Hello all!

 

It is finally getting a little quieter in my house.  My FIL should be boarding a plane at this very minute.  I imagine my husband will be home shortly needing a hug & a big, hot cup of coffee.  Saying goodbye is never easy.  Saying goodbye when they are halfway around the world just sucks.

 

I'm still blessed with the presence of the nonstop-eating-machine, my oldest, Soren until Sunday.  After that school resumes for him and my little ones.  I'm really looking forward to some quiet.  Yet I'm also pretty sure that come Monday around 11:00 a.m. I'll be lonely and wishing for the turmoil.  You just can't win with me.

 

Many of theStudio Commercial designers are already back in full swing after the holidays.  Our store has filled up rapidly with some beautiful products, some fantastic little goodies I would love to play with.  Add in our brandnew January Grab Bag free with any purchase over $10.00 and, well, I'm sorely tempted to play and not, well, play LOL.

 

For January theStudio has a new monthly Free Gift with Purchase on any purchase over $10.00. 

This month we've got a lightly winter-themed bag of treats for you.  This Grab Bag contains 6 brand new products from 5 of your favourite designers:

Ambowife Designs
Angel Hartline
Aveziur
Booland Designs
LightningBug Creations

 

 

And to keep the tradition going, even here on the Commercial side of things, we've got a wonderful CU-ok freebie for y'all.   Just click to download & enjoy:

 

 

 

I almost hate to tackle this here.  This is a small space, and this is a big subject.  But it will be a start.  It will be something to try, to tweak and play with.  Something to make your own.  I am talking about drop shadows.

 

Today I will do a short tutorial on using the Warp Tool to alter drop shadows.   My goal is to have my frame pop off the page.  I'll start by sharing my paper & my frame:

 

I imagine no one is jumping up & down at the sight of the frame on the paper.  It just blends in.  I added the standard drop shadow.  The photoshop default.

I find the default a little too dark, too rigid for my tastes.  I normally dial down shadow opacity to 40-50% depending on the light/dark of the kit I'm working with.  I always up the blur factor by increasing size in the effects (fx) panel.  I'm not a fan of strong edges on my shadows, though this does have a place & purpose on some elements.  Nothing is concrete in photoshop or design! 

Now that I've played with all the drop shadow settings in the effects (fx) panel.  It's time to get a little more control over my drop shadow.  My favorite way of doing this is to put the drop shadow on it's own layer.  I do this by going to my layers pallet.  Then;

To warp the drop shadow layer select it in your layers pallet.  Then click edit-->transform-->warp 

You will see a 9-grid mesh appear over your image.  You can pull & push, warp, your shadow any which way.  Play with it, hit the check mark above your design(work) area when finished, or hit the  if you want to start over.

I did mine in a rough butterfly shape to help it pop up & out.  Then I dialed down the opacity even more.  Honestly, I like the opacity even lower but it doesn't demonstrate very well if I do it.  I just think it looks good.