Need some help!

[Pctrlady]

I am a photographer but not a computer person. I am trying to downsize and shape photos to fit on a circle sticker. I am trying to make personalized poker chips. If anyone can walk me through this it would be great!

Lori

[Byron Gale]

Lori,

Here's how I would do it...

I'd open the image, then double-click the Background layer to make it a normal layer.

Then I'd select the Elliptical Marquee tool and use it to make my circular selection. (By holding SHIFT while dragging with the tool, it makes a perfect circle.)

After doing any necessary repositioning/nudging of the selection (using the keyboard arrow keys), I would press CTRL-SHIFT-I to invert the selection (select everything except the circle) and then tap the Delete key, leaving me with just my circular selection on a transparent background.

I would then hold the CTRL key while I clicked the layer's thumbnail in the Layers palette (to re-load the selection of the circle), then click the menu Image > Crop to reduce the Canvas to a square the same size as the circle.

Now for the relatively-tricky part -- resizing.

You probably know what size circle you need for your chips. I'd open the Image Size dialog and check to see what the Document Size values are, and evaluate whether I needed to resample. To begin with, I'd just enter the desired circle size in both the Width and Height boxes and observe what my Resolution did. If it doesn't go above, say, 500ppi, I'd just leave it alone and click OK, then save my image as a copy for printing.

If the Resolution is completely unreasonable, I'd then select the Resample Image option, choose Bicubic Sharper, and pick an acceptable value for print - something in the 200-300 range. Again, OK, and save as a copy for printing.

These are just some basic guidelines. Try it out (make sure you don't destroy your original picutes!! Use a copy.) and see how far you get. Post back when you have questions.

HTH,

Byron

[cats4jan]

Another way of doing it

Choose the marquee tool - oval option - make a circle selection
(To make an exact circle in PSE4, I have to hold the shift key while I draw my circle)

To make a circle the finished size you'll need, open a new canvas the exact size or use the rulers as your guide

Go to your photo
select> all
edit> copy

Go back to your circle selection

edit> paste into selection
(You must use "paste into selection" not "paste")

Choose the move tool

resize and place your photo using the bounding box - hit enter to accept

control d to deselect
______________
If you want to make more than one "chip" - fill the selection with black and use it for a template. Duplicate the circle layer as many times as you need

Selecting one of the circles with the magic wand will make a selection around the circle - and then you can paste into selection same as above.

[walterplummer]

Hello all,
By trial and error I found that you can go to Mode on the marquee toolbar and select Fixed Size and enter the diameter of your circle in both width and height boxes and it will place that diameter selection on your photo. So if you need a 2 3/8" diameter selection type 2.375 in both boxes and you have it. No guessing. Walt:)

[Pctrlady]

Thank you all for your help. I will be playing with your ideas and let you know!

[cats4jan]

That must make an even dozen - of the ways in which you can accomplish this same task. I'm going to try that fixed marquee idea. Very interesting. Sounds so easy.

EDIT

Wow - that worked slick. I made a perfect sized circle with one easy click.

You can cut a perfect sized circle from a photo using this method, but I couldn't find a way to size the photo to fit the circle.

So I used this method.

I started with a blank canvas - drew my circle using the fixed ratio circle marquee method

filled that circle with black using the paint bucket.

I then had a perfect template for my photo buttons.

I opened a photo
copy/pasted it onto my page with my black circle
placed the photo layer above the circle layer

control g - grouped them together

Selected my move tool to use the bounding box to size and place the photo - then merged the photo layer and the circle layer - using "merge down"

http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p103/cats4jan/Tutorial%20Samples/150-button.jpg