Photographs are an exquisite means of remembering the precious moments of our life. The sheer importance of photographs adds a certain unexpendable value to photographs. Due to this, editing photographs is of the utmost importance for us. Photoshop has just given what we needed to be able to edit photographs easily. In this article, we shall look into how we can add a Polaroid-style photo frame to an image in Photoshop CS6.
- The first step in using Photoshop is to upload the image into Photoshop and then a duplicate layer is created by right-clicking on the layer 1 in the layer panel.
- To increase the canvas size, click on image>canvas size or press the shortcut keys Ctrl + Alt + C/Cmd + Opt + C. Now change the width and height to 20 per cent in the canvas dialogue box. Then change the canvas colour to white and finally press OK.
- Now press C to select the ‘Crop Tool’ and crop the image.
- Now in this step; we will unlock the background layer by double-clicking on the ‘background’ layer and then click OK.
- The next step is to go to the layer panel and then click on ‘layer 0’ to activate it. Now we create a new layer by pressing Ctrl + Shift + N/Cmd + Shift + N, and then we drag the new layer to the bottommost position.
- The next step is to activate ‘layer 2’ by clicking on it and then subsequently delete the ‘layer 0’ by right-clicking on it and then selecting the ‘delete’ option. Also, increase the canvas size of layer 2 by 50% along the width and height of the image.
- The next step is to select the rectangular marquee tool by pressing M. Then draw the selection as shown in the image.
- Moving on to the next step, make black as the foreground colour and white as the background colour by pressing D. Now press Ctrl + Backspace/Cmd + Delete to fill the selected part with background colour i.e. White.
- Then deselect the selection by pressing Ctrl + D/Cmd + D and then create a new layer at the bottommost position of the layer panel.
- Now click on the ‘layer 1’ to activate it. Then we merge Layer 1 with layer 2 by pressing Ctrl + E/Cmd + E.
- The next step involves adding a layer style to ‘Layer 3’. Press F7 to open the layer panel and then click on Add layer style>Drop shadow.
- Now we change the blend mode to ‘Normal’. Then the value of opacity is increased to 100%, and the angle is changed to 136 degrees. The size is changed to 131 pixels, the value of the spread is changed to 38%, and then the size is subsequently changed to 250 pixels. Now finally change the contour to ‘Gaussian’ and then click OK.
- In the next step, press Shift + C to select the crop tool. Move the mouse cursor over the image. Then press/hold the Ctrl/Cmd key. Then draw a line with 240-260 degrees from the positive X-axis and then release the mouse.
- Then press T to select the Text tool and then write the text you want to write.
- The final step is to go to the tool panel and then select the move tool to rotate the text as per the requirement/preference and then finally save the photograph in PNG as JPEG format doesn’t support transparent backgrounds.
And this brings our quest of understanding how to add a Polaroid-style photo frame using Photoshop CS6 to a successful close. The steps mentioned above are for beginners and have been systematically elucidated to facilitate a better understanding of the process. With rigorous practice, adding a Polaroid-style photo frame will be a lot easier than it actually is perceived in the steps above.
