Hi from Lisa, plus your requests.... - SBB Digital Scrapbooking Forums | Scrapbook-Bytes

lisahoo · #1 (**permalink**) 02-13-2006

Greetings PSE users (or PSE-user-wannabee's!!)

I wanted to take a minute to introduce myself, as I'm going to be working with Stacy (username Fox-Myers) on developing more tutorials for y'all for PhotoShop Elements.

I've been using PSE 2.0 to do my digital scrapbook layouts since November 2004 ~~ I have paper-scrapped for a few years before that. I have an 18 month old who is into EVERYTHING, so the discovery of digital scrapbooking has saved my sanity!! I still use my paper-scrapping toys every now & then, and if I am ever lucky enough to have a craft room, I will again. I've used PSE for web graphics and desktop publishing for the last 3 years (btw, it uses a LOT more memory to use it for digiscrapping!!).

Y'all have been good about posting your requests for 'how-to's in PSE, but I wanted to give you all an open invitation -- if there are things you'd like to learn to do with PSE, whichever version, please let us know!!

First off, you want to check the PSE Tutorials section (and also the PhotoShop tutorials section -- an awful lot of the things you can do in PS can also be done in PSE!)

If you don't find what you want, be SURE to post it HERE ~~ if you can list the version of PSE you are using, that is helpful too! (I have PSE 2.0, which I've been using for years, and PSE 4.0, which I've only been using for weeks -- ha!)

Stacy and ShellyRae from the tutorials team, as well as the other community members are usually really quick to answer the quick questions which is great, but I'd also love to hear the big ideas you might have for what other cool things we can do!

I know there are some new text capabilities in 4.0 I'm dying to play with -- what's on your wish list?

afwife · #2 (**permalink**) 02-13-2006

Hi Lisa! Thanks for volunteering to help us!

well, i have begun designing my own kits. i actually have quite a few near completion. i just havent had the time to finish them up due to my DH being deployed and me now being a single parent (temporarily).

my BIGGEST struggle: BOWS

i have now resorted to making my own with ribbon, and then scanning them in. but i do see that people are making them look somewhat realistic - creating them digitaly. i have seen a few tutorials, but i havent found any that i really am learning from. maybe its user error, not tutorial error. but i wish the oldie designers would share that one secret

THANKS!

i use PSE3.0 and PS7.0

Pepy · #3 (**permalink**) 02-14-2006

Hi
I'm a new here. I like making digital scrapbooking with using adobe photoshop. I have a question, what is the different between adobe photoshop and photoshop element

Thanx
Pepy

sprauncey1 · #4 (**permalink**) 02-14-2006

Pepy-
The short answer is: about $500!

Photoshop Elements (PSE) is a "simplified" version of Photoshop (PS) without some of the more advanced capabilities like complex actions and levels manipulations and layer masks. I'm sure there are more too, but I haven't found them yet in my learning. I used PSE for a year and still to this day use it 90 % of the time. I bought PS CS2 only because they gave me a great deal on it and I wanted to be able to run some of the free actions that are out there.

Now the basic set up is the same between the two, but PSE has a lot more shortcuts to make it more user friendly. People who use PS generally have a bunch of keystrokes memorized that do the same thing as the shortcuts, but I don't have them memorized yet, which is probably why I keep going back to PSE.

But PSE does take some time to get used to as well, it definatley is not an intuitive program, so don't expect to be cranking out super fab LOs on the first day (or week or month for me). But soon enough you can become proficient at the basics of the program and then just keep on learning stuff.

If you are planning on making/selling your own kits then I would jump to PSCS2 for $600 since you will eventully want the advanced capabilities to make realistic items for your kits. But if you are just planning on scrapping and maybe dabbling in making your own kits, then stick with PSE ($100), it really is a powerful program for what most of us want to do!

knightsgal76 · #5 (**permalink**) 02-14-2006

I just purchased pse from ebay..... Atomic Cupcake has LOTS of FABULOUS actions for pse (called effects) - the exact same actions they have for Photoshop they have for PSE.

arti-bytes · #6 (**permalink**) 02-14-2006

For a beginner, I suggest PSE4 as it teaches you how adobe writes it's programs. It is very user friendly, and like Raechel said, you can use effects from Atomic Cupcake to do some really cool stuff. You CAN create your own papers and elements in PSE once you take time to learn what your program can do. I will probably end up getting CS2 as well down the road, but am very content with my PSE4 and the layouts that I am able to crank out with it now.

lisahoo · #7 (**permalink**) 02-14-2006

Thanks everyone for jumping in with the difference between PS & PSE ~~ I had PSE at one time ~~ and it had too much horsepower for me!! Granted, I was using it to make web page graphics, not print-quality scrapbook layouts!

I think the topics will likely split into two piles, skills/techniques for making digital scrapbook LAYOUTS and techniques for making digital scrapbook ELEMENTS.

So I will add making realistic bows to the 'element' pile, and a summary of the differences between PSE & PS to the other!

Thanks again & keep 'em coming!

sprauncey1 · #8 (**permalink**) 02-16-2006

Lisa,

I know that there are kinda a couple out there that are "beginner" tutorials for PSE, but they still don't "dumb" it down enough I think. I thought about a while back writing my own, but with my new pregnancy, my energy has gone out the window! So anyway, could you maybe do a PSE newbie tutorial. Especially talking about the way to get "stuff" onto your page, moving stuff around once they are "on" the LO, etc. Pictures would be awesome for this. Really this is where I find most people get "lost" with PSE. Especially since it opens up with the window maximized and you cannot see how to drag one thing to another etc like when you have it in the tile/cascade views. Also a short discussion about the organizer/editor/quickfix windows would be good too, because sometimes the new person is in the totally wrong place and the instructions out there make no sense.

So that is my request for all those buying and trying PSE and don't know to ask! If you don't understand what I'm going for just let me know! You are super!