Hand Drawn Lines (Photoshop Elements)

I’m traditional.

I live in a traditional style home. I like traditional flavored spaghetti sauce. My music selections are generally traditional, and my digital scrapbooking style is no different. I like things to look as if they’ve been hand scrapbooked… the traditional way.

In this tutorial, you and I are going to create some hand drawn lines on our scrapbook page. However, the technique is totally non-traditional, and I can’t wait to share it with you!

Do I have your curiosity going? Here’s a hint: You may want to practice your pucker.

Step 1: Prepare your workspace

• Create a new document (File > New > Blank File) that is 12×12 inches, 300 pixels/inch, and has a white background.
• Press the letter D to reset the color chips to the default of black and white.
• Click on the Create a New Layer icon in the Layers panel. This will be the layer we will be doing our work on.

Step 2: Create a Stroke Outline

• Get the Rectangular Marquee tool.
• Click on your document and drag a selection outline. My selection outline is approximately 11×11in.

TIP: To reposition while dragging, hold down the Space Bar on your keyboard.

• Choose Edit > Stroke (Outline) Selection. In the Stroke dialog box, enter 15 px for the width, black for the color and choose Outside for the location. Be sure the Blending Mode is Normal, Opacity is 100%, and do not check Preserve Transparency. Click OK.
• Press Ctrl D (Mac: Cmd D) to turn off the Marquee.

Step 3: Give It a Hand Drawn Look

• With the top layer active, choose Filter > Distort > Liquify.
• Choose the Pucker tool.
• In Tool Options, set your brush size to 100.
• Click and drag your cursor along the stroke outline. As you drag, your line should be ‘puckering’ and begin to look more hand drawn.

PUCKER TOOL TIP 1: I found that it works better to start in the center of a line and work outward. If you start dragging from a corner, the corner will tend to collapse and go all weird on you.

PUCKER TOOL TIP 2: If your hand and/or mouse is as wobbly as mine, you may need to go back over a couple areas to get rid of the original thick stroke. But a note of caution, each time you drag over an area, it will pucker more.

TIP: You can press Ctrl Z (Mac: Cmd Z) to back up one step, or, if you’d just like to start over, press the Revert button.

• Click OK when you are satisfied.

Step 4: Give It a Friend

• Duplicate the top layer by pressing Ctrl J (Mac: Cmd J).
• Press Ctrl T (Mac: Cmd T) to get a transform outline.
• In the Options Bar, change the width to 101%, the height to 101%, and the rotation to 180.
• Press Enter to accept the changes.

• Right Click (Mac: Ctrl Click) on the top layer in the Layers panel. Choose Merge Down from the fly out menu.

Your hand drawn lines are now ready to dress up your scrapbook page!

I would love to see your scrapbook pages using this tip! Scrapper’s Guide has a gallery set up just for Tip of the Week creations, so get scrapping and show me what you’ve got!

Credits: Scrapbook page by Jen White. Made with Recess by Heather Roselli. This kit is available in the store at Digital Scrapper.

Download a PDF version of this “Hand Drawn Lines” tutorial.

Windows: Right click on the link and choose “Save Target As” or a similar command.
Mac: Click on the link to download the file.

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