Having problems making my collage

[357mag]

I want to make a Grand Funk Desktop background using a collage but I'm having problems getting the photos on my background one by one. I first made a black non-transparent background. Then I showed the Organizer at the bottom so I have all my photos ready. But I'm not able to get one on the black background without something going wrong. You can see what I mean by looking at my screenshots. I want to place one photo at a time on the background and then resize and move them around until it looks the way I want.

[357mag]

Okay I think I got it going now. You have to drag the photos into the Layers Palette first. But I'd like to ask once I get everything arranged the way I want and I'm ready to save my collage do I merge down or just simply save as .png and quit?

[JoeB]

Okay I think I got it going now. You have to drag the photos into the Layers Palette first. But I'd like to ask once I get everything arranged the way I want and I'm ready to save my collage do I merge down or just simply save as .png and quit?

Whenever you are working with an image that has layers, selections, etc., you should ALWAYS save first in .pspimage format so that all of those items are retained in case you want to open the image later and fine tune it.

After that, you can save it in any format you wish that will serve the purpose for which it is to be used. If you're going to use it as a Windows background then saving in PNG format should be fine. Doing so will automatically flatten the saved PNG image unless it has transparent areas and you choose to save transparency using the advanced options in the PNG save dialogue.

[357mag]

Yes I was planning on saving as a Paint Shop Pro Image first. I'm currently revising some stuff and I'm having problems reloading my photos in the Layers Palette. When I select my photos in the Organizer and move the cursor over to the Layers Palette the program wants to open all of the photos up as separate backgrounds instead of just simply placing all my photos in the palette.

What is the proper technique to load photos in the palette?

[Kathy_9]

You should be able to drag the image from the Organizer to the layers palette and it will open as a layer and not a new image. If you drag from the Organizer to the main work area it will open as a separate new image.

[ehume]

I think the place to go is Ms Cassell's Scrapbook Campus. Even if you do not end up with a scrapbook, it can teach you a lot about layers.

[357mag]

You have to drop the photos on the tiny, black square in the Layers Palette.

[Kathy_9]

You have to drop the photos on the tiny, black square in the Layers Palette.

Yes, that's correct. The tiny black square is a thumbnail image of the background layer.