Where Am I?

For this tutorial you will need the materials in the zip file below.

For a French, Italian, Spanish, German and Dutch translation click on the flags.

This tutorial was written using Paint Shop Pro 2020 Ultimate. Plugins used in this tutorial are Mura'sMeister/Perspective, Creativity/Splatter, Pic to Painting/Slumber and effects of PSP itself. Export all Brushes into Brushes Folder. Export Fur 6.png as a Custom Brush. The program Animation Shop is used for the animation. Unzip the Materials in a folder you make on your desktop called Where Am I. Duplicate the tubes and use the duplicates to work with. Close out the originals to keep them from getting deleted. Save your work often! To work this tutorial, it is helpful if you have some working knowledge of Paint Shop Pro.

Use the bookmark below to mark your place along the way.

1. In Materials Palette, set the Foreground to color #be9256, Background color to #401601.

2. Create a New Image size 1100px by 736px. Flood fill with background color.

3. Effects/Texture Effects/Blinds.

4. Effects/Edge Effects/Enhance.

5. Layers/New Raster Layer. Tools/Paint Brush/BokehBrushes_16, change size to 400, Rotation to 90, all other settings as default, stamp where shown below .

6. Merge/Merge Down.

7. Duplicate. Effects/MuraMeister/Perspective.

8. Effects/3D Effects/Drop Shadow. Vertical -16, Horizontal -36, Opacity 60, Blur 44, Color #000000.

9. Open calguismistedlandscape02082012.pspimage. Copy mist 1 layer/Paste as New Layer.

10. Move upward so ball lines up with bright ball. See image below. Pull layer below Raster 2. Activate top layer.

11. Layers/New Raster Layer. CTRL+A to select all.

12. Open 448929062_10211966683720213_5441082063657300089_n.pspimage. Copy/Paste Into Selection. CTRL+D to deselect.

13. Adjust/Blur/Gaussian Blur. Radius: 18.

14. Effects/Pic To Painting/Slumber. Choose Slumber/Set as seen below. Send and Close.

15. Effects/Creativity/Splatter. Use settings as seen in images below to create a similar effect.

16. Effects/Distortion Effects/Polar Coordinates.

17. Effects/Geometric Effects/Circle. Set to transparent.

18. Image/Free Rotate by 90, Right. See image below.

19. Image/Resize/Resize by 80%/Resize all layers unchecked.

20. Effects/3D Effects/Drop Shadow. Vertical -16, Horizontal 36, Opacity 60, Blur 44, Color #000000.

21. Move circle into bottom left corner, left of large dark rock in image.

22. Duplicate. Image/Resize/Resize by 64%/Resize all layers unchecked.

23. Image/Mirror. Mirror Horizontal.

24. Place first duplicated ball into upper right corner setting on border. Lower Opacity down to 70.

25. Duplicate. Image/Resize/Resize by 70%/Resize all layers unchecked.

26. Image/Mirror. Mirror Horizontal.

27. Place in upper left corner. Using Pick Tool, rotate the ball so it looks like image below. This image also shows where the balls should be located.

28. Move small ball layer below largest ball layer.

29. Go back to the top layer to continue.

30. Open 450552756_786403656997934_4861130725371637015_n.pspimage of dog. Copy/Paste as New Layer.

31. Place dog just to right of center touching the bottom border.

32. Effects/3D Effects/Drop Shadow. Vertical -23, Horizontal -59, Opacity 60, Blur 44, Color #000000.

33. Adjust/Sharpness. Sharpen More.

34. From tool bar select Paint Brush/Fur 6 brush. Use these settings below.

35. Layers/New Raster Layer. Left stamp brush on right side of dog. Stamp again a little lower over legs.

36. Layers/New Raster Layer. Left stamp brush to left side of dog. Image/Flip. Flip Horizonal.

37. Merge/Merge Down. Pull grass down so it appears shorter. Adjust placement if necessary.

38. Effects/Edge Effects/Enhance. Move grass layer below dog layer.

39. Activate Top Layer. Go to Tool bar/Text tool. Select font Calligraffiti, Size 72, Font color #be9256, Stroke width 0.0, Kerning 25.

40. In Materials Palette, switch Foreground/Background colors by clicking on the double arrow.

41. Type out the words "Where am I?". In layers palette Convert to Raster Layer.

42. Place words where I have placed them in image. (top right below border).

43. Effects/Edge Effects/Enhance.

44. Close off word layer. Merge/Merge Visible.

45. Duplicate. Image/Resize/Resize by 90%/Resize all layers unchecked.

46. Go to Merged layer. Adjust/Blur/Gaussian Blur/Radius 10.

47. Image/Flip. Flip Vertical.

48.Effects/3D Effects/Inner Bevel. Apply as using settings below.

49. Activate Copy of Merged Layer. Selections/Select All. Float/Defloat.

50. Layers/New Raster Layer. Flood fill with #be9256.

51. Selections/Modify/Contract by 5px. Delete. CTRL+D to deselect.

52. Using Magic Wand, select the 5px border. Apply Inner Bevel as seen below. CTRL+D.

53. Open words layer and re adjust if necessary so they are over the dog.

54. Image/Add Borders/Add 5px border, Symmetric checked, color #be9256.

55. Using Magic Wand, Tolerance 0, select the 5px border. Apply Inner Bevel as in Step #52. CTRL+D.

56. Stamp your name or watermark if you wish.

57. Image/Resize/Resize by 95%, All layers checked.

58. Adjust/Sharpness/Sharpen.

59. Save your work as Where am I as a .jpg file if you are going to use animation, Copy.

60. Open Animation Shop. In empty work space, Paste as New Animation.

61. Open SimoneAni-175.mng file. Click within first frame/Edit/Select All. Copy.

62. Go back to the Where am I file. Duplicate it 20 times so you will have 21 frames in all. (Your animation has 21 frames so you must match that number always).

63. Click within first frame. Edit/Selections All. Right click/ Paste/Paste into Selection. Hover the sparkling animation above the dog's head. Left click into place.

64. Click on the View Animation icon to see if you like the way your animation is sparkling. If you want the animations to go slower, set the Animation/Frame Properties/Display from 10 to a higher number, for instance 13. View again. (I resized my image before saving so it would best fit my webpage, but you may leave it as is if you wish.) Once you are satisfied you will now save your work.

65. File/Save As. When the Save as box appears, designate where it will be saved (I save my work in the working folder), give your work the name Where am I and leave it set to save as a .gif file. Save.

66. As the next three boxes come up, click on Next in all three, then when next box appears, click Finish.

Thank you Pam for checking this tutorial for me. Your time and effort is always appreciated. Jul 23, 2024.

If you are going to use this tutorial for stationery, cards or place the tutorial/tag on another site, I would appreciate you contacting me for permission, giving Arasimages credit for the original tutorial and if possible, a link back to my site. Thank you.