Simple Matte Simulation

One of the nicest ways to dress up a snapshot is to surround it with a matte and a frame. This can be done digitally in Photoshop in just a few simple steps.

First, select your image. For this example, we'll start with a puppy picture of the late, great Stanley the Dog. After checking the dimensions and resolution, we'll save the image as a .psd (Photoshop) file, preserving the original for future projects.

In the Layers palette, we'll Option-double-click on the Layer called Background (in italics) to rename it and convert it to a regular layer. This allows us to have transparency on the layer. (Although transparency isn't actually necessary for this project, it's always nice to sneak in an extra technique or two.)

Now we want to expand the canvas (not the image) to make room for our digital matte. Rather than Image> Image Size, we use Image Canvas Size. We'll add a full inch around the outside of the image. (Be generous, you can always crop the canvas down at a later stage.)

In the dialog box, note the 3x3 grid of boxes labeled Anchor. This determines in which direction or directions the canvas will be expanded. By clicking in the middle square (the default), we expand the canvas is all directions evenly. If we click in the upper-left corner, all of the new pixels will be added to the right side and the bottom of the image.

Remember that we converted from the background layer to a regular layer. If we hadn't, the extra space we add to the document would be filled with the background color. Instead, since regular layers support transparency, the added area is empty. (If you add a color other than white, the bevel you apply later will interact with the color.)

The matte should surround the image. We'll add a new layer so that it appears above the photograph. With the new layer active in the Layers palette, hold down the Command key for Mac/Control key for Windows and click on the original layer's thumbnail. This makes a selection of all non-transparent pixels on that layer.

The menu command Select> Inverse (keyboard shortcut Command-Shift-I/Control-Alt-I) reverses the selection, giving us a selection of the outer area of the image and excluding the pixels on the lower layer. Let's fill with white, although any color can be used. Pressing D on the keyboard gives us the default black foreground color and white background color. Pressing X switches them. Option-Delete/Alt-Backspace fills the selection with the foreground color (white).

We'll add another new layer on top of the white matte. Now we'll use the menu command Select> Modify> Contract. We want the matte to appear with a five-pixel bevel, so we'll contract the selection that amount.

We want a nice dignified black matte for our photo of Stanley, so we'll press X on the keyboard to return to black as the foreground color, then Option-Delete/Alt-Backspace to fill the selection. The plain black just sort of sits there, with no body or depth. To make it look 3D, we'll add some texture and a bevel.

Let's start with the texture. The menu command Filter> Texture> Texturizer opens this dialog box.

The Hand tool appears when the cursor is positioned over the Preview window, which allows us to reposition the image in the Preview to see what's going on. (By default, the preview is centered on the image. In this case, that shows the transparency grid because there are no visible pixels in that area of the active layer.) With the Texturizer filter, the Preview window is the only visual feedback available, your image itself is not updated live.

We'll set the Scale slider to the lowest setting, which gives us the finest size of simulated canvas, and we'll use a moderate Relief setting. (When working with high-resolution images, these numbers will need to be increased.)

We can reduce the effect of the Texturizer even more if desired by using the menu command Edit> Fade Texturizer. (The name of the most recently used filter will appear in the menu command.) We'll take a look at some reduced settings, but in this case the Cancel button is best. (Another one of those extra techniques, just sort of sneaking in hereÉ.)

To add the appearance of depth, we'll use a bevel on the white layer. Double-clicking the layer opens the Layer Style dialog box. The only change we'll make is to increase the depth to 150%.

Remember, too, that Photoshop includes a variety of Actions to create frames. You can load them into the Actions palette by selecting Frame.atn from the list at the bottom of the Actions palette menu.