Hi everyone,

I've decided to close my shop at STS due to some personal issues and family. I'm not retiring from designing, just taking a long brake until I can focus more on creating digital scrapbook kits again.

Everything at my Stuff to Scrap store will be 60% OFF and will end March 9, 2013 when my store closes. I also have a kit for you all as a Thank You for be such great customers! 

It's $2 Tuesday over at STS and I have Twitterpated and My Sweetheart kit and glitter papers in the bin today! 

For this tutorial I will show you how to create a 12x12 digital scrapbook layout in Paint Shop Pro x3. 

Open up Paint Shop Pro and click on File-->New and put the size you would like. For your resolution make sure you put 300, this is so you can have quality printing when printing your layout. 

Under Image Characteristics make sure the "Raster Background" is clicked. Color depth is set to "RGB - 8 bits/channel" and the "Transparent" is clicked. 

Now click OK and you are ready to start creating your layout.

Before I start on a layout I like to pick the photos I want to scrap. Look for a few photos and open them in PSP x3. Once you have your photos opened in PSP copy and paste them into your layout image. To copy an image go to Edit-->Copy, to paste an image go to Edit-->Paste as new image.

Now pick the digital scrapbook kit you would like to use. I'm using my kit Love Birds that is free at my facebook fan page until February 28, 2013. I like to pick my papers first then my elements. Once you have your background paper, copy and paste it into your layout image. Do the same with all your other papers that you would like to use has your background.

Now place your photo where you would like it to be on your layout. To do this you would need to click on the pick tool on the tool bar or press the letter K. This is the second tool at the top, it will look like an arrow. With this tool you can resize your photo and move it around. When resizing your image make sure you use the corner tabs to keep it as a scale image.

Sometimes when you have more than one thing opened in PSP it can crash. Lets save your layout just in case this does happen. Go to File-->Save As name your layout and for the file type change it to a PSPIMAGE (.PSP). A .PSP image is the same has a .PSD image, it will save all your layers and wont marge then when saving. This is a great way to go back and make any changes you need. 

Now open up the elements you would like to use on your layout. Once you have them open copy and paste them into your layout. 

Now that you have everything in your layout image you will see all the different layers in the Layer Box. This Layer Box will be on the right hand side of your program. I want my photo to be on top of all of my elements, so I will click on my photo layer and drag it all the way to the top. Once my photo is the top layer, I will click on my Pick Tool or "K" and start moving my elements around. 

Now for the shadowing. Shadowing is the most important thing in digital scrapbooking. Without the shadows your layout will look flat. There is two ways to create a shadow in PSP but I will only show you one.

Go to Effects-->3D Effects-->Drop Shadow. A drop shadow box will pop up, I like to have the "Preview on Image" click so I can see how the shadow looks on my layout before clicking OK. I also like to have the "Shadow on new layer" clicked so I can move the shadow when needed.

Offset is where your shadow will be placed, either far or close to your image. Attributes Opacity is the darkness and lightness of your shadow, Blur is the thickness of your shadow, and color is the color or the shadow.

The rule of shadowing is to shadow with the darkness of your item. Just about all digital scrapbook elements are real items that was extracted to digital. So they will have a darkness to it, this was caused by the actually shadow that was once there. You would want to place the digital shadow a long the darkness of the element so it will look more real and 3D. 

Now add shadows to all of your elements, papers, and photos. Once you are done you can save your image as .PNG, .JPG, or .PSP . If you would like to upload the layout to the web you would have to resize your image. Go to Image-->Resize change the "Resolution" to 72, change the "Pixel Dimensions" to 600x600, and make sure Pixels is click and not Percent.

Now you know how to create a layout from start to finish in Paint Shop Pro x3. If you have any questions please ask. 

This month I joined in on the Build A Kits at Stuff to Scrap. The theme for this month was "a blast from the past". When I was thinking "what could I make" and all I could think of is when my brother and I would play legos all the time. Now that I have a son all he does is play legos. So, I've deiced to go with a lego/blocks themed kit. Here is a look at my parts of the BAK. 

New month at STS means a new collab kit by the designers. 

Je t'aime, love with a french flair, is the kit you need to scrap all those pictures of love.  The STS Designers have created this adorable kit that is elegant yet a bit of fun for your scrapping needs. This kit contains 2 full alphas, glossy styles, glitter sheets, 72 elements, and 39 papers. 

Contributors:  Scraps by Andrea, Build a Memory, Ponytail Designs, Scrappin Serenity, Digital Harmony Design Studios, Flower Scraps, and Scraps by Missy.

Buy Je T'aime kit during the 1st week of February and recieve the qp's for free.  (no need to buy seperately, will be incluced in the download links) 

The Stuff To Scrap designers have made your life easier by making these quick pages with our Je T'aime collab!  There are so many choices to easily scrap all those pictures!  You will be able to just plug your own pictures in, add any journaling or a titles you wish, and you're done!

Contains: 20 12x12 Quick Pages in .png format.

It's all about tags with another wonderful commercial use grab bag created by the designers at Stuff To Scrap! Tag Your'e It! Grab Bag contains commercial use layered tag templates, extracted tags, single layer tag templates, speech bubbles, journal pieces, and more .  This collection will make your tag stash overflow!  As with all of our CU grab bags, Tag You're It! has been quality checked to give you the highest quality items to create your kits.  

It's here, my first Photography Marketing Set. All sets will come with PSD files so you can customize it to you and your branding. 

This Marketing Set includes : 
-Business card (2x3.5)
-DVD case and cover (Mpix & Miller'sLab specs)
-Facebook Cover
-Gift Certificate (5x7)
-Letterheads
-Logo
-Price Guide (5.5x8)
-Reminder Card (2.5x3)
-Sticker
-Thank You Card (3x3)
-Welcome Luxe Card

• Customizable text and color, 300dpi resolution
• Standard or free fonts included
• Color customizable 
• Compatible with Photoshop, Photoshop Elements, and Paint Shop Pro

Photos by Gunnii Sack Photography 

I'm having a CT Call and I'm looking for some who are creative and willing to help. I have some spots open for my team and if you would like to join go HERE to fill out my application. This call will end January 31, 2013 and on February 1, 2013 you will receive an email from me.

It's that time of year again! Time for the Designer Darling Competition! Are you an aspiring designer - do you want to challenge yourself and learn more about designing? Do you want to earn a spot on the Stuff to Scrap team? Sign up HERE

For some, a mask layer may be called a clipping mask. Basically a mask layer is used the same way as a clipping layer in the digi world. I found by using a mask layer in Paint Shop Pro is the easiest way to use any layered template you may want to use in PSP. This tutorial will help you create and how to use a mask layer in Paint Shop Pro. This tutorial was created using PSP x3 but can be done in almost all PSP programs.

A mask layer is a layer created to cover part of an image or to create a fading effect. The amount of coverage is determined by the black and white image in the mask. Where the mask is black, the image below the mask is invisible. Where the mask is white, the image will be visible.

First you will need to open up your PSP or PSD file in Paint Shop Pro by dragging/dropping it in or by using File-->Open . 

I'm using one of my templates I created for my Little Birdie Photography Marketing Set.

**Little Birdie Photography set will be in my STS store soon.

When you have your image open click on the eye (visible toggle) of the layers you do not want to make into a mask. If you would like to make more than one image into a mask then you would have to do this for each image. I would like to change the color of two images on my business card. So I would do this set twice. See below images.  

Once you have done the above step click on the image you would like to make into a mask. Right click on the image you would like to create a mask layer with. Then look for New Mask Layer, and click on From Image. Make sure you have only Source Opacity clicked. Then click on okay. Once you have done this then your layer should look like the first image of this post. 

Since I would like two layers in my image to be mask layers I will repeat the second and third step. It is very important that you repeat the second and third step if you would like more than one mask layer in your image. If not, then it will look as the first image below.

Now that I have my mask layers created I would like to change the colors of the curve and pattern. To do this you would need to click on the Flood Fill Tool (#7 tool from bottom in PSP x3)  or press F. 

Repeat the forth step to recolor all the mask layers you have created with the colors you would like. Below is my finished product. This is a great, fast, and easy way to complete a layered template you are working with.

Welcome to the Stuff to Scrap January 2013 blog hop. For this months blog hope we have a fun Coca and Coffee theme. I just loved working with the colors for this kit. I love to richness of the colors with a little touch or softness to it. 

If you get lost on this blog hop you can go back to A-M Digital Designs blog to start over. 


Your next stop will be KapiScrap & Art blog. 


You can grab the elements HERE
You can grab the papers HERE