“Rounded shapes” trick
Here’s a trick that’s come in handy many times over the years. It used to be that PhotoShop didn’t have a rounded boxes feature (and maybe some of you are still using versions that don’t do that yet) So this trick gets around that and lets you create rounded boxes, but the principle behind it lets you do LOTS more! And it uses Alpha Channels, so you can amaze your friends with your in-depth PhotoShop knowledge.
1. Create a new Alpha Channel
2. In your new channel, use the marquee tool to create a box, then fill it with white:
3. Deselect, the use Filter>Blur>Gaussian blur to blur it. The amount you use will determine the amount the box is rounded.
4. And here’s the magic: bring up Levels, and move the black and white “pointers” in towards the middle of the histogram as shown:
See how it tightens up the blurred box? Now you can load that selection and fill in an active layer, for a rounded box!
Hmm… As I said, not terribly impressive now that PhotoShop has a rounded box feature, or is it?
Here is a more complex shape made with the same trick:
Still not interested? Well, here’s an example using the trick on text, to give it a sort of “worn away” look:
Finally, here’s a picture where I used this trick; I softened the glyph shapes on the floor to give them a more natural look than they had when I originally created them in Illustrator: Elder of the Order.
