DIY Frames | DYD2021

Document Your December Tutorial
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Welcome to today’s tutorial which is all about how to create your own DIY Frames! I’ll give you ideas and tips on how to create and decorate frames and in my samples, I'll be giving them a holiday flare, since it’s Document Your December time here at The Lilypad!

You can start with a plain frame if you don’t want to start from scratch and then you can decorate it. These frames by Rachel Jefferies are a good choice. Check these out.

Aged Framing Bits and Bobs by Rachel Jefferies
https://the-lilypad.com/store/Aged-Framing-Bits-and-Bobs.html

You can search the store category for “frames” and you’ll find many to choose from.

You can create also easily create your own frame shape. Here’s a great tutorial from the blog that will help you with that. Check that out HERE.

There are numerous ways to create a frame. Basically, you want to start with a shape and then you will cut out the middle section to create the frame. In Photoshop, I usually select the rectangle marquee and draw a square or rectangular frame (Alternatively, you could select the elliptical tool for a rounder shape.

Or, rather than "cut-out" your frame, you can layer shapes on top of each other, then clip your photo to the smaller layer, having the large shape framing the photo (such as my star frame sample where I used the shape tool to draw the star, then duplicated the layer and resized the star so the smaller one sat inside the larger star and the smaller one is where the photo would be clipped to).

TIP: In Photoshop, you can hold the ALT and SHIFT keys at the same time as you draw your shape and it will keep the dimensions equal i.e. a perfect circle or square.

Another option is to use the shape tool and create a shape). Then I select “edit” from the top menu bar and select “fill”. Then select “color” in the contents box and the color picker will pop up. Select a color for your frame (then hit OK) to select and close it down. Select the marquee tool again, draw the square/rectangle shape that you want to cut out of your original filled shape. You’ll see the marching ants for your selection and when you press the “delete” button, the area will be cut out, leaving the frame shape you created.

There are other ways to create a frame, you can use a paper, journal card, etc to start with and then cut out your frame shape from that. You can create multiple frames and line them up, overlap them, rotate them. TIP: when you have a frame or grouping of frames you like, save them to your computer so that you can use them again. PSD files will preserve all the layers so they can be turned on and off as desired or create a plain frame which can be saved as a jpeg that you can decorate later to fit your page design. Don’t forget that if you decorate the frame and then save it to your computer, you’ll want to rename it so you don’t over-ride the original frame file.

Once you have a frame, you are ready to start decorating. There are so many fun things to do with the frame. Here are some of my favorite ways to embellish and coordinate a frame to fit the color scheme, holiday mood or just to jazz it up a bit.

1. Stack frame and papers/journal cards together, fanning them out a bit. You can save this as a PSD file and then anytime you want to use this grouping, you can clip, recolor and resize or move these stacked layers quickly to create a new look. So much faster than starting from scratch.

2. Clip papers to the frame.

3. Add color by adding a fill layer or brush on color. Try using the gradient tool for a fun coloring effect.

4. Attach elements, wordart and/or stamps to the frame.

5. Add text stamps or select a font and add your own text.

TIP: In Photoshop, you can click on the LOCK icon (located just above the layers panel) which will lock the transparent layers, meaning you can stamp overtop of the frame and it will only adhere to the frame. Don’t worry, if your editing program doesn’t support this feature, just erase any bits that spill over the side of the frame, it’s a bit more work but totally doable, so just do whatever works for your program.

You can add depth and realism to your frame by adding a style such as drop shadow or bevel & emboss.

Are you getting excited about these ideas? Are you going to give this a try and create your own frame or decorate a plain frame? Here are a few frames I created, to give you some ideas.

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