This tutorial was written in November 2001 and  © by Lady Oz.  You have my permission to make a copy of this tutorial or print it out for your own personal use ONLY .  If you think that my work is good enough and would like to create a  TEXT LINK to my tutorials, or share them with a group, please let me know.  This tutorial belongs to this site and I wish it to remain here.

What you create from my tutorials belong to you, to do with as you wish....I hold no claim to them...but I would love to see what you create from them. ;o)

 

Lake Applet Tutorial

 

How I made this Lake Applet!

 

This is a fun tutorial for anyone and doesn't need a lot of PSP skills.

What you will need.

• PSP 7     (I use version 7 but can easily be done in earlier versions.)

• Almathera Puddle Filter   to be placed into your Plugins folder.

 

I have simplified this lesson just so that you can get the hang of it before venturing off with your own tubes, pics etc. However, if you wish to use your own you will have to play around with the settings until you get them right. ;o)

 

• Keep an eye on the settings on the bottom bar of your program.  It is essential that each of the three graphics are the same as one another...otherwise the picture will be out of whack!

• Do not forget to save your image as you complete each task...wouldn't want you to lose what you have worked so hard to achieve! ;o)

Open up a transparent image size 230 x 400 16.7 million colours

Save As 'lake1.psp' in your PSP Animations folder...if you haven't got it...make one!

Grab your selection tool ...Rectangle...Feather 0....Antialias unchecked

Starting from 0,0 (top left hand corner of your image) select an area of 230 x 230 (check the bar at the bottom...you will see the numbers changing as you move your mouse around the image)  See image below but ignore the gradient fill....yours should be transparent and the settings at the bottom are just to show you where you have to look. 

Grab your flood fill tool and fill with your choice of gradient... linear gradient and fill the new area with this. Go to Effects...Noise...Add...choose 2% and uniform. (See Pic 1) *DO NOT DESELECT*

Add a new Raster layer and then grab your tube tool and add your tube to
this layer. With your move tool put it to the bottom of the
gradient fill. Merge Visible these 2 layers. (See Pic 2) *DO NOT DESELECT*

Copy (Ctrl + C) and then *Deselect Now* Add a new Raster Layer.

Paste the copy onto the new layer.

Grabbing your mover tool again...drag this selection down to the bottom of your image 230, 400 (see pic3) ...Keep Selected!


At this stage we need to make 2 copies of our image. So...Shift + D twice. Now we have 3 images all the same...for now!  :o)  Put them side by side in your work area in numerical
order.  The picture below shows the 3 images side by side but with the first pic showing the next steps you will make.

Go back to the first image (which you should have by now saved as 'lake1.psp') as we are
working on this one first. (The other two images will be at this stage 'image 2' and 'image 3')

Now go to Effects...Plugins....Almathera...A Puddle...and use these settings.
Lake...reflection 110 displacement 50 lighting strength 80 perspective 50 scale 40 OK.





Grab your mover tool again and move this selection further down again...230, 455 (look at the settings on the bar at the bottom...like I said before, this is important) okay, now deselect. Merge all layers visible and save as 'lake1.psp' in your animations folder.

Minimise this image and go to your second image.

Go to Effects....Plugins....Almathera...A Puddle...now this time you will only need to
choose 'last used' and all your previous settings will come up....reflection 110
displacement 50 lighting strength 80 perspective 50 ....this last one is the only one
you change... scale 35...yes, the last number is 5 less than the one for the first image. :o) OK.

Same again...grab the mover tool and drag further down to 230, 455. Deselect. Merge layers
visible. Save as 'lake2.psp' in your animations folder. Minimise this image and go to
image 3...nearly there. ;o)

Do these same steps for image 2..changing the scale to '30' for this last one. click ok
Merge layers and save as 'lake3.psp'.

That's it...now for the animation ;o)

Open up Animation Shop and click on the Animation wizard

Select "same as first frame" > NEXT

Transparent > NEXT

Upper left corner of the frame....with the canvas colour > NEXT

Yes, repeat the animation indefinitely.....60 > NEXT

(You can change how long you want each frame to be displayed to get a better effect
of what you are hoping to achieve)

Add image...open the folder where you saved these 3 images....
holding ctrl down...select image 3 image 2 and then image 1 in that order
...this puts them in the correct order. Click on >NEXT > FINISH.

Now go to VIEW > ANIMATION....Then if you are happy with the result, click on save as
"whatever name you have chosen"...it will save it as an optimized animation. (Be sure to exit the animated preview before you try to save)

Voila! Your done! wasn't too painful was it?

Now you can play around with full scale pictures or tubes of your own and even add a
border to each one, before animating. I have a page on my site where I display a few of the applets I have done, using this method, which I stumbled on by sheer accident!

If you have any problems with anything just give me a buzz!