How to Create a Thumbtack in Photoshop
Photoshop is a great tool for creating simple graphics to enhance your design projects. Icons of everyday office supplies are useful and practical as they add visual appeal and a sense of functionality. One of the simplest icons to create is a thumbtack. By combining a basic shape with some preset styles, you can begin stylizing logos, Web pages and scrapbook pages in no time.
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Instructions
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Creating the Basic Shape
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Open a New Document with dimensions of 100px by 100px and a resolution of 300.
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Click the "Create a New Layer" icon at the bottom of the "Layers" palette. By default, this layer will be called Layer 1 and should have a white background.
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3
Select Layer 1 by clicking it so it's highlighted in blue.
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Locate the first icon in the "Tools" palette that looks like a square. Click and hold so the fly out menu appears. Select the circle icon called the "Elliptical Marquee Tool."
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Hold down the Shift key as you complete the next step to create a symmetrical circle.
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Place the cross-hairs near the top left corner of your image and drag it to the bottom right to create a circle.
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Click the letter "X" on the keyboard and toggle the black so it's in the foreground color.
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Click the "Paint Bucket Tool" in the "Tools" palette and click within the circle to fill it with black.
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Click "Command + D" on a Mac or "Control + D" on a PC to deselect the circle.
Adding Dimension
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Right Click Layer 1 in the "Layers" palette and select "Blending Options" from the drop down menu.
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Click on the words "Color Overlay" in the list of styles on the left. Select the color you want for your thumbtack by clicking on the red default color sample and choosing a color from the pop up window that appears and click "Okay" to close the window.
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Click on the words "Drop Shadow" in the list of styles on the left. Set the Angle to 100 degrees, the Distance to 3px and the Size to 3px.
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Click on the words "Bevel and Emboss" in the list of styles on the left. Set the style to Emboss, the Depth to 50 percent and the size to 13px.
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Click on the words "Inner Glow" in the list of styles on the left. Set the Opacity to 30 percent, the Source to Center, Choke to 50 percent and the Size to 5px.
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Click on the word "Stroke" in the list of styles on the left. Set the Size to 1px, the Position to Center, Opacity to 47 percent and the color to black.
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Click "OK" to save all your style changes. Now your thumbtack is ready to use by itself as a transparent .GIF or as a layer in another Photoshop project.
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Tips & Warnings
Always hold down "Shift" when you need to create a perfect circle. If you try to do it manually just by "eyeballing" it, your shape will most likely be lopsided. Save your original PSD file so you can alter the color and styles of your thumbtack for future projects.
