Create a Transparent PNG file for Quick Pages

by Kathy's Scraps

Instructions for Photoshop. Please adapt to your program.

NOTE: All quick pages must be 300 dpi and 8”x8” (2400x2400 pixels).

Drop shadows should all be going the same direction. Here is a good shadowing
tutorial for Paint Shop Pro (the principals can be used in any program):
http://www.fortunecity.com/westwood/alaia/354/tutorials/shadows/

1.  Begin with a transparent background.

2. Create your layout as you usually do, just do NOT add any photos for the QP. You may add text, but remember others will not be able to remove the text.

3. Let’s make a "hole," to slide a photo behind. The hole can be anywhere on your layout, or you may want it behind a frame. You will need to draw a box/circle over the frame, just don’t delete the frame layer...keep reading.

4. Using your dotted line tool (marquee tool) draw your "hole" on a NEW layer. If you don’t like it you can delete it by clicking off of the object you just drew. You can use the box or the circle marquee tool.

5. You will see a dotted line where your hole will be. Change this now if it is not as you want it.  Re-draw it.

6. In Photoshop there is a box on the top line that says Feather, you can enter a number in this box to make the edges softer on your "hole."  I like 20, experiment to see what you like.  You will not see the feathering until after the next step. Do not use this feature if you are making a hole for a frame.

7. When you get your hole where you want it, you will need to find the layer you are putting the hole in. Sometimes this may be one layer, sometimes more than one layer.

8.  In your layers box, find the background paper and click on it.

9. Press your backspace button (or your delete button) on your keyboard.  You now should have a transparent hole in that layer.

10. If you are making the hole through several layers you will need to find each layer and press the backspace button (or delete button), while the dotted line is still showing. Do not do this to the frame layer, because you do want the frame to stay there.

11. Once you have your transparent hole, just click somewhere on your layout to get rid of the dotted line. The only way to undo something after you have clicked off the dotted line is by undoing your history for this piece.

12. If you have a frame that is neither round or square you may click on the background layer(s) and using the erase tool erase everything inside the frame. Be careful to not erase outside the frame. If you do, undo the last action.

13. When your layout is complete you MUST save it as a png file to keep the transparency.

File Hosting Sites 2

Do you need some place on the web to upload files for safe keeping, where you can access them from anywhere? Or maybe a site to upload a large file that you can't upload anywhere else? I did a search online to find such sites and here is what I have found. I have not used any of these sites, so please do your research and use at your own risk.

Host-A - http://host-a.net/ - Their free account gives you 40 megs of storage space for any file type, along with image hosting, password protection, multi file uploads, 6,200 megs of monthly bandwidth, download counters, daily backups to multiple servers, and more. You can access your files with any computer. The upgrades are one time payments, for life. You can add 125 megs of space for $5, 340 megs for $10, 1000 megs for $25 or add 6,000 megs of bandwidth for $2. Wow!

Mozy - https://mozy.com/home - MozyHome Free includes 2 gigs of server space to upload your private files to for backup. MozyHome Unlimited gives you unlimited server space to upload your private files for $4.95 per month (yes, you can pay monthly). They even offer MozyPro to back up files for any business. Can be used for both Windows and Mac users.

Aruna - http://goaruna.com - Unlimited storeage for free. Access your files from anywhere. They give you a dropbox, where you can let others upload a file to your account and they have a secure file transfer where you can password protect your file. They have desktop software you can install to drag and drop your files into, to upload directly to their site. I just signed up for this one and it looks a lot like 4shared or MediFire. I am not sure if there is a time limit on how long your files stay on this site, can't find that information. The help file is no help at all. Not sure I would trust this as a backup site.

My Net Images - http://www.mynetimages.com - A free, easy to use, image and photo gallery/album sharing service. This site supports jpg, gif and png images up to 512 kb in size. You are allowed 999 megs of storage space, with options to upgrade coming in the future. You can upload single images or many at once, and no additional software required. View your files by file name, thumbnail images or full size images.

File Hosting Sites 1

Do you need some place on the web to upload files for safe keeping, where you can access them from anywhere? Or maybe a site to upload a large file that you can't upload anywhere else? I did a search online to find such sites and here is what I have found. I have not used any of these sites, so please do your research and use at your own risk.

Hotlink Files - http://www.hotlinkfiles.com/ - They claim to be your hard disk on the net, where you can upload up to 1,000 megs of all file types for free, for files up to 50 megs in size, hot link to those files, share the files, access them from anywhere, stream audio and video, and more. Registration allows you to upload all other file types and easily manage and track all of your files stored on the host server. They will store the hosted files indefinitely (forever).

FileAve - http://fileave.com - Their free account includes 50 megs of file hosting for use anywhere. You get direct link URL's to share the files on other sites, all the HTML codes to embed your files, monthly bandwidth of 1024 megs, and a free subdomain name. All file types are permitted, but no scripting is allowed. Their upgrade to 100 megs is $5/month or 6 months for $25; 200 megs is $10/month or 6 months for $50; or 1024 megs is $25/month or 6 months for $125. Free hosting accounts that are inactive for more than 60 days (2 months) will be removed from the webservers, but their TOS recommends to log in to your account at least once a month to keep it active.

FileMonster - http://www.filemonster.net/ - A free file hosting service allowing anonymous guest uploads of up to 250 MB to their servers. No upload limits, no download limits, unlimited bandwidth, password protection, and virtually all file types are permitted. Any uploads not downloaded or accessed in 30 days will be deleted from the web server. Free registration is available for users wanting extra features and privileges.

Share your files with others

Many of us use sites to store our files so we can send people links to be able to download those files. I thought I would go through some of these sites and give you my pros and cons on them. Note: these are my views only. Here I am featuring sites where you upload a file and then a link is emailed to your recipient. 

YouSendIt - http://yousendit.com - With this site you can send, receive and track files, up to 2 gigabytes in size for the paid version. The free version, called Lite, allows you to send files up to 100 megs in size. This is a great service if you want to send one file to up to 100 people. You upload the file to the site, enter the email addresses (they even have an address book you can store the emails into) and send off your email. Your friends will get the email with a download link to get the file. They will have seven days to download the file. Once your friends download the file the service will even send you an email saying they have done so. After seven days your file is deleted and gone off their server so you don't have to worry about deleting the file from anywhere. The files are sent as soon as you send off the email. Great service if you need to get a file sent to someone quick and get a notice when they have received it.

SendThisFile - http://sendthisfile.com - Works like YouSendIt but there is a monthly charge for the service. They do not offer a free service.

SendSpace - http://www.sendspace.com - Again works like the above sites. They do have a free Lite version and a pay for version. They also have a point system where you can earn points and when you get enough you earn one free month of their paid version. You do have to earn a LOT of points!

DropBox - http://www.getdropbox.com - I had to use this site for one store I was in and it is totally different. You can upload files by dropping them into a folder on your desktop, kinda cool. You can share files with others by "inviting" them into your DropBox. Never really understood it, but there is a free version (2 gigs of space) if you would like to try it. They also have a photo gallery where you can share photos with family and friends.

QuickSharing - http://quicksharing.com - Another site where you can upload a file (up to 500 mbs) for free, but they offer an unlimited number of downloads. The file will be kept on their server as long as it has been accessed in the past 30 days...so if not accessed for 31 days it will be deleted. They do warn you to keep a copy of the file on your hard drive, that this is NOT a back up service. I would be leery of this site because you don't sign up for an account, so I don't know how you would be able to delete a file that was already uploaded if you wanted to. I have not tried this site.

Tips and Tricks

Make sure your photos (and kit papers and elements) are proportional to the original file. 

If you change the size of something and make the width 32% larger, make the height 32% larger too. 

You don't want your best friend to be stretched up and down or heaven forbid sideways! 

Dragging with the corner tool in SOME programs will keep things proportional but not in all programs. Remember to keep everything PROPORTIONAL! In some programs you can check off a box to keep things proportional, check your program.