Paper Weave Tutorial!

Ok, so I had some down time tonight while my hubby played his video game so I decided to make the tutorial for the paper weave now so I don't forget.

First, I'm not a PS or PSE expert so if there's an easier way to do this, please comment and share the knowledge. Second, I'll try to answer questions if I can but I'm hoping others will help out because we'll be moving sometime in the next two weeks and I'm gonna be busy and because I'm not nearly as knowledgeable as some.

This tutorial will work easiest and best in PS but I believe it is possible in PSE. It will take a little more work and require you to be very diligent with your layers panel but it should be possible (I think). If not, I'm sorry but here's how to do a custom shadow work around since all of the weave rectangle layers require the shadow to be on it's own layer:

*There is a way to make custom shadows in PSE but it’s not as easy. Make a duplicate of the rectangle shape and fill it w/ black (or dark brown - whatever color you like your shadows to be). Change the blend mode to Linear Burn or Multiply (again whatever you prefer) and change the opacity to your preferred %. Then do filter, blur, Guassian blur and pick whatever number gives you the blur you need for a paper shadow. Probably a smaller # for papers. Lastly, you might need to nudge the shadow w/ your the keyboard arrow keys in the direction you have all your other shadows going on the page.*

First, I took the rectangle tool and made a long rectangle (whatever size width you’d like the paper to be). Keep in the mind, the smaller the width, the longer this will take.

Then I duplicated it and dragged across the page until the page was full.

Then I duplicated that same shape again and rotated it and made a row across the top.

Then I added a text layer to the top of the file numbering the columns and rows so I could more easily keep track of which column and row I was dealing with at one time.

Now begins the tricky part:

Decide if row 1 is going to start above column 1 or below column 1. In my case, I had it start above column 1.

The next step is to command click on the thumbnail of column 2 (while keeping the layer of row 1 selected in the layers panel). Then hit the delete key to remove that part of row 1.

Now, do the same for column 4, 6, 8 (or every other column) until row 1 has all the right parts deleted.

Your page should look similar to this at this point:



Whatever shadow you added to your vertical columns, add the same shadow to row 1 now that it has had all the necessary pieces deleted.

Once the shadow has been added, you’ll need to shave off using the eraser tool or selection tool (whichever way you prefer) the shadow on each end of the pieces of row 1. This will require you to take the shadow and create it’s own layer so you can manipulate it.

Something like this:



Ok, now that the edges of the shadow have been erased, you will take the smudge tool and push the shadows closer to the row 1 pieces at each end where the row 1 looks to be going under the vertical strips. So the shadow will be almost nothing as you get close to the vertical strips that show through. I usually use the smudge tool to do this with a brush at 20% strength.

Should look like this:



Now you’ll want to dodge and burn the pieces of row 1 to complete the idea of the weave. You’ll burn (very lightly) each edge that goes “under” a vertical column. Then, very lightly dodge the middle of each piece of row 1 that is “above” the columns.

One last thing remains to fix the weave and it’s shadows.

For all of the vertical columns, you will need to make their shadow layers a separate layer.

Right now there is no shadow showing for the paper strip of column 2 even though it’s supposed to be “above” row 1. To fix this, duplicate the shadow layer for column 2. Move it in the layers panel so it’s above the shape layer of row 1.

Like this:



Command click on the layer thumbnail for the shape of row 1. Go to the select menu and click on inverse the selection.

Should look like this:



Now, hit the delete key and voila, that missing shadow is now fixed.

As seen here:



Do the same for the rest of the columns that are “above” row 1 until row 1 is complete.

Now do ALL of this for row 2 but utilize the opposite numbered columns so use 1,3,5,7,9, etc instead of 2,4,6,8.

A hint: If you can, using the group option in photoshop really helped keep me organized with all those layers. Once I finished a row, I grouped all the pieces for it and labeled it row 1. I don’t know if you have this option in PSE.

Now to save time, once you’ve completed row 1 and row 2, select either the group for row 1 or all the layers for row 1 and hit command J to duplicate. Get the move tool and while holding down the shift key, drag a copy of row 1 down until it’s in place for row 3.

Do the same for row 2 to make it row 4, etc until the page is finished.

Ok, that’s it. LOL Hope this helps. And if you’ve hung in there this long, thanks - I know this was a lengthy tut!!

 

You are so welcome!