Applying a glitter edge to an element

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Applying a glitter edge to an element

I finally figured it out! Using the tutorial from http://www.designsbymeganturnidge.com/blog/?p=1652 I made a few changes. I hope this makes sense. I made my changes in red.
1. Create a circle with the shape tool. Easy peasy. Leave it as a vector. Don’t rasterize the circle. We want that vector mask for the warping part so the edges stay nice and clean!
Then I jumped to step 4.
4. Create a new layer for the doodle. Create a new layer above the circle. Then hold down CTRL (Command) and click on the thumbnail of the circle’s vector mask in the layers palette. Then you’ll get the marching ants. We want this selection on a different layer because then we can clip papers to the circle below and make FUN elements.
5. Contract the selection. SELECT > MODIFY > CONTRACT. Then put in a value based upon how much you’d like to contract the selection. I entered 10 for the pixel number.
6. Make yourself a doodley brush. Open up the brushes palette and select a hard, round brush. I’ve found that a brush size of 9-12 pixels is usually perfect, but play with the size based upon how thick you want the doodle. Set the spacing to 1% and then play with the roundness and angle of the brush. This time I set it to an angle of -31 degrees and a roundness of 72%. Make sure the hardness is set to 100% so you get a clean doodle.
THEN I added a new layer and choose the style I wanted and applied it to the layer.
7. Make a path and stroke the path with the brush. Switch over to your PATHS palette. Make a work path and then stroke that path with the brush. You should see your doodle there now! Once you’ve done that, you can delete the work path.
Before warping be sure to merge the layers.
I then went back to step 2 and completed the warping.
If there are other methods, please share, I would love to learn them.

Cool! Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for sharing your experience with us. I always tell my mom, I love learning from those who've gone before me saves me a lot of time and heartache in so many different things in life. smiley

Great info Elise! I never thought of making my own glitter edges...

Thanks for sharing this, too!

In Photoshop, I've always made use of glitter pattern files. (Marisa has a ton of beautiful options you can download.) Just add a stroked edge to the element, then fill the stroke with the glitter pattern in the Layer Styles FX Dialog box. The stroked edge can be adjusted wider or narrower--check to see if orienting it inside, outside, or centered looks best with the element shape you are working with--then adjust the scale of the glitter pattern if needed. If your stroked edge is very narrow, a scaled down glitter pattern might make it look for realistic.

The great (sometimes frustrating) thing about PS, is that there are usually ten ways to do every task. I love to learn new techniques, too! Thanks for sharing, Elise.

Thanks Holly, I need to play with this some more. I used a flower shape with tight inner edges and when I selected the stroke area it didn't select the tight turns. Just need to practice more smiley

Thank you for sharing this information. I have wondered for some time how this is done. smiley