grungy) and is a Photoshop genius.

IT'S PINK SATURDAY AGAIN

I love Pink Saturdays - such a nice day, all happy stuff!

Here's my contribution for today: a quotation and some more blog buttons, if you would like to use them to decorate your own blogs.

Here's the quote:

Some men see things as they are and ask why. Others dream things that never were and ask why not.
George Bernard Shaw

And here are the buttons:

Copy ALL of this code and paste it into an HTML/JavaCode box, then insert your own email address where the three *** are, between the mailto: and the " (no spaces!) for your own email button.






<a href="mailto:***"><img border="0" src="http://i659.photobucket.com/albums/uu313/1stFloorFlatComputery/tn_AllJoysEmail.png"/></a>

If you'd like to take this button to decorate your blog, just go Layout > Page Element > Add A Gadget, then copy the code below and paste it into an HTML/JavaCode box.









<a href="http://1stfloorflat.wordpress.com/"><img border="0" alt="" src="http://i659.photobucket.com/albums/uu313/1stFloorFlatComputery/tn_Pinkwelcome.jpg"><img/></a>

WordPress users go here if you would like a blog button (you need different code for WordPress, so I created another blog specially for you).

And don't forget to visit the other blog I write for: BladeRubber Blog - for the giveaway - as it closes TODAY (winner announced tomorrow). All you have to do is leave a comment on the BladeRubber blog. I'd hate for you to miss out!

Go here to visit Beverly at How Sweet The Sound and to see all the other Pink Saturday posts!

PINK SATURDAY - ROSES ALL THE WAY

It's coming up roses for my Pink Saturday contribution this week!


This perfect pink rose is from our garden last Summer.

First, a poem:

For if I wait, said she,
Till time for roses be,
For the moss-rose and the musk-rose,
Maiden-blush and royal-dusk rose,
What glory then for me
In such a company?
Roses plenty, roses plenty
And one nightingale for twenty?
- Elizabeth Barrett Browning
A Lay of the Early Rose

More glorious pink flowers

God gave us memories so that we might have roses in December
- J M Barrie

Here's a vintage rose button I made in Photoshop for you to decorate your blogs with (just go Layout > Page Element > Add A Gadget, then copy the code and paste into an HTML/JavaCode box).






<a href="http://1stfloorflat.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://i659.photobucket.com/albums/uu313/1stFloorFlatComputery/thRose.png"/></a>

And here are some more rose quotations:

I saw a sunset in Queretaro that seemed to reflect the colour of a rose in Bengal.
- Jorge Luis Borges

Pink Parfait rose





The fragrance always remains in the hand that gives the rose.
- Heda Bejar

And finally, the best-known quote of all ...

What's in a name? That which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet
- William Shakespeare(1564 - 1616)
Romeo and Juliet: Act 2 scene 2

Go here to visit Beverly at How Sweet The Sound and to see all the other Pink Saturday posts!

AND THE OTHER WAY TO MAKE A BUTTON...

I just got a comment from KBeau

See the post below (thank you so much for this) who tells me there is an easier way to make a button (after I just spent 2 hours trying to get Blogger to take the code, and ending up pasting it into a gif. Aaargh).

If you don't fancy typing any code, or don't have an external photo store (Picasa, Photobucket etc) you could do this instead:

KBeau says (I have paraphrased just a little):

In Blogger, you upload a picture directly from your computer instead of from an external site.

Once you have your picture, go to Layout > Page Elements > Add a Gadget > Add a Picture.

Locate the picture on your hard drive (or it can be on a website), and upload. Blogger will even shrink it to 220 pixels wide. Plus you have the option of making it clickable by typing in the website that it will link to (there is a box for that).

Isn't it nice to have a choice? Thanks, KBeau!

MAKE YOUR OWN BLOG BUTTON

I have noticed a lot of people like to put buttons on their blog, and I finally worked out how to do one myself!


So of course I had to share how I did it:

• Create/save a picture or photograph in your favourite graphics editing programme. It needs to be saved at thumbnail size, around 120 - 150 pixels wide, and whatever you want the height to be (you may want oblong or square, you may want tall & thin). Most blogs will be happy with 120 pixels wide.
• Create a line of text on top of your pic - either as a separate layer, or as a text box, depending on the programme you have. Save the image as a jpg. (In Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro etc you may need to flatten it before you save it).
  
• Upload your image onto an external site like Photobucket, Picasa or Flikr.
• In Blogger, go to Layout > Page Elements > Add A Gadget
• Click on HTML/Java Script, and copy&paste the code below in the box, substituting your own code in between the "" marks: the first set will be the url of your blog, and the second set the url where you stored your picture (which should be a jpg).
• Replace the instructions highlighted in RED with your own urls.

And that's it! If you hate it, simply delete the HTML/Java Script box.

Please note this is not a clickable button, just a pretty one to liven up your blog.

Let me know how you get on.

PLEA FOR HELP: PHOTO STORAGE

Here's a question for all of you altered art & photography fans out there.


How do YOU store all those digital photos?




Copyright-free photo from Tack-O-Rama

As you will know if you read my computer rants on the blog, I have had a few crashes and had to install a new hard drive. Luckily, I had done sporadic backups and so have around 20-30 CDs full of pix - many of them duplicates. And an external hard drive, which I did a backup onto - and the next backup started to copy the identical information again!

So I need to do 2 things:

1. Configure/organise/instruct the external hard drive just to backup the new stuff or changed stuff (not recopy all the old stuff already on there, especially my huge music section).
2. Totally revamp/reorganise all those photographs, so I can get rid of all these CDs and actually find what I need.

My problem is this: my old web is written in MS Front Page - I loved it; it has an autothumbnail capability. Unfortunately MS no longer support it, so neither does my web server - so I have to completely rewrite the entire website. I bought Serif's new package - which doesn't do autothumbnails (waaaah!) so I am now saving my pictures in 3 sizes (original 300dpi, 72dp for the web and also thumbnails) and even more versions of the same pic if cropping for closeups or alter for digital scrapbook/journal/altered book pages.

It's all become a nightmare, totally out of control, and I want to organise it all once and for all, before the situation snowballs even further.

So if anyone has a solution, I would LOVE to hear it!

HELP!

HOT TODDY PIC

I finished that photoshop course (2 hours each Friday for 4 weeks) so feel a little more confident about messing with layers. Here is one of my first attempts - an old cabinet card with sunlight effect at top left; the image was sharpened, lightened and posterised, then I added text.

For a READABLE hot toddy recipe, look at the post below.

This was fun! In time, I will improve...