learn: create a facebook banner (in photoshop) with Cara King

1. Open Photoshop and create new document (File>New). A box will appear and you can select the height and width. Make sure Pixels is selected. The width should be 851 with a height of 315 pixels. (for Facebook specs). Usually for web the resolution needs to be 72 dpi (pixels/inch). I like to bump it up to 96 …just cos. Colour mode should be RGB for any web related work.

2. Open one of your illustrations. I have chosen an element of my image that I want to use. An easy way to copy and paste this is to select the funny coat hanger looking tool.

Once selected, up the top of the page there is a box that says Feather. I usually make it around 10 ..which softens the outside. You can then trace around the outside of the element that you want to use making sure to reconnect with the line you made in order to make it “selectable”. That is, you will now see the flashing lines. This means the image has been selected. You can then copy it.

3. Go back to your original image. (untitled-1 – or hopefully you’ve named it “banner”). And paste this image onto the file. It will automatically go onto it’s own layer. You will probably need to resize it as the image will appear a lot larger than the banner. Go to EDIT>TRANSFORM > SCALE. And you can bring the edges in to the size that you require. Furthermore you can transform / rotate if you wanted it on an angle.

4. You can then use the eraser tool (which is the rectangular block) and tidy it up a bit. Make sure the colours are such that the background is white.

5.      Next, open another illustration and repeat the same steps using the coat hanger tool and then paste it into your banner file. Eventually you will get a number of layers which you can play with. Each element will be on it’s own layer. In order to move any image you should make sure you have the right layer selected. You can also turn layers on and off by clicking on the eye.

6. 

7. This is the selection tool which means once you have selected the correct layer you want to change, you can move the image around to see which layout looks best.

8. When you are happy with the final layout you can then save it.  (FILE>SAVE FOR WEB.) Which will flatten the image. Or FILE> SAVE AS  and select format as jpeg. This will flatten also the image. I usually save as a Jpeg for best results.

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