Confused about adding and moving text on Version 6

[jolo]

I am using PSP version 6.10.48 - 64 bit on Windows 7.

I saw a video and read some instructions about adding and modifying text and I just keep getting confused.
For the most part, I am trying to add some text to a photo and I get messed up.

Can someone help me?
Jon

[hartpaul]

Try this:
1. File >New and in the New Image dialog box width 1000, Height 1000 pixelsas units, Raster Background and tick the Transparent box . OK
2. Make sure Materials palette is visible (F6) and right click a color you want as the fill color of the text. Make sure the All Tools box below and to the left of the Background and Fill Properties is ticked.
3. Select the Text tool on the left and with the text tool options along the top select your Font (try Arial from the drop down box) set the units to pixels and a size of say 48 .
Allignment Left,
Text Flow - Horizontal and Down,
Stroke Width 0,
Create as Vector,
Leading, Kerning and Tracking at 0

3. Move your cursor into the Image1 workspace and type a word. This will still be fairly small in the image. Now select all the word - left click drag - same as you would to highlight a word in a word processor, or do Control A to select all the word (s)
4. At this stage any changes you make will apply to the selected word - size change , right click a different color, change the font etc. You can also select a single letter by the drag method and change just its characteristics.
5. When finished select the Tick up beside the presets to apply the text. Your text will now be surrounded by a bounding box (same as using pick tool) and in the centre is a small circle. When your cursor is over that you can move your text wherever you like so long as the cursor shows a four directional arrow. To the right is a small square box and when the cursor is over that you can rotate the text. at the corners and mid sides are handles you can use to distort the text making it wider , larger etc
6. You can now choose another tool, or move the cursor to another area and do more text on that vector layer, or select the raster layer and click the area to produce a second vector layer so you could have words or letters on different layers and move them independently til you merge.
If you change the Stroke width back in point 3 you can have two color text outlined in your Foreground and Stroke Properties color. You can also use patterns and textures inside your text.
All of that can now be done on a picture or image.

[jolo]

Thanks hartpaul for sharing your time, experience and expertise.

I will give your instructions a try. I feel like there is something obvious that I am missing, it is hard for me to believe that adding some text to a photo can be so complicated for me !!

Thanks again and a thank you for anyone who posts in advance. All contributions to my post are greatly appreciated !!

Jon T.

[MarkZ]

I often run into the problem that when trying to select text I miss the target and select an underlying layer instead. When attempting to select text, select the layer (object) first and after attempting to select text check that you are still on the correct vector layer. Also, I often overlook the fact that the text object is a sub-layer of the vector, so you may need to check that you are selecting the object. I often need to zoom in to make sure I can get at the text.