A lot has been taken for granted in this tutorial as far as what you may/may not know about utilizing the software you have.  In order to get it up and on the web I really did hurry.  For that, I apologize.  A read through of the tutorial on Paint Shop Pro may help you understand some of the terminology.  Paint Shop Pro Tutorial

    This tutorial was created using Photoshop Elements version 2.0 and Adobe has jumped forward in leaps and bounds.  You may find you have to struggle through a few of your pull down menu's to find the correct location of shortcuts and/or terminology.  It will however, give you a better understanding as to how some of the basic tools work in Photoshop and Photoshop Elements.  Should you feel you're getting stuck in the quicksand trying to get through this, DO NOT hesitate to fire me off an email and we'll struggle through it together.  You're never alone in this quest to develop patterns ... this is just a starting point and there's a LONG way to go from here.

1. <File> <Open> Navigate to folder where the picture is.  Select the file and Click <Open> (or double click on the file and it will open automatically.

2. <Image> <Resize> <Image Size>

3. All I entered on the above screen was the Height of “10” and the Resolution of “300”  with the Constrain Proportions box selected it will automatically adjust the Width so there’s no distortion of the image. Select <OK> to apply the resizing.

4. Press and hold the “Ctrl” key on your keyboard and while holding press the “0” number key.  This will make the image fit on the screen.  You can also do <View> <Fit on Screen>.  Ctrl+0 is a handy shortcut.

5. <Image> <Mode> <Grayscale> will remove all color making the image black and white.

6. <Filter> <Sketch> <Photocopy> entering the following parameters.  Once this screen comes up you can use the little hand that shows up over the image portion of the screen to move over to where the Shrine gentleman is or the – or + key to zoom in and out.  Detail = 24 Darkness = 50.  Select <OK>  These number will change with every pattern you make.  24 and 50 just happen to be the ones that apply to this picture.   Play with the settings and you’ll find interesting effects.

7. <Enhance> <Adjust Brightness and Contrast> <Brightness and Contrast using the following settings.  It’s easier to just drag the sliders all the way to the right than to select the boxes and type 100 in both Brightness and Contrast.  Select <OK>

8. <Filter> <Sketch> <Stamp> with the following setting again.  I just use the sliders as shown in the image below. Light/Dark Balance = 1 Smoothness = 13.  These numbers will be different with every pattern you make.  1 and 13 are the numbers I used to create the pattern we’re discussing but play with them and familiarize yourself with them.

9. Here’s where it gets tricky and a bit of the artistic side of your mind will have to go to work.  The computer can only do so much automatically for you.  What we’re striving to do in this next step is make it a true scroll saw pattern by making sure all the white is “connected”.  The white will be the wood that’s left after we scroll saw the black areas away.

10. The tools we want to make sure are correct are the pencil tool settings (circled in the following image  and the foreground  and background colors (also circled with text descriptions in red.  For now, have the foreground as a light grey, the background white and the pencil size at 15.  Again, the areas highlighted in red in the image on the next page are what we’re looking for.

11. Select the flood fill tool by clicking it with your mouse and then click anywhere in a white area of your image.  This will flood all the white with grey.  All the white that is “connected that is.  If there are areas of the image that are completely surrounded with black it cannot flood the grey beyond the black.  This will show you where the white areas are not connected.

12. Select the pencil tool now and draw in the image any details that need removed (small flecks of black for instance) and “connect” all the white.  I used red in the next image so you can see where I “drew” to achieve this.  See fig. 1.  Obviously, what is red in mine is what you would have drawn in grey.  Fig. 2 is a better sampling of what your screen will look like.

        Fig. 1         Fig. 2

13. Repeat step number 7 for Brightness and Contrast to return to a black and white picture.  The repeat step number 12 and 13 until you are satisfied all the white is connected in the manner you want the pattern to portray.  I purposely made it a point to be sure all the white (well, all the white that I want connected anyway) is in the previous fig. 1 with the red shown for highlighting.

14. You will notice there is still some white in the cane and Shriner’s cap.  These are areas that I want to be black so they will be cut away.  There is also a problem, in my opinion, in the separation of his lower legs so.

15. Change the foreground color to black and with the pencil tool, draw in any areas that are white now to make them black and I’ll add some separation to his legs, fill in the shoes and create some shadows in a couple spots.  Following fig.1 will show what I did in red and fig. 2 will show the same thing as you’d see it in black and white on your screen.

         Fig. 1     Fig. 2

16. Guess what … repeat step 7 for Brightness and Contrast and you’ll be back to black and white with a pattern that looks like the following image.  Congratulations and I hope I was some help in getting you through this process.  There are many, many shortcuts and this pattern is very basic.  It could be done with substantially more detail by taking the time to draw more detail in, highlight areas, remove areas over and over again until you got the pattern just the way you desire it.

Now that you've made it this far.  Take some time to thank a Shriner!!

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