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Super Blade Pro
with Presets
Super Blade Pro is often used with text
or dingbats to create metallic or gel
effects.
Both the pieces of text
above were created using the same Super
Blade Pro (SBP) preset, but with different
colored text to start with.
The one on the left is applied to text
with a gold gradient fill, and the one on
the right the text had a red fill.
You
will need the Super Blade Pro filter, which
you can download from Flaming Pear HERE
as a free (time limited) trial.
The font I used is called Gregorian, you
can download it HERE or use any chunky font.
| Download my
SBP preset HERE
Save the zip file to a temporary
location. There are 3
files in the zip. They all need
to be unzipped to the same
folder. You can put them in your
SBP Environments and Textures folder,
but it doesn't matter which folder so
long as all the files are in the same
place and you know where you have put
them.
The 3 files are the preset file,
which ends in .q5q and 2 .bmp files.
Now, to create the text we are
going to apply the SBP effect
to...even if you already know how to
create text, please follow these
instructions, as its important that
the text is "selected"
before we try to apply the SBP effect.
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| Open the
image you want to add text to, or
create a new image 400 x 300, raster,
white background.
Layers menu, New Vector Layer
Click on the text tool
Set up your materials pallet with
the foreground color set to dark red,
solid color and the background color
set to medium red, solid color.
With the text
tool, click on the
centre of your canvas.
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Set the following on the tool
options pallet:
Create As = Vector
Font = Gregorian (or any chunky font)
Size = 48
Stroke = 1
Alignment = Centre
Anti-Alias = ticked (set to smooth on
PSP 9/X)
Line Style = Solid
Auto Kern = unticked
Kerning = 120
Leading = -300 (this setting reduces
the space between lines of text - if
its too small try -150)
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Left
end of options pallet
Right
end of options pallet
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| Type your
text in the text entry box, and click
Apply.
Click on the Object Selector Tool
(at the bottom of the tool pallet).
In PSP Photo XI click the Picker tool.
Use the centre spot of the text
frame to drag the text into the
position where you want it.
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| Selections
menu, From Vector Object (you should
see marching ants as well as the
vector selection frame around your
text at this stage) Layers menu, Convert To Raster
Layer.
The marching ants remain, but the
vector selection frame disappears
(this step is vital!)
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Effects menu,
Plugins, Flaming
Pear, Super Blade Pro
Click on the Load Preset button as
shown below...
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| Where it
says "Look In" at the top,
click the down arrow and navigate to
the folder where you have unzipped the
preset to.
Select the preset
"jh_red_text.q5q" and click
OK
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If you have used a different font,
then you may need to adjust the Radius
setting at the top a little (+ or - 1
or 2) to get a bevel that looks
similar to mine.
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| If you want to use this preset with
different color text, click the left
lighting color block, and select a
dark shade of the color text you are
using.
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| Click Apply
Selections
menu, Select None.
.....and
there you have your gel text.
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| There
is a nice selection of Super Blade Pro
presets for text or dingbats at http://pixelating.com/Treasury/Blade/bladeS.htm
With these presets, you have to unzip
the file to your Super Blade
Pro\Environments and Texures folder
and then move the .q5q file up a level
to the Super Blade Pro folder.
If you don't do that then when you
load the preset, it will give a
message that it can't find the
bitmaps. If you need to you can
locate the bitmaps each time you use
the preset, so long as you remember
where you have unzipped them to. |
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