Hope I can pull this off. Ever had images of your dolls that you deemed fit for framing? Well here's a long winded tutorial to show you how you can make a virtual wood frame.
Start by opening the image you want to use:
Now enlarge the canvas size by going to Image>Canvas Size, increase both dimensions by one inches and make sure the relative box is checked, click OK.
Press Ctrl/J to make a copy of the background and then click the make new layer icon at the bottom of the layers palette, (cirlcle) to create a new blank layer.
Select the rectangular Marquee tool, (circled in the tool menu on the left, or press M, if the rectangular tool isn't selected, right click the icon and select it or press Shift/M until it appears) and make a selection across the top of the canvas. Press Shift/Backspace, or go to Edit>Fill to bring up the fill dialog. Select Pattern in the Use: window and select the "Wood" pattern in the pattern picker by clicking the triangle in the pattern window, (if it isn't in the pattern picker, click the arrow in the picker window and select "Patterns" click append when the windows appears and then locate the pattern.) Click OK to apply the pattern. Press Ctrl/T to bring up the Free Transform tool, and size the panel to fill the entire area at the top of the canvas, (the tool will "snap the edge of the panel to the edge of the canvas, you can use the arrow keys to place the inner edge to the outer edge of the main image and use the center sizing handles to drag the outer edges out. Press Enter to apply the transformation.
Go to Edit>Transform and select Rotate 90 degrees CCW, press Ctrl/T (free transform) again and drag the panel to the left bottom edge of the canvas and size it to fill the white area on the left. Press Enter to apply the transformation.
Press Ctrl/J to make a copy of that layer, go to Edit>Transform> Flip Horizontally, and drag the copy to the right edge of the canvas. Press Enter.
Press Ctrl/J again, go to Edit>Transform>Rotate 90 degrees CCW again,and drag and size to the top of the canvas
Press Ctrl/J again, go to Edit>Transform>Flip vertically, press Ctrl/T, drag this one to the bottom edge and size it to fit. With the top layer selected, press Ctrl/E to merge the top two layers into a single layer.
Now, we're going to miter the corners. With the merged layer selected, Grab the polygonal lasso tool, (L on the keyboard, or select it from the tool bar on the left, if the polygonal one isn't selected, right-click on it's icon and select it, or hold Shift and press L until it appears,) set it to add selection, (circled in the tool bar at the top) starting in one of the corners, click once, draw a line to the corner where you need the miter to be, click there to create another anchor point, (don't try to hit the corner exactly, just get the line to intersect it), then make a triangle of sorts as shown, when you return the tool to the starting point, a small cirlce will appear and when you click that, the "marching ants" will indicate a selection. Repeat this process to the remaining corners. When all four miters have been selected, press Delete, this will delete all the pixels inside the selections.
Now, we're going to give the frame a 3D look. First, with the top layer selected, hold the shift key, and select layer two, selecting the top three layers and press Ctrl/E to merge them into one layer.
Then click the fx icon, (circled) at the bottom of the layers palette and click on Bevel and Emboss. Use the settings shown don't click OK yet.
If you're happy with the color of the wood texture, you don't need this next step, If you'd like the wood to be a bit darker, or a different color, click color overlay in the fx window, click on the circled window to bring up the color picker, select a color you like, (darker, more red, etc, the default color is bright red, don't panic when it turns the frame bright red, nothing's perminant til you make it so), and set the blend mode in the window to color burn, (this will make the color darker, so pick your color with this in mind).
Now, one more thing remains (whew, finally), We're going to make it look even a tad more 3D. Click on layer 1, click on the fx icon again, and select inner shadow. Use the settings shown. Press Ctrl/Shift/E to flatten the layers, (or right click the top layer and select merge visable), and Ctrl/Shift/S to save as: and name your file.
And, here's the final result:
Pretty involved I admit, but it looks pretty cool too. Thanks for your time, B~M

Here's one I whipped up this evening. In this one, I didn't apply the color overlay to the wood pattern, leaving it the default color to show what that looks like.
As complicated as that technique looks, it only took me about half an hour from start to finish, (including making the simulated backlit curtain background) to do this one. If I can do it that quickly, it can't be too difficult

Thanks that's a terrific tutorial b-man.

OK, one more example for this thread. Here, I used the same pic of Chloe in that close fitting blue dress again, for this one, I created a wood panel backdrop from scratch using photoshop.
If one has limited resources, (or in my case space), photoshop can help you create some pretty cool photos of your dolls I think

Wow!



That's amazing, B-Man! You are the god of Photoshop! If I had Photoshop and the patience to sit down and mess with it, I'd totally use your tutorials. Well, I probably will eventually, skills and patience or no. Great work!

Wow, B-man! That's neat! Wish I had photoshop. It looks like an amazing program.

Thanks guys! Photoshop has two big down sides, it has a steep learning curve, (it's very technical and complex), and it's pretty pricey. But for someone like me, who's always wanted to create art but has no real artistic talents, it's worth it, (to me anyway).

Thanks for the info. But I'm quite sure you do yourself a dis-service b-man, your artistic talents are ace, and the work you exhibit is excellent.

Ok, one more. This is one I got from psd tuts+. It's a bit more complicated, and I darkened the color a bit and added some knots to the wood texture with the liquify filter just cause
Here's a link to the tutorial if anyone's interested.
http://psd.tutsplus.com/tutorials/photo ... all-scene/

More excellent work, thanks b-man. And thanks for the link.

'w w!'.................

Thank You!

I took a shortcut..........took a picture from my cell at existing pic of my gal on my bedroom wall

Nice work Dave. You'll be up to b-man's standars next.

Alrighty then, one more Tut for this thread PS fans. Let's say you'd prefer a more modern polished metal looking frame for your dolls. Here's a simple one for you to try. I'll start by opening a portrait of my favorite Trek Babe, Candy..
First, we'll convert the Background into a layer by double-clicking on it and clicking ok on the new layer dialog box.
Expand the canvas as before by going to: Image>Canvas Size
It should now look like this:
Click on the create new layer icon, and click on the gradient tool select the "silver" gradient (circled in the gradient picker), to find it, click the arrow at the top right corner of the picker,(circled)and pick the Metals gradients, click append when the dialog box appears, scroll down to the gradient, click it.
With the new layer selected, start at the top left corner and draw a line to the bottom right corner.
Click on Layer 0 to select it, Hold Ctrl and click on the layers icon to select all but the transparent border, go to Select>Modify>Expand and enter 8 Pixels
Select Layer 1 and press Delete, you'll now have an 8 pixel gap between the main image and the frame, we're going to put a bit of an inlay there.
With layer 1 selected, click the fx icon at the bottom of the palette, and select Bevel And Emboss, I set the depth at 150, and left everything at the default settings, you can play around with these some to try to get some different effects.
Don't click OK yet, in the layer style window, select Stroke, set the size to 8 pixels, position to outside and set the color by clicking on the color box and selecting the color you want to use: (I used a gold color for this one)
Lastly, Press Ctrl/E to merge the layers, then Right-Click Layer 0 and choose flatten, Press Ctrl/Shift/S to save as and name the file
And here's the final product:
Thanks again for your time, hope you enjoyed the tut. B~M

Excellent tutorial b-man thanks. A very good explanation and the pics complement the explanation so well. None of that work is easy to do and takes time to perfect you've done a great job. Candy looks terrific in her trek outfit.

Thanks again Jay, here's one I did yesterday of her in that outfit. For this one, I used a brushed aluminum texture I made myself, and changed up the Bevel and Emboss settings a bit for a different look.