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Bee Line
I own the intellectual copyright for the written tutorial. What you make is yours, but please do not take my tutorial. Share only my link. This tutorial is intended for a beginner to learn about using work paths and making animations. If you have any questions, please feel free to email me. To do this tutorial you will also need Photoshop CS3 - CS4. You may download a free trial at Adobe. Remember to save as a .psd file often! 1. Open new, transparent image, size 500 x 500 px 2. Choose the Freeform Pen tool. In the toolbar set it to PATHS (2nd icon) Draw a curvy path
3. In the Layer Palette, Click on the PATHS tab. 4. Choose the Paintbrush tool. 5. Open up the Brushes Palette. Window > Brushes 6. In the brushes palette, click on the words "Brush Tip Shape". Choose a small round brush tip. I chose size = 9. Then set the Spacing to about 100%. Look at the preview window. You want the dots to be spaced apart.
7. Now click on the WORDS "Color Dynamics". Set the Foreground/Background Jitter = 50%, Hue Jitter = 50%, Brightness Jitter = 27% (or your choice), Purity = 65% (This will affect the color of the dots!)
8. Now choose two colors that you want your dots to vary between.
9. In your Layer Palette (on the PATHS tab), right-click on the work path and choose Stroke path. Choose brushes. And this is what it will look like:
10. To get rid of the path line: Right-click on the Work Path layer and choose Delete Path
11. In the Layer Palette, click on the LAYERS tab
12. Open up the tube of the bee you want to use. I chose ladybug, actually. Resize if necessary. Image > Resize to about 75 px wide (or your choice) 13. Select > All, Edit > Copy 14. Click back on the dots image. Edit > Paste. 15. With the mover tool, move the bee to the beginning of the path.
16. Now double-click (click twice) on the names of each layer to label the layers. this will help us keep track.
17. Right-click on the bee layer and choose Duplicate layer.
18. Fix your layers so that you have a bee layer on top, then trail layer, then bee layer on bottom. HIDE the bottom bee layer by clicking on the eye.
19. With the mover tool, move the bee over a little bit, following the path. I moved it so that it left 3 or 4 dots behind it. 20. Right-click on the top bee layer and choose Duplicate. Move this layer to the top. HIDE this new bee layer. 21. Right-click on the top trail layer and choose Duplicate. Move this layer up and below the top bee layer (the hidden one). HIDE this new trail layer. 22. Click back on the trail layer that is not HIDDEN. Delete all the dots in front of the bee. I drew a selection box around all those dots and pressed the DELETE key.
23. Right-click on the bee layer that is not hidden and choose Merge Down.
24. HIDE the merged layer. UNHIDE the top two layers. 25. Click on the top bee layer. With the mover tool, move the bee further along the path, another 3 or 4 dots. 26. Right-click on the top bee layer and choose Duplicate. Move this layer to the top. HIDE this new bee layer. 27. Right-click on the top trail layer and choose Duplicate. Move this layer up and below the top bee layer (the hidden one). HIDE this new trail layer. 28. Click back on the trail layer that is not HIDDEN. Delete all the dots in front of the bee. I drew a selection box around all those dots and pressed the DELETE key. Then delete a few of the dots behind the bee.
29. Right-click on the bee layer that is not hidden and choose Merge Down. 30. Now repeat steps 24 - 29, until your bee has reached the end of the path line. When you are done UNHIDE all the layers.
31. Draw a rectangle box around the bees to crop out the extra space. Image > Crop
32. Window > Animation
33. In the frames window, click on the menu arrow and choose Make Frames From Layer
34. Set the time delay in each frame. Click on the tiny black arrow near the time in the frame and choose 0.2 seconds. Do this for each frame. On the last frame, I set the time to 1.0 seconds.
35. Now save: File > Save for Web & Devices.
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