This was the first tutorial I wrote. I can clearly see better ways of creating this image, but I am leaving this up to remind myself how far I’ve come and what I have learned from the Paint Shop Pro community.
Materials needed: PSP, I did this one in Version 7, it should be easily adapted to other versions. You will also need Blade Pro or Super Blade Pro. I wrote this tutorial with the assumption that you have a better working knowledge of PSP 7 than I do! There are a couple more examples at the bottom of the page to give you more ideas. Make this exactly as I did or personalize to make yours unique!
Don’t forget to save often!!!
Click the thumbnails or a better view.
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Begin with a 400 x 400 transparent canvas. With your ellipse selection tool, antialias checked, make an egg shape in the middle of your canvas. Make the shape as big as you want your egg to be. Flood fill the egg with a beige color, I used #D0CEC2, R 208, G 206, B 194.Don’t deselect! |
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Add a texture of your choice, or use:Effects | Texture Effects | Fine Leather Color | Black Angle | 210 Blur |10 Number of furrows | 10 Length of furrows | 10 Transparency | 247 Don’t deselect! |
| Add a new layerEffects | 3D Effects | Cutout V | -5 H | -10 Opacity | 70 Blur | 50 Shadow Color | #836A43 Note: This is not the cutout used in my egg above. Yours will look different, but better than mine using these settings. Deselect |
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Effects | 3D Effects | Drop Shadow V and H | 2 Opacity | 80 Blur | 30 Shadow Color | Black |
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Next, we will make the horizontal “bands” in the middle of the egg. Make a new layer and use your ellipse selection tool and make a selection like mine, fill with white. |
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Contract your selection by 18 or so (use your best judgement), then hit delete, select none. Make another ellipse selection to get rid of the upper half of our ellipse or use your eraser. Make your band look similar to the one in the pic. You may also have to use your eraser to make the ends of our band fit the egg better or the deformation tool. |
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Duplicate the band we just made, nudge the duplicate layer up and line it with the original band. Go back to the original band layer, use the deformation tool and make it a little longer to fit the egg better. When you have the band fitted to the egg correctly, use a gold or silver blade pro or super blade pro preset on both of the bands. I used a sparkly gold preset from Web Elegance which is no longer in existence.. With her permission, you may download the preset here. Next, add a drop shadow to both bands. |
You should now have an image that looks similar to this one. Have you remembered to save?
The next part is not necessary, but it does add to the looks of your egg. There may be an easier way to accomplish this look (and if you know it, please let me know *g*). I used Abilene font size 48, vector and antialias checked, capital letter O. The Stagecoach font is very similar to Abilene and can be downloaded from The Font File, although it’s not necessary. Any letter O will work or a fancy dingbat, just use what’s available to you and have fun with it! Let’s make some metallic braid!
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Add the letter O, resize if necessary, rotate it a bit, convert to raster layer, then duplicate over and over and move each “O” into position. Once you’re almost half-way across, merge visible all of the layer “O’s”, then duplicate the merged layer of “O’s”, mirror that layer and move into position on the right side of the egg. |
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To finish it off, add another “O” to the middle, again resize if necessary, move it into place then convert to a raster layer. Duplicate it as many times as you need to complete the decoration. (The middle of the braid does not need to be rotated.) Then, merge visible the decoration again, apply your blade pro preset, add the same drop shadow settings as we last used and move this layer under the bands. You may have to nudge the bands a little to line things up again. |
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Next we need to add a closure to our jeweled egg box. On a new layer, I used the Abilene font again and chose the lower case “x”, then rotated it sideways and resized, then converted to a raster layer. (Size your “x” smaller than I did) Once again you be the judge on what you want it to look like. Apply the same bp preset and the same drop shadow. |
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Add a new layer for the chain we’re going to make. With your paintbrush, foreground color set to white, draw a line for our chain. Apply blade pro and again, the same drop shadow. |
Here’s what your image should look like now or something similar. Don’t forget to save!
Make a new layer, we’re going to add a jewel to dangle from our chain. On the new layer, make a small vertical ellipse, fill with white, then choose your favorite jewel preset or whatever you wish for your decoration. I used a pearl type preset. Add another new layer, use your paint brush, same settings as earlier, and draw three prongs to hold your jewel. Same treatment to it, bp preset, then drop shadow. You should have something like below.
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You can merge visible all the decorations.
Add a new layer, we’re going to add another decoration to the top of the egg. Use my idea or one of your own, be creative!
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I used Davy’s Dingbats 2 which can be downloaded from The Dingbat Pages, upper case letter J for my decoration, flipped, enlarged and deformed to fit the top of my egg, then converted to a raster layer. Apply the bp preset to your decoration and add a drop shadow. Be sure and sharpen the decoration if it needs it. |
At this point you should have three layers, the top decoration, the middle decorations and your egg. Hang on now, we’re nearly finished! View my finished egg for references. Find a base or dingbat for your egg to sit on, decorate it any way you wish. Add a new layer to make your background. I used a gradient, then used Flaming Pear‘s aetherize filter on the background. Once your background is to your satisfaction, merge all (flatten).
Resize (if you want your image smaller), always sharpen if you resize a graphic, frame if you desire, take a deep breath, then stick a fork in it, it’s done!
Here’s another with a shiny gold preset and a ruby jewel.
And another, but this time vertical.
Let me know if I can assist you in any way, thanks for taking the time to view and/or try my tutorial!
