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DIGITAL SCRAPBOOKINGTips & Tricks ~ Tone-on-tone with Soft Light
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Hello Shabby Shoppe readers! This is Rosy, here to talk (write) about a favorite little trick of mine involving blending modes in Photoshop; more specifically, the Soft Light blending mode. This is by far the blend mode that I use the most! Actually, I would be satisfied if there were only two blending modes in PSE as long as they were Soft Light and Multiply! :)
So what do I do with the Soft Light blending mode? First, let’s talk about what this blend mode does. Soft Light will multiply the dark tones and screen the light tones, so any blacks will become a darker version of the background color and whites will become a lighter version of the background color. There are many uses for this in photo editing, but on scrapbook paper this is what it will look like.
I often use this on fonts and brushwork to get a softer look; but that’s not all! This works well to make your own tone-on-tone papers. Sometimes you have a beautiful solid paper that needs just a little pattern for a finished look to your page. Here’s one way to add some pattern to your paper.
(note: these instructions are shown in Photoshop Elements 9)
1. Open a solid (or almost solid) paper and a paper that has the pattern that you’d like to add.
2. Layer the patterned paper on top of the solid paper.
3. Convert the patterned paper to black and white using whatever method you prefer. (I usually adjust it to have more contrast.)
4. With your patterned paper selected, go to the drop down box with blending modes and select Soft Light.
Now your paper has a tone-on-tone pattern!
You can lower the opacity or duplicate the patterned layer, depending on the look you want. Another option is to invert the black and white layer. It’s a great way to stretch your stash of digital papers and use SP’s beautiful patterned papers with any color palette!
Here is a page that I’ve scrapped using this trick. The background paper and the purple patterned paper have been blended and the title and date both have the Soft Light blend mode applied as well!
Thank you for stopping in at the Shabby Shoppe blog and I hope you find this trick useful!
Tomorrow Kylie will be here with the projectSCRAP July templates for us!
Jul 21, 2012 @ 18:27:07
Just starting out with this digital scrapbooking and with photoshop so can’t always follow directions easily. I always seem to be missing something. I would love to be able to use this technique but …. when I change my second paper to black and white and then use the blend mode the paper turns back to the patterned paper, same colours and all. My plain coloured paper was sitting there at the bottom of the stack and seemingly had no effect. Do you have any idea what I did or didn’t do wrong? Thanks.
Jul 22, 2012 @ 17:54:28
If you are using the method of turning your paper to black and white that duplicates the layer first, you may have to delete the colored layer underneath the black and white one. Check your layers palette to make sure that you only have a solid paper underneath a black & white paper. Let me know if you still have questions.
Jul 23, 2012 @ 01:13:43
Hi Rosy,
Thanks for getting back to me. I tried turning my patterned paper to black and white and then bringing in a coloured paper. Then I put the coloured paper under my black and white patterned paper. In the end everything was black and white but when I turned the eye off by the black and white layer it worked. I am going to keep trying this out. I am onto something now. Thanks for your help. I have some questions about the line drawing tip too but I will work this one out first. Thanks.
Jul 20, 2012 @ 14:18:02
Fantastic, thanks so much!
Jul 19, 2012 @ 19:04:14
Thanks for sharing this tip! I loved it and went in and made a ton of tone on tone papers. LOL Thanks again!
Jul 19, 2012 @ 01:31:48
You explained the blend mode so well. SO excited to go play!
Jul 18, 2012 @ 16:02:04
Thank you so much for the wonderful post!! I love learning new things.
Jul 18, 2012 @ 18:44:46
Me too, a new technique is kind of like a new toy to play with :)
Jul 18, 2012 @ 15:25:13
Awesome post! This is so handy and reminds me there are so many tricks in PSE I am oblivious to!!
Jul 18, 2012 @ 18:41:59
Thanks, Randa!
Jul 18, 2012 @ 14:51:15
Wow, this is a really useful tip! I’ll have to go start playing around. :-)
Jul 18, 2012 @ 18:39:12
Have fun!
Jul 18, 2012 @ 09:22:24
Awesome post! I use soft light blend mode all the time editing my photos but I’ve never used it like you described above on creating different papers. Great tips!!
Jul 18, 2012 @ 18:38:49
Thanks, Ashley! I’m just beginning to realize the potential that it has in photo editing, but it’s definitely a great digi-scrapping tool!
Jul 18, 2012 @ 05:35:38
Great post Rosy – I think I use the Soft Light blend mode on nearly every layout I create! It’s definitely my fave too! You know, I’d never thought of changing a patterned paper to black and white first though. I will be trying this for sure – thanks so much!
Jul 18, 2012 @ 18:37:15
Yes, I’m realizing that almost 100% of my layouts have something “soft lighted”!