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Need help with shadows

purlz76 said:
TLP blog has a warping shadow tutorial that I swear by it. Click HERE.

Now I've learned to tweak it a bit to get the desired effect I want. I've yet to use the Smudge Tool. Cos that warping is good enough.

Yes, flipping the corners to make it look curled is very difficult and tricky. Sometimes I have to refer to the pre-set shadows in the stores to make sure I got the angles and/or blurring effect correct.

HTH :)
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I followed the tutorial and after several tries, I could see a difference in my long rectangle.

It is such fun to try all of these ideas. Thanks ladies.
 
Karen said:
That's pretty much what I do too Pam... except I didn't know about a Ctrl+click and getting warp from the pop up menu... so thanks for that tip Juliette! :) I've always wished there was a hotkey for warp, that is going to be very useful!

I do the shadow and create a new layer part and then I just go to Edit, Transform, Warp. I also sometimes will do a Filter, Blur, Gaussian Blur (6-8 pixels) on the shadow layer too, just to soften the edges a bit more.
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You can make your own keyboard shortcuts in PS ;)
 
pbrooks said:
I agree with AmyG, great advice and I am going to try all of your suggestions. Last night I followed Juliette's advice and was able to see a very slight curl I think I tried many times but I have not given up. I am determined to master this technique.

Juliette, I looked at your layouts with your awesome shadows and that is helping a lot.
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Once you have done this a few times, it will be a must do for your pages!! Right, Juliette? ;)
 
That looks great Pam! You really get a sense of the stitching holding the strips down and that they're lifting from the page. Are you happy with it? :)
 
Brandi said:
You can make your own keyboard shortcuts in PS ;)
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I know, but I'm always worried I'm going to use one that then I'll later need the orignal shortcut for. LOL! :) I do have a handful that I added to the F1, F2, F3, etc. keys because I knew I didn't care about whatever they were originally assigned to be.
 
Glad some of you can use my action! It's one of my favorites.

I've reassigned so many keyboard shortcuts. You can always put it back the way it was if you need to.
 
Speaking of shadows, do you have a to-go stitching shadow(s)? Can share with me (& us)?

I had created two. But it doesn't work for every stitches. Sometimes I will use the tape shadow (provided by one of the designers) to the stitches too. :giggle
 
Agnes, I'll have a look when I get home later :) Are you hoping for a style to install, or just the numbers so you can play?
 
i'm gonna have to come back and go through that tutorial when i get a free second. i have always loved this effect, but have never learned how to do it myself.
 
HeatherB said:
I find that smudge works best in tiny increments. Don't pull the shadow out to its final position in one go.
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Also start with a smaller strength smudge like a 20% you might need to do it more often but the 40% or 50% is a lot for someone starting and it will be TOO MUCH and you will need to re-do more time making it more frustrating.
 
Pam, I made two video tutorials on how to distress fold/curl papers in the Art Journal area in case you want to take a peek. video tutorial.
 
It's a little more fiddly than warping, but puppet warp works great for warping the shadow too on a separate layer. Just anchor the shadow along the sections you don't want to move and then pull the anchors on the edge you want to shift. Then I apply a low opacity gaussian blur 4-7 usually).
 
Hi Lorry, the link you shared doesnt work are you able to direct me to where I can check out your action? Thank you in advance ;)

Oops scrap that It automatically downloaded he he thank you x
lorryfach said:
I made an action to put the shadow on a separate layer and call up the warp tool. Anything that's more than one step in my world gets an action, and the action gets a keyboard shortcut. :P
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Lorry thanks south for the action - a great timesaver. I always think I should make actions but never get around to it!
 
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