Designer Technique - Betty Jo (Blending Photo into Paper)

I have known Betty Jo and her designs for quite a long time, but have not really had any personal contact with her. As many know, I've been having a stressful few weeks and thought I would be behind again on the Designer Technique and had resolved to be a week late again as I had not sent Betty Jo a reminder as I always do for all designers.

However, to my great surprise, Betty Jo contacted me today inquiring as to whether or not I had received her e-mail days ago. I am usually careful in checking my spam folder, but it must have gotten by me. Wow, first she is on the ball getting it done and then she is on the ball making sure I had received it to get it up in a timely manner and I just want to declare, "Bless your heart, Betty Jo!"

I remember my first impression of Betty Jo; that being her name itself lending to a type of person that you could just feel welcome into her crafty country home to sit about her table with a cup of tea and freshly baked cookies to chat away. How surprised I was when I peeked about her kits to realize they exemplified the same feeling. They are very unique to her own style and make me feel cozy as if I'm walking down the craft isles at my local hobby store.

You can find Betty Jo's kits at Kathryn Balint and Friends and E-scape and Scrap. Get to know Betty Jo at her blog called Digi Scribbles.

Be sure to catch her BIG coupon at the bottom of this post.

I love the blending technique she shares with us and I was able to translate it all into Photoshop Elements while I read it. There is one step she shares that I had never thought of doing, so I appreciate her tutorial and hope to find time to try it soon.

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Thanks ever so much Hummie for inviting me to be one of your featured designers. What an honor!

I’m a minimalist scrapper, photo-focused, generally using only a few elements on a page. Photography is a passion, especially nature and landscape photography. My two granddaughters are also favorite subjects for my albums but have become a bit camera shy lately. However, that’s not a problem. I want them to grow up knowing their Gran is more interested in just being with them, then photographing them. When my photos are in scarce supply, and I have an itch to scrap, I often borrow from my dear friend and long-time CT member, Cheryl Flora. Cheryl is by far one of the best child photographers I know and it is always a joy for me to scrap a RAK for her.

I often use only a title and/or quote on my page for public view, adding personal journaling later before printing the layout.

This is a recent layout and one for which I’ve had many wonderful comments. My friend’s photo of her gorgeous granddaughter Meikina is the main focus of this page. I so love the photo, I used it twice, blending a duplicate into the background. I’d like to share with you the simple way I did the blend. I’m only familiar with Photoshop CS2, but perhaps you can adapt my instructions to your own program.



Full list of credits

Blending a Photo into the Background with Photoshop CS2:

First, I duplicated the photo so I had a working copy, and then recolored the photo in this way: I chose one of the background colors with the color picker so it was showing in my foreground color box. In this case, it was RGB bfa074.

Next, I followed these steps: Image> Adjustments> Hue/Saturation> and checked the Colorize box. This changed my photo to the color I chose from the background. I then played around with the Hue, Saturation, and Lightness until I got what I liked.

I then flipped the recolored photo: Image> Rotate Canvas> Flip Canvas Horizontal.

Next, I placed the photo on the background of my layout. Then I resized it: Edit> Transform> Scale. Grabbing a corner node, while holding down Shift and Alt, I dragged the photo to the size I wanted and clicked OK.

Then I clicked the "f in a circle", "Add a Layer Style", at the bottom of the layers palette. Clicked Blending Options> Overlay> and set the Opacity to about 80 and clicked OK.

Next, I used the eraser tool with a large soft brush set at 250 pixels or more, at around 50% Opacity and Flow, and carefully removed the hard edges from the photo, and anything else I didn't want there.

I finished my layout by adding other elements of choice.

Hummie requested that I share a favorite kit. Actually I would like to share two of my favorites and most popular.



Top Flight is located:
KB & Friends
Escape and Scrap


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Rusty Skillet Christmas is located:
KB & Friends



Thank you so much for stopping by. In appreciation, I would like to offer you a coupon good for 30% off anything in my Kathryn Balint and Friend’s store only.

Coupon is good until November 30, 2007.

For the coupon to work, you have to be logged into the store and add the items to your shopping cart, then, while in the shopping cart, scroll down and put the coupon code into the coupon code box. Don’t accidentally use the gift certificate box during checkout.

Coupon code (case sensitive): Hummie-30off