This tutorial was written by me on April 25, 2020. The results are of my own imagination.  Any resemblance to another tutorial is purely coincidental.  

Please DO NOT claim this tutorial as your own.

This was written assuming you have a working knowledge of PSP.

Please keep in mind that I write the tutorial as I am creating it.

Sometimes I may not explain properly where to place things so please see my example if you are ever in doubt :)

Remember to save often.

Supplies needed

I am using PSP 2018 but this tutorial should work with any version.

Animation shop (optional)

PTU Tube:  I am using Elias Chatzoudis.  Please do not use this tubes without a proper license.  

You can purchase his tubes at CDO here. 

PTU Kit:  I am using a fun kit called "Watermelon Mini" created by AoRK.  You can purchase the kit at CDO here. 

PTU Animation: (optional)  I am using animation from package 538 created by Rebel Dezigns.  You can purchase the ani from CDO here.  I am using animation file 1619.

Mask:  Mask 916 by Rachel Designs which you can get from her blog here.  Open the jpg and minimize in PSP.

Font of choice for your name.

Plug in: None

Drop shadow of choice.

Vivienne's Paintbox has awesome drop shadow settings that I use a lot.  You can find the settings here and check out her awesome tutorials :)

Unsharpen mask on each layer you resize.  Settings are below.

Adjust sharpness, Unsharpen mask, radius and clipping set to 5 and strength set to 30.  Click ok.

Let's get started.

Open a new 800x800 transparent image.  We will resize later.

Add a new layer and flood fill with white.

Add a new raster layer, and open paper of choice.  I am using paper 5, copy and close the original.  Select the new raster layer, select all, edit, paste into selections, select none.  Go to layers, new mask layer, from image.  In the drop down select RD mask 916 and click ok.  Merge group. Resize 95% and again by 95%.  You can close the mask as we no longer need it.

Copy your tube and paste as a new layer. Drop shadow.

Open frame 2, copy and close the original.  Select the mask layer and paste.  Resize 90% and move slightly up to the right.  Using your magic wand, click in the center of the frame.  Selections, modify, expand by 30. Open paper of choice,  I am using paper 7, copy and close the original.  Select your mask layer and add a new raster layer.  Standing on your new raster layer, go to edit, paste into seletions.  Select none and drop shadow your frame.  Move your tube so she is in the center of the frame.

Open element 8, copy and close the original.  Select the mask layer and paste.  Move to the upper right corner of the mask.  Duplicate, mirror and flip.  Move to the bottom left of the mask.

Open element 20, copy and close the original.  Select the frame layer and paste.  Resize 50% and move to the bottom left of the frame.  Drop shadow.

Open element 3, copy and close the original.  Select the frame layer and paste.  Resize 60% and move to the right center of the frame.  Drop shadow.

Open element 1, copy and close the original.  Select the heart layer and paste.  Resize 30% and move to the bottom right of the frame.  Drop shadow.

Open element 2, copy and close the original.  Select the whole watermelon layer and paste.  Resize 30%, Image, free rotate to the right by 20 degrees, all layers not checked.  Move to the bottom right so it is in front of the whole watermelon.  Drop shadow.

Open element 13, copy and close the original.  Select the frame layer and paste.  Resize 50% and move to the right side of the frame.  Duplicate, image free rotate, to the left 90 degrees, and move to the bottom left of the frame.  Duplicate, image, flip and mirror.  Drop shadow each layer.

Open element 25, copy and close the original.  Select the whole watermelon layer and paste.  Resize 70% and move to the bottom right.  Drop shadow.

Open element 16, copy and close the original.  Select the watermelon slice layer and paste.  Resize 70% and move down and to the far left.  Drop shadow.

Open element 26, copy and close the original.  Select the watermelon scatter layer and paste.  Resize 40% and move to the bottom left so it is showing behind the tube.  Drop shadow.

Open element 28, copy and close the original.  Select the watermelon scatter layer and paste.  Resize 25% and move to the bottom left of the frame so it is behind the box.  Drop shadow.

Open element 23, copy and close the original.  Select the watermelon wedge and paste.  Resize 15% and move to the bottom left of the wedge.  Drop shadow.

Open element 6, copy and close the original.  Select the watermelon scatter layer and paste.  Resize 20% and move to the bottom left so it shows behind the wedge and box.  Drop shadow.

Open element 27, copy and close the original.  Select the tube layer and paste.  Resize 20% and move to the bottom left so it is covering part of the right side of the box.  Drop shadow.

Open Wordart, copy and close the original.  Select the tube layer and paste.  Resize 70% and move to the bottom right so it covers the bottom of the tube.  Drop shadow.

Open element 17, copy and close the original.  Select the wordart layer and paste.  Resize 15% and move to the bottom left of the wordart.  Drop shadow.

Add any other elements you like.

Image, resize by 600 pixels on the longest side, all layers checked.

If you forgot to unsharpen mask on your layers, go to adjust sharpness, Unsharpen mask, radius and clipping set to 5 and strength set to 30.  Click ok.

Add your copyright and name.  If animating the tag, leave it in layers and do not merge.

**If you do not want to animate your tag, hide your white layer and merge visible.  Save as png.**

Animating a tag.  Are you ready?  Might want to grab a coffee :)

Open animation 1619 in psp.  It will open in layers and this is what we want.  I am going to show you a different way of using the animation.

In your layer pallet you will see 25 different layers.  We need to select each odd layer starting from the top.  Holding down your Ctrl key on your keyboard click each odd layer.  25, 23, 21 etc until you reach layer 1.  You will need to let go of the Ctrl key when you scroll down the layer pallet but make sure you press it again to select the next odd layer.  Ok do you have all the odd layers selected?  If the answer is yes, lets go the the next step.  Important: Do not continue until all your odd layers are selected or the ani will not work properly.

Now go to Layers, New layer group or click on the icon next to the trash can.  If you hover over the icon it will tell you what it is.  When you create a new layer group, a pop up window will appear.  I just left the name as default for now and click ok.  Scroll all the way to the top of your layer pallet.  You will see a layer called group 1 with all the odd layers under it.  We are going to work with the group 1 layer.  On the left of the layer you will see an arrow pointing down.  Click this to collapse the group.  Now you should see Group 1 layer and all the even ani layers under that.  We are only going to work with Group 1.  On the top of the layer pallet you will see an icon that looks like a chain link.  Standing on the group 1 layer, click on the link.  This will lock all the layers in the group together.

Standing on Group 1 layer (highlighted in blue) go to edit, copy.  Go to your tag and edit, paste as a new layer.  The animation group will be the top of your tag.  Click on the down arrow to collapse it for now and rename the group 1 layer to Animation 1.  Go back to Rebel Dezigns animation and close it.  DO Not save changes.

Ok now lets get this animation to the spot we want.  I want the animation group to be just above my frame layer.  There are two ways you can do this.  Go to Layers, arrange, send to the bottom and then layers arrange, move up.  You will need to keep doing the move up until it is above your frame layer.  Or, you can left click and while holding down the left click on your mouse, move the group down.  Once you have the animation above the frame layer we can resize it as it is kind of large for what we want :).

Standing on the Animation 1 layer, edit, resize 30% all layers not checked.  Now select your pick tool and move the animation into a spot you like best.  I moved mine to the far left about half way down the frame.  Once you are happy with the placement continue to the next step.

Next step.  

Click on the arrow beside your animation to expand it.  Now that we have resize the animation it will be blurry.  We will need to unsharpen mask on each of the animation frames.  Go to Adjust sharpness, Unsharpen mask, radius and clipping set to 5 and strength set to 30.  Click ok.  You will need to repeat this for each animation frame starting from frame 1 through frame 25.

Next step.

We need to hide all the layers except for layer 1.  Click on the eyeball next to each layer.   Important:  Do not hide Animation 1 group layer.  Once you have only layer 1 visible, continue to the next step.

Open animation shop and go back to psp.

With only frame 1 visible, to go edit, copy special copy merged.

Go to animation shop and paste as a new animation or Ctrl+V.

**Back to psp.  Hide frame 1 and unhide frame 3. Go edit, copy special copy merged. 

Go to animation shop and we need to paste after current frame or Shift+Ctrl+L**

Repeat from **to** until you have 13 frames in animation shop.  One for each of the odd animation frames from psp.

To view your animation, go to View, animation.  If you like the speed of the animation. go to the next step.  If you want to slow the animation down a bit, go to select all, animation, frame properties and change the display time.  The higher the number the slower the animation.  

Go to File save as gif.  Run through the optimizer using default settings.

I hope you have enjoyed my tutorial.  I would love to see your results.