Oscraps

Hey everyone! I am Karen, of Snickerdoodle Designs, and I’m here today to talk about patterns.  Subtle or bold, distressed or not,  patterns add so much to a digital scrapbook page.

With the use of Blend Modes and Opacity Levels you can convert a plain paper to a pretty paper. Here’s how:

1. In Photoshop CC or Photoshop Elements, open a background paper.
2. Place a Pattern on a blank layer above your background paper.
3. Experiment with Blend Modes and Opacity Levels of the Pattern.

Yes. It’s really that simple. There are other things you can do to add even more interest, but today we’re looking at a few basic techniques.

Here is a simple cardstock paper with a Distressed Pattern, in Normal mode on the layer above the cardstock.

In the image below I’ve changed the Blend Mode of the pattern to Multiply and lowered the opacity to 26%. The result is a soft and pretty look

By changing the Blend Mode to Screen, and increasing the opacity (to 73% in this case), we can get a totally different look:

Here’s another example.  I changed the blend mode of the pattern to Hard Mix and lowered its opacity to 47%. I added a Color Balance adjustment layer to it, tweaking some of the colors. Now we have a totally different paper from the one above.

Don’t restrict yourself to plain cardstock though. Here is a paper from my This is Me April kit.

It’s a pretty paper by itself, but if you wanted to add even more interest, here’s something you might try:

1. Add a pattern on a layer above a paper
2. Experiment with Blend Modes and Opacity Levels. In this case, I used Color Burn and lowered the Opacity to 84%
3. I added a Mask to the Pattern, and brushed away a majority of the pattern, just leaving it near the top of the paper to add more interest.

There are just so many ways to play with patterns!  

These patterns are provided in PNG format, which gives you the ultimate flexibility!

Distressed Patterns 01 and 02 are now at Oscraps! They are included in my Commercial Use Moving In, Phase 1 sale, saving you 40%. This sale ends tomorrow, March 17th.

I’ve included a Distressed Pattern Freebie for you to download and experiment with.

If you would like to download a PDF of this tutorial, you may do so HERE.

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial!

Karen Schulz
Snickerdoodle Designs