Click the link above to watch a quick, minute-and-a-half long video on how to add a pattern to your graphic header.
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BONUS: 20 "POINT 'N CLICK" PATTERNS |
If you see YELLOW highlighted text below that says "Eligible For Bonus", then that means you can immediately download the 20 "point 'n click" BONUS patterns using the link below!
** YOU ARE ELIGIBLE FOR THIS BONUS **
To download the bonus patterns THAT YOU SEE USED on the images above, just RIGHT CLICK HERE and choose SAVE TARGET AS to download the bonus patterns.
You will be downloading a file called bonuspatterns.pat
When the download is complete, copy the .pat file from your desktop and save it to this folder:
C:\Program Files\Adobe\Photoshop Elements 5.0\Presets\Patterns
When you are INSIDE the patterns folder, right click and choose PASTE to paste the .pat file there.
PLEASE NOTE: The bonus patterns are a collection of scan lines, grid lines and other patterns you see USED on the images above. You can apply the patterns to ANY image or shape or text you want to use.
If you want to create the SAME EXACT effect you see used ON the two images above, then DOWNLOAD THE 2 .PSD files provided below.
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BONUS: 20 Point 'n Click Patterns On Existing PSD Files |
DOWNLOAD THE 10 LAYER PATTERNS ON WHITE: Click here
DOWNLOAD THE 10 LAYER PATTERNS ON BLACK: Click here
To download these, you MUST right click and choose SAVE TARGET AS to save them in .PSD format.
Using a .psd style, just OPEN the .psd style in Elements, then RIGHT CLICK on the layer with the style & pattern you want to use and choose COPY LAYER STYLE.
Then go to the image you are making and right click on the LAYER you want to apply the style to, then choose PASTE LAYER STYLE. Voila! The exact same effect is added to your graphic.
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BONUS: Design Dashboard Pattern Collection Bonus |
In addition to the bonus you may have just received, you are also eligible for another pattern set, called "dashboardpatterns.pat".
This is the pattern bonus you read about on the web page prior to ordering.
Save these to the same folder you saved the last set, by RIGHT CLICKING on the link below, then choosing SAVE TARGET AS.
Save these .pat files to the SAME directory you saved the last set, which is:
C:\Program Files\Adobe\Photoshop Elements 5.0\Presets\Patterns
Below you will find step by step instructions on HOW to use the pattern files you just downloaded.
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Step One: Adding a Pattern To Your Header |
If you'd prefer to add a PATTERN to your graphic header, the first thing you must do is decide on which portion of the header you want to apply the pattern to.
There are 2 options so select the one that suits your graphic header layout and follow those instructions.
OPTION A EXAMPLE
What you see aabove is a graphical header made up of a background image with a light grey color applied to it, along with a graphic image that spans nearly the full background area.
Below you will see what that image looks like when viewed in the LAYER PALETTE, showing the image layer and background layer:
If your LAYER MENU looks similar to the one above, with a background and ONE image layer then CLICK HERE FOR THE OPTION A STEPS.
OPTION B EXAMPLE
If your header is made up of multiple images then you want to use the OPTION B instructions.
The example header is made up of three layers starting with the background layer, then image #1 and then image #2, as shown below:
If your LAYER MENU looks similar to the one above, with a background and ONE image layer then CLICK HERE FOR THE OPTION B STEPS.
OPTION a: ADDING A PATTERN TO THE BACKGROUND
Step 1.1: Open "header.psd" by going to FILE > OPEN and choose "header.psd" from the "My Web Site" folder.
Step 1.2: Go to WINDOW in the MENU BAR and choose LAYERS menu then when your image is open you need to select the IMAGE LAYER (it will be labelled "layer1" or something similar) like this:
Step 1.3: Go to the menu bar and click on SELECT, then SELECT ALL:
Step 1.4: Next go to the MENU BAR and choose EDIT then choose FILL LAYER:
Step 1.5: When the options window opens, you need to click the down arrow next to the PRESET patterns.
Step 1.6: Next to CUSTOM PATTERN you need to click the little down arrow:
That brings up the PATTERNS section.
Step 1.7: Then click the round arrow you see on the right in the next image:
Step 1.8: Now from the menu, choose LOAD PATTERNS:
Step 1.9: When asked to find where on your hard drive you want to load them from, choose: Web Site Dashboard then in there go to the folder labelled "Patterns".
Step 1.10: Inside the "Patterns" folder you will see a file called dashboardpatterns.pat. Click that and then click the LOAD button to proceed.
That brings up the PATTERN selections. When you find one you want to use just click to select it and it will appear in the Pattern Menu.
Step 1.11: When the patterns have been loaded, you'll see them appear and from there just click on a pattern that you want to use.
BEFORE clicking the OK button, you need to set the pattern properties because chances are you're not going to be able to use the pattern "as is".
Here's the image with the scanlines added to it, but in order to get it to look like that we had to change the properties from NORMAL to MULTIPLY and the opacity from 100% to 20%.
Due to the limited space to show the image above, the scanline pattern is very faint so here's a cropped close up of what it really looks like:
What you need to do when you have your pattern added is to mess around with the properties and change the mode from NORMAL to MULTIPLY and the opacity from 100% to whatever percentage suits your image the most.
Here's what our image looks like at normal/100%:
The scanlines are too dark, so we change it to multiple and try 75%:
Still too dark. Let's try 20% to see if that's right:
20% opacity is a lot better, so I'll go ahead and click the OK button now and save the image as is.
In your case you may need to try different settings to get yours to look right, but if you start by changing the mode from NORMAL to MULTIPLY you should see a near instant difference.
OPTION B : ADD PATTERN TO PARTIAL BACKGROUND
Step 1.1: Open "header.psd" by going to FILE> OPEN and choose"header.psd" from the "My Web Site" folder.
Step 1.2: Go to the TOOLBAR and click on the RECTANGULAR MARQUEE tool to select a PORTION of your image that you want to apply the pattern to, like this:
Step 1.3: In the example above we selected the image of the man on the left hand side, so now we'll apply a pattern to the selected area so go to the menu bar and click EDIT.
Step 1.4: Now choose FILL LAYER:
Step 1.5: When the options window opens, you need to click the down arrow next to the PRESET patterns.
Step 1.6: Next to CUSTOM PATTERN you need to click the little down arrow:
That brings up the PATTERNS section.
Step 1.7: Then click the round arrow you see on the right in the next image:
Step 1.8: Now from the menu, choose LOAD PATTERNS:
Step 1.9: When asked to find where on your hard drive you want to load them from, choose: Web Site Dashboard then in there go to the folder labelled "Patterns".
Step 1.10: Inside the "Patterns" folder you will see a file called dashboardpatterns.pat. Click that and then click the LOAD button to proceed.
That brings up the PATTERN selections. When you find one you want to check out just click to select it and it will appear in the Pattern Menu.
Step 1.11: From the available patterns in the menu, click the one you want to use. In my case it's the scanline pattern and I'm applying it then I am going to change the mode to MULTIPLY, with a 20% opacity applied:
Now just click the OK button and you're all set!
(As an added note, what I did after applying the scan line effect was to create a 1 pixel black line between the images.
