Tutorial: How to Create Textured Fonts Using Gimp

After I had my Blog redesigned over the summer I was in awe over the glitter effect in the word "Wonder" in my Header. I was hell-bent on learning how to do this. I assumed it would take Photoshop (which I do not have). After some research I found a FREE program called Gimp that can be used to achieve many things that are done with Photoshop. I watched some videos online and taught myself how to achieve texture effects. Since these are great for breathing some life into TPT product covers, I thought I would write this tutorial. 

First off, you will have to download and install Gimp. Once that is done, you are ready to go!

1. Select File > New. A window will pop up in which you can specify the file size you want.

         

2. Select the Text Icon in the Toolbox. You can then drag a text box onto the canvas and start typing whatever text you want to texturize.

 

3.  Highlight your text and select the desired font and font size.

 

4. Now it is time to add the texture you want. Go to File > Open as Layers. Find the file on your computer that you want to use (can be any digital paper). As a side note, I found that sometimes it helps to resize the file into a smaller image if it is very big.

For my purposes, I chose red glitter paper.

5. In the Layers Panel, Right-click the text layer and select "Alpha to Selection". You should now see a slight outline of your text through the texture layer.

6. Next, select the texture layer, go to Select > Invert.

7. Go to Edit > Cut.

8. Go to Select > None.

9. In the Layers Panel, right-click the top layer and select "Merge Down". Repeat.

10. You can use the cutting tool to crop the image.

11. Optional: To make the image transparent, go to Colors > Color to Alpha.

12. To save the image, go to File > Export As... Save as PNG file to retain transparency.

13. Ta-da!

Now you can use your fancy text in a TPT product cover. Here is an example:

See how you can use textures to highlight some other elements in your cover? In this case I chose red glitter to complement the red glitter drapes. I hope you have fun with this!