This is a tutorial for making basic blends. The program I personally use in my graphics design is Adobe Photoshop 6.0+, and this tutorial is based on that program. This is only my particular style of blend making... there are dozens of different methods and programs to use when you create blends, so don't feel obligated to use this tutorial as the be all and end all.

Beginner's Tutorial 4: Creating a Simple Blend
Layer Mask Method

First of all, you need two pictures to blend together. You can use as many different pictures as you like in blends, but for a beginner, I'd recommend just using two. I've selected two pictures of John Mayer that I will be using in this tutorial.

 Before I go any further, you should check out my tutorial on the Tools of Photoshop if you're not already familiar with the basic tools.

Okay, now we'll begin the actual tutorial. Your first step is to open the pictures you'll be blending (see screenshot below). I would highly recommend resizing the pictures so that they're the same height. You can do this by going clicking the following pop-down menus: Image ---> Image Size. A new window will open, and you can change the height and width of the picture. Make them the same height; width doesn't really matter, so let that be whatever the automatic sizer makes it. I would recommend resizing smaller rather than larger, because making a small picture bigger will just make the quality worse. Both the pictures I'm using are a height of 340 pixels. Note the height that you make the pictures for the next step.

Now you're going to go to the pop-down menu at the top of the screen that says File, and you're going to click New. When you do this, a window like the one pictured below will come up. Remember the height of your picture? Enter it in the "Height" box in this new window. Make sure that it's in "pixels..." sometimes the program automatically sets it in "inches." You don't want your blend to be 340 inches high, so make sure you check that. Next, make the new background 650 to 700 pixels in width. I usually do this because it gives me enough room to see what I'm doing, as you'll see in the following steps. Before hitting "OK," make sure that the Resolution is set at 72 or higher, the Mode is set for RGB Color, and the Contents is set on white. You can give this new background a name if you want, but it's not necessary.

Now you have your new background. The next step is to drag your original pictures onto the new background using the Move tool (which is circled on the picture of the toolbar below). After you've selected this tool, you click one of your original pictures, then you hold the mouse button down and drag it until it's on top of the new white background, and let go. This makes a new layer for the picture. Move the picture until it's all the way to one side, and then repeat the process with the other picture, except you'll put it on the opposite side. See in the picture below how the two original pictures are open behind the new background, and they seem to be copied on top of the new white layer? This is what it should look like if you've done this correctly.

This is where things start to get complicated, so bear with me. Pictured below is the Layer Menu. It usually appears in the lower right-hand corner, but not always. As you can see, the original white background we created is the bottom layer, while the two pictures are each separate layers on top of it. Layers can be a little tricky to work with at first, but once you get used to them, they're your best friends when you make blends. And now, we're going to start blending. Select Layer 1, which should be one of your pictures (make sure it's highlighted), and then click the little button I've circled in red on the picture below. This adds a "layer mask." It's a sort of layer within a layer. Adding a mask is vital to the next step, so make sure you do it. When you add a mask, you'll see a white box appear next to the miniature picture of the layer. Now that that's done, let's move on the using the Gradient tool.

The Gradient tool has been circled on the picture of the toolbar below. After you've made a layer mask, select it. The bar at the top should show something like black blending into white, and there are a number of buttons to choose from. Don't mess with those... just leave the settings as they are. If you've changed them before, then just click the little Gradient icon on the bar and click "Reset Tool." Once you've done this, you're going to click in the center of your soon-to-be-blend, then hold and drag the mouse button till you're about halfway across one of the pictures (you need to make sure that the layer you're doing this to is highlighted. After you do this to Layer 1, you need to add a "layer mask" and do it again to Layer 2).

In the picture below, the right-hand side (Layer 1) has already had the gradient effect applied... see how it kind of blends and feathers into white? That's what this should look like if you've done this correctly. The left-hand side (Layer 2) hasn't had the gradient effect applied yet. The little red cross is where you should click and hold the mouse button, and the line across the picture is about where you should drag it and let go. I know this sounds complicated, but just play around with it and you'll catch on. You can always look at the History menu to go back a few steps if you mess up.

Alright then. Once you've added layer masks to both layers and done the Gradient effect, it should look like the picture below, with the white feathered space in the middle. Using the gradient effect makes things blend the most evenly, but you can also create a similar effect by using the Eraser tool and just erasing the edges of both pictures... this can look weird if you're not careful, though.

Now you're going to go back to the toolbar and select the Move tool again. Make sure you've got Layer 1 highlighted on the layer menu. Now all you need to do is drag the layer so that in overlaps the other one, as in the picture below. The gradient tool has faded the middle of both pictures, so they blend together nicely. And we're almost done!

Now we're going to select the Crop tool, which has been circled in red on the picture of the toolbar below. Drag the crop tool around the actual blend below, excluding the extra white part. When you've selected the area you want cropped, right-click the picture, and you'll get the little pop-down menu pictured below. Select "Crop."

And viola! This is what your blend should look like if you've followed all these steps:

If you're happy with the blend as it is, you can save it. First, go to Layer ---> Flatten Image to merge all the layers you used into one picture. Then save. Not bad, eh? This is just the first part in blend making. Now that you've made the actual blend itself, there are dozens of effects you can add to it. If you'd like to go to a tutorial for a few simple effects to use for beginning blend makers, click the following link.

Click here for the Simple Effects Tutorial.

All tutorials are written by Stephanie Sinkhorn unless otherwise stated within the tutorial. The blends used within the tutorials are © Stephanie Sinkhorn and not intended for use on other sites.