Art-Challenged R Us
First off, I meant to mention the new community icon_style. It's an icon-challenge community where the challenges are style-related, rather than being in a single fandom, or inspired by a quote, or whatever. The current challenge (which has just under a week to run) is to make a black-and-white icon with one splash of color, a la the red coat in the movie Schindler's List. If you're into icon-making, consider joining the community.
Anyway. So I'm working on the challenge (in PSE 2.0), and first am very happy to discover that I can figure out how to make the single colored object by making a black-and-white layer and erasing the desired object from said layer to let the color show through. And then I can make a frame (though by none of the methods that were described to me by y'all) by filling a layer, and then erasing the middle with the block eraser tool.
So, I'm looking for pictures that suit the challenge, when I get distracted by a piccie of Alan Rickman. Because how could I not be distracted by a picture of Alan Rickman, duh. And I cap it and I fix the proportions (because for some reason my DVD program distorts them) and I crop it, and I add a border. And it looks... okay. Not too good, not too bad. I'm crap at picking colors with the color tool, so the frame color doesn't suit the picture, but at least the cropping of the photo is pretty good; benefits of having a photographer for a dad, I guess. But it needs text. And I'm thinking the hard part is done, I've added text before, it's easy.
Only it's not. I can't get anything but a tiny, pale, not-at-all-texty blur onto the text layer. And it doesn't get any bigger, no matter how much I increase the point size. And every time I try to position the text tool on the picture, it adds another layer. And after about a half hour of this, I'm starting to feel like a real idiot. ::headdesk::
But I shall persevere.
Tomorrow.
When I shall hope to feel less stupid.