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The tips Brinda Berry shares are so uber fantastic, I wish they were on my blog.
What? Follow that tiny flashlight you’re shining in my eyes? Um. Okay. The day of the week? Well, I’m pretty sure it’s the day after yesterday, which would make it…
Wait a minute! Why are you putting dots of goop on my head? What are those suction cups? Wait a minute! Wait a minute! I remember now. I remember it all.
Today is Thursday. Yes. Thursday, the 17th of May.
And, it’s the day after Brinda Berry posts her bi-weekly fantabulicious* techie guru wisdom on my blog. MY blog. See?
*[Step away from the suction cups. I know fantabulicious is not a real word.]
Okay, readers. Looks like I have some issues to manage with these we’re-here-help people in white coats. Why don’t I turn this post over to the person you came to visit?
A day late and a million clues short, I bring you the lovely, wise, and wonderful, Brinda Berry!
Graphics 104 or The Last Dance with Graphics- by Brinda Berry
Doing a series on graphics has been a lot of fun for me. Why? Because I’m not a graphics guru. I’ve been sharing the neat little tricks that can save you some time and money. I think, “If I can do this, anybody can.” If all this gives you a headache and makes you groan, then forego a couple of Starbucks double caramel macchiatos and hire someone to do graphics work for you. I’ll give you a couple of links at the end of the post.
Tip #1. How to know the size of a graphic you want to replace.
a) I use the Google Chrome browser. If you use Chrome, right-click on the image and click Inspect Element. The size will flash on the screen. It will also display in the right corner box.
b) If you use Internet Explorer, right-click and then click on Properties. Try this on Gloria’s banner at the top of the page and you’ll see the dimensions of 960 X 260 pixels.
Tip #2. Getting rid of a background in a photo.
Have a great photo of you but need to get rid of the ex-husband at your side? There’s a solution. No, I don’t have an ex-husband photo. I don’t even have an ex-husband. I’ll just use a random photo from my computer.
I took this photo with my iPhone. It was my old phone and didn’t really take great photos. My new iPhone takes much better ones. Imagine if I’d had my actual camera with me. I thought this statue was the coolest thing ever. It was stuck behind an escalator in the lobby of a coliseum. What if I wanted to use it for graphic and didn’t want the background? I completed the next process in approx. 15 minutes.
werewolf statue
1)In Pixlr.com, use the Editor software. Open an image from your computer.
2)Click on pink ERASER tool from left floating toolbar.
3) Look at floating menu with different size eraser heads, etc. Choose different size according to detail you need. Also be aware that you can go to the menu bar at the top and click View to Zoom In and Zoom Out.
4) I used the Paint bucket tool and put a color in where the background was erased. Notice that you see little white spots and outline where I didn’t erase well. I would need to fix this before having a finished product.
5) Look at the floating toolbar at the left and you’ll see a paintbrush tool. I used it to touch some of my messy stuff. To illustrate an end result, I quickly stuck Mr. Werewolf on a banner and added some text. Remember that in using the Pixlr.com Editor software, I have three layers in the banner below: text, image, and background. There’s a little eyedropper tool in the floating toolbar that I used to “grab” the green color in my image and then use to paint (with the bucket tool) on the background.
6) Another handy tool is the lasso tool (also on floating toolbar at left in Pixlr Editor) to drag around an outline and crop elements from an image.
Hiring Someone
I promised to leave you with some links of real graphic designers. I’ve happened across a few people with good prices and lots of talent displayed on their websites.
Kristen at http://kctdesigns.com/?page_id=199
Talina at http://bookinitdesigns.weebly.com/advertising.html
Other posts in this series:
Graphics 101, Graphics 102, and Graphics 103
BIO: Brinda lives in the southern US with her family and two spunky cairn terriers. She’s terribly fond of chocolate, coffee, and books that take her away from reality.
Gloria Richard 
I actually knew how to do something. Okay, I didn’t, but my husband has done this for me before. Now, thanks to you, I can do it. 🙂 Well, maybe. Great post, Brinda!
Sure you can do it. Go ahead and impress the hubby. 🙂
Oh, Ciara! Why did my mind immediately go to ways you might manipulate photos of your husband that he would not have agreed to create for you?
Send help.
Never mind. The we’re-here-to-help white coats are back in the room.
Brinda, I love when you get all techie on us. I used to rely on my daughter for all changes on my blog. Then she cut me off … claiming I was a big girl and needed to learn a thing or two on my own. So far I’ve dabbled with graphics and discovered it’s tons of fun 🙂
Yes, my son has tried to cut me off but I keep calling him for tech support. I agree that graphics can be fun.
Squee! This is the best tool yet! I can reduce belly fat in my pics, dewonkify my hair, erase people behind me who are pointing and laughing. The possibilities would boggle my mind if it hadn’t already reached that destination.
As for techie guru next generation members turning off the the help spigot, my stepson is suddenly not answering my calls immediately. Curses on caller ID! But, I’ve worked a creatively sneaky way to get to him. It’s called a prepaid cell phone.
Sweet! I’ve been fiddling with doing my own graphics lately. I’ve been using Pixelmator, but I’m going to check out the software you describe!
Julie- Pixlr.com has several tools besides the Editor. I think they are easy to use. I’ll have to check out the one you’ve been using.
That’s cool!
Hey Tyrean! Thanks for reading the post and leaving a note. 🙂
The possibilities for Graphic Manipulation ping my
creatively sneakycreative buttons.Stay tuned! You’ll know when I
mastermuddle my way through the techniques in these series.All hail BB! I love your techie mind. Really wish we could put our heads together and I could gain your knowledge though osmosis. Sadly, that only happens in fiction. Guess I’ll have to do it the other way. Thanks for the guide!
Megan- Thanks for reading. This is the last of the graphics series. Now I must come up with a new tech topic. Ideas? Suggestions?
I’ll think on it and let you know if I come up with anything. My gears are screeching and grinding at the moment.
Your brain is a well-oiled machine, so I can’t imagine. You must need a nap.
That’s for certain! I came home to husband on a work trip and a SICK baby. I’d settle for a good nights sleep. Fingers crossed for tonight!
So not the way you planned to incorporate your writing retreat Zen. Poor baby. Poor, Megan. Wishing you that good night’s sleep, kiddo.
I love playing around with photographs. It can be a great time-consumer and makes me feel like an artist.
You are a talented graphics artist as well as mega-creative. I think I’ll nickname you Renaissance Man. 🙂
Hey, Michael (aka Renaissance Man), when Brinda gets tired of putting up with my how-would-I questions that morph into here-I-did-it-for-you answers, do you want to play backup?
Thank you for another fantastic post. I’m learning so much from this series..
Hey, Susannah. SO glad you keep visiting to pick up Brinda’s words of wisdom.
Thanks, Savannah! I’m so glad that it’s helping someone.
I did a bunch of this last night. 🙂
SQUEE! We have another techie guru in the house.
I did not do a bunch of this last night, last week, last month, last year…
And you did a wonderful job. We could all learn from you. For those of you who want to check it out, look at these covers:http://libbyheily.blogspot.com/2012/05/book-cover-help.html
As always, insightful, intelligent, inBrindalish. One question: How did you get my mom to agree to pose for your post examples? I’ve even tempted her with a soup bone for my Jessica Aspen review of Little Red Riding Wolf, but all she did was howl.
Hey, Sherry! She chose your mom because I couldn’t get Scotty-boy to cough up a photo of you in your polka dot undies.
That guy is stubborn.
LOL. Isn’t that statue great? I want one for my house. It might look out of place, but it would be a conversation piece.
Wish Sherry had gotten her mom to pose. Love that statue! But I am way out of my league here. As advanced as I’ve gotten this year I’m overwhelmed with tweaking the pictures. Hopefully these posts will stay up till I’ve caught up. Great post Brinda, love that you are moving ahead of me and my computer knowledge. Someday I hope to learn!
I’ll soon have archives so you’ll always be able to find this blog, Jessica.
Jessica, Thanks for the blog love. 🙂
Love the post, not sure I am willing to try it, not because I can’t but because I am LAZY! *chucking*
Hildie McQueen, you are not lazy. You are selective in the projects your choose to take on.
That excuse
alwayssometimes works for me when I’m either overwhelmed or under-planned.There’s a lot I’m not trying because I have ENOUGH on my plate- haha. So, I totally understand.
Useful stuff, Brinda. Manipulating graphics ought to be so much easier that it is, but in the meantime there are people out there who can do this stuff well.
Cheers!
Hey, Nigel! Send me a pic. I need a case study on which to practice Graphic
MutilationManipulation. Thanks for visiting Brinda’s awesome post.Nigel- There are some great and affordable graphic artists online. You are so right.
Gloria-don’t ever delete or lose or misplace Brinda’s posts. I will need them later. Badly. 🙂
Brinda’s posts are staying in my archives forever.
A year from now, I’ll ask if I can recycle some when I’m either (1) on a whirlwind book-signing tour, or (2) too
lazyuninspiredbusy jumping in mud puddles to create one of my own.Hi Lori- Thanks for reading and leaving a note. It’s nice to know that Gloria’s keeping these for the duration. Woohoooo!
Hi Brinda & Gloria! Great info. This series is terrific. Love the end product you came up with and it was nice that you included the links to some professional graphics designers. I’m saving these posts for future reference. Have a great weekend you two!
Thanks, Jill. I am definitely an amateur sharing knowledge. There are tons of great and affordable options for the important projects. I called on my son for designing my romance trading cards. I do my own website graphics since they don’t call for the amount of detail that some print jobs might.
This is fabulously helpful for me 🙂 Thanks for another great installment in the series!
This was fabulously helpful for me. Thanks for another great installment in the series 🙂
Hi Marcy, I’m glad it was helpful! Have a great weekend.
Hey, Marcy! Thanks for the visit. Keep those blog savvy posts going. I study your tips, and have plans to implement them when I get my act together.
‘Course, I’ve been trying mumble, mumble years to get my act together, but I believe it will happen this year. And, not a
momentdecade too soon.Great series, Brinda. Thanks for putting it all together, and thanks, Gloria, for hosting it 🙂
Hey, Mike! *Waving high to Qegu*
For visitors who don’t know who or what Qegu is,
nanner, nannershe is Mike’s wild-eyed fuzzy friend, and the all time record holder for the most comments on my site. You can see her and read about her here.Thanks for the visit! It reminds me I’m looking for
victimscase-study pics to practice the techniques Brinda taught. I think a “What would Qegu say?” picture manipulation might be fun.For me.
You? Depends on your mood and tolerance level for a pet who talks behind your back.
[Cue ba-da-boom drumroll.]
Haha…sounds like a fun little project. Knock yourself out 🙂
I just want to repeat what everybody said: this post and this series is so helpful. So many useful tips. Thanks, Gloria and Brinda.
Thanks, Fabio. I am glad to know that someone might be able to use these tips!
I always like to use image with my posts & struggle to come up with finished product. My challenge is not eliminating an object form the image but impose another one & blend it well. Such a bad job I have done with the banner of my blog. Thanks for the wonderful tips.
Hi Yatin,
Yes, I do agree that blending is a challenge. There are lots of good YouTube videos demonstrating techniques and which tools to use in graphics software. Just go to the YouTube site and enter the search terms to blend layers in Photoshop. Although I’ve shown you how to use a free tool in my blog post series, some of the tools are the same. Check out this one video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KNuQERoJQPA and the use of the Multiply, Lighten and other Blend Modes with 2 layers stacked on each other. The video even uses a technique I’ve seen my son use where you use the same image on 2 different layers stacked to intensify the effect. If you are sticking with Pixlr.com software, check out this video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfB7m8uzoLE where the artist shows using layers. Although he only uses one photo, you could easily use the same techniques with multiple images.