cookie cutter tool leaves white background

[soulcatcher]

I am using PSE 6 I have several pictures on a scrapbooking page. the back ground is my fist layer. I desaturated it to make it black and white. then my next layer is a picture and I am trying despersatly to cuse the cookie cutter tool to frame it and I keep getting a white background when I hit the green check mark. I have tried selecting the background with the magic wand tool and deleting but it will not delete. I tried inversing it and putting it on it's own layer by hitting CNTRL-J and still nothing. What am I doing wrong? Please help. I even went to the help menu and no luck. You guys are always so helpful so I sure someone will be able to help. THANKS!!!

[cats4jan]

Don't understand what you are trying to do - but realize one thing with the cookie cutter tool - when you use it - you will have parts of your photo only where there is black on the sample.
http://i126.photobucket.com/albums/p103/cats4jan/Tutorial%20Samples/PH-frame-sample.jpg

Maybe you're thinking of the shape tool? That tool draws a shape using your chosen background color. It will create on it's own layer. Make sure to simplify any shape after making it. (Look to the top of your editing screen - click on the word "simplify.")

[Bayla]

I'm not sure what is happening here because whenever I use the cookie cuter tool I get left with transparency not white from the 'discarded' bit.

One question - how are you getting your pictures onto your background layer? I'm just wondering if you are dragging them up from the photobin which makes them a frame layer (instead of dragging them down) and maybe that could affect how the cookie cutter works. (I've temporarily taken PSE6 off my computer so can't try this out, I'm just postulating a theory....maybe someone else could see I'm correct?)



Bayla

[soulcatcher]

I am dragging the photos up from the photo bin into my page which puts the picutre on it's own layer. I then simplify the layer and then I use the cookie cutter tool (and yes it is the cookie cutter tool not the shape tool )I drag it across my photo to get the edge effect I want. What does dragging it from the bin do?

[Bayla]

Dragging from the bin creates a Frame Layer (http://www.elementsvillage.com/forums/showthread.php?t=33382&highlight=frame+layer) otherwise known as a 'Smart Object' I believe. There's various things you can't do to a smart object layer unless you simplify them first, but once you've simplified you can't then go back and change them. It's preferable then to drag an image down onto an image in the photobin so that you create a regular layer.

The reason I asked was I thought that maybe it was affecting how the cookie tool worked and was the reason you were getting a white background.

Bayla

[swbansal]

Hi,

Please make me understand, what exactly is the effect you want, so that i can help you achieve it.

If you are getting the white background, this means you have a a white layer below the layer you are working on, which is fine.

If you don't want that white background, then you can place any background layer, of you choice, below the layer you are working on.

May be this would solve your problem. If not, please explain the exact effect you require.

Thanks,
Swarnima

[Bayla]

Swarnima,

You have responded to an old post from a year ago and the OP hasn't visited this site in ten months: presumably their question has been answered.....

Bayla