When I'm done with this page, I'll have added at least two or three more, including the text layer to identify the pictures and an "effects" layer to add drop shadows behind the frames. Some hold the photos and others the shapes that are behind or in front of them. As you can see by the Layers palette in Figure 5.2, I have a lot of different layers. The Layers palette in Photoshop Elements allows you to add or remove layers or rearrange them just by dragging them.
Both Paint Shop Pro and Photoshop Elements, shown in Figure 5.2, have an actual layers palette, so you can see what's where, and move it up or down and even apply special effects accordingly.įigure 5.2 Photoshop Elements has a more convenient approach to layering. In any graphics program that uses the layering concept, there's going to be a way to rearrange them, sending one layer backward or forward as needed, but simple programs like Picture It! don't offer as much control over layers as a more complex graphics program. Then they appear as a strip of frames down the right side of the screen.
In Picture It! you can select objects and move them up or down, but you can't actually see your layers unless you choose Show Stack in the View menu. See Figure 5.1.įigure 5.1 Using the Format menu, you can move an object forward, backward, or to the front or back of the page. One little quirk is that they call their layers stacks. Here's how Microsoft Picture It! handles layering. The good news about going digital is that with many photo programs, layers are easy to create and can be moved around with a lot less trouble than if you have to glue them in place. If you have plenty of storagespace on your hard drive, that's not such a problem, but working with hugefiles also slows down the computer, and some computers quit in disgust if youask them to do more than they want to. But, just as a lot of pieces of paper andplastic flowers and studs and charms add bulk to a paper page, piling up a lotof layers adds extra bulk to the digital file. Why not leave it in layers? Well, you can, and should, as longas you continue to work on that page. Then, when you savethe page, you merge everything so it's all "stuck down" as if youglued it there. Each thing you addto a page is on a separate transparent layer, so you can slide the photos, text,and frames around until they're in the perfect place. But the animators were ableto save a lot of time and paint by using one set of cels for his arms, anotherset for his legs, and one that didn't move as much for his body.That's basically how layers work in photo programs, too. Because film runs at 24 frames per second, it took a lot of pieces ofcelluloid to make Mickey do that happy little dance. When Disney Studiosturned out its first Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, back in1928, Mickey was actually created out of about five layers of celluloid, or cels, laid over a background, and filmed two or three single frames at atime. To really understand layers, think about a cartoon. You might, for example, use torn tissue to make an edge arounda photo or mount a photo on a piece of double-stick foam tape, so it stands outslightly from the rest of the page. The old-fashioned way is to literally pile up layers of paper on thebackground sheet. If you want your pages to have a sense of depth or texture, you probablyrealize that it comes from working in layers, adding one piece on top ofanother.
You learn about usinglayers and templates, and how to add design elements without making clutter.Let's start with layers. Inthis chapter, you learn about layout and page design. There's no need for panic, though.Simply understanding a few basic concepts makes the whole job easy and fun. Just the thought of designing a page from scratch sends many a novicescrapbooker running and screaming. Digital Memories: Scrapbooking with Your Computer