Settings from the effects menu at the top of your PSP screen are as follows: Size 32, Hardness 50, Step 25, Density, Thickness, Opacity 100, Sharpness 15, Sampling Continuous, Limits Find Edges, Auto Tolerance is checked. You can change the size of your eraser & any of these settings to suit your needs. Begin by erasing all the white in the image, go right up against the edge of the beads.

Notice the little extra shadow in the picture, right around the edge of the darker shadow of the beads?

You can either erase that part of the shadow or use the "lighten or blur" tool from the right hand pallet to fix this edge. Erasing that little edge will give your final picture a nice crisp shadow. Leaving the darker part of the shadow in the picture will add depth to your final image. Of course, if you prefer no shadow at all, simply erase the dark & light area.

When you're finished erasing, you should have something like the image shown below.

You are going to have some jagged edges around the beads and the shadow area. Don't worry, that's fixable. If you want to place the picture you just edited, on a background, continue on.

If you want to finish fixing the photo and leave it with a solid white background, go on to step 3.

Note: If this image had started out with a gray background or some other color, you could see how the beads would look against white at this point, if you wanted to. Just click on Layers from the top menu bar and select Merge/Merge All (Flatten). This is a good way to find out if you missed anything with your eraser tool. Simply click Edit/Undo Flatten from the top menu to continue erasing.

Step 2 - Placing Image On A New Background

Lets put these beads against a background. I'm going to choose a pattern that comes with Paint Shop Pro 8 just to make it easy.

Note: If you want to use your own pattern behind an image, save a copy of your pattern in the patterns folder in the Paint Shop Pro 8 (or 9) directory. Use the .psp extension when saving. When you are ready to choose your own pattern, repeat the steps below and locate your own pattern in the list.

From the menu bar at the top, click on Layers and select New Raster Layer and click OK. You should be able to see the layer palette on the right hand side of your screen, under the materials palette. If you don't see the Layer Palette, click on View in the top menu, scroll down to Palette and select Layers.

You should see two layers. Raster 1 are the beads. Raster 2 is the new blank layer. Make sure you're on layer 2. A good way to determine which layer is which is to hold your cursor over the layer. A thumbnail will show you which layer contains the beads and which is the blank.

On the Materials Palette, click on the Swatches tab and then click on the pattern tab.

Now your image should look something similar to this one.

Step 3 - Getting Rid Of The Jaggies

Now we are going to get rid of all the white jagged edges around the beads. Go to the Layers Palette and make sure you select Raster 1, which is the layer your beads are on. Highlight that layer.

From the toolbar menu on the left, select the Magic Wand.

Now click on the area around your beads, and not on the beads themselves. Then click on Selections in the top menu and select Invert.

Then click on Selections again and choose Modify and then choose Contract. Choose 1 for the number of pixels to contract.

Now click on Selections again, choose Modify and then choose Select Selection Borders. Make sure "outside" is checked and also make sure "anti-alias" is checked. Set the border width to 10 and then click OK.

From the left hand toolbar, click on the eraser tool. Select the regular eraser (not the background eraser).

Set the size to 60 or so from the top menu. I like the larger size so I can cover more area at once. Hold down your mouse button and make a few swoops over your image, erasing all the white edges and jagged areas. If you have erased the beads, click Edit/Undo and check your settings and try again.

When you're finished, click on Selections and choose Select None from the top menu. Now the beads should look a lot smoother around the edges with a lot less or almost no white/jagged edges. IF your image doesn't look like that or you want a better look, you can click Edit/Undo a few times and redo the last few steps and adjust the settings as needed.

Note: A way to smooth out small rough edges when you're finished is to use the soften tool, blur tool or lighten tool. Adjust the size of the tool and other settings as needed and simply go over the area you want to soften with the tool of your choice. I use this around the edges of the shadows if needed. (the lighten tool is the box right above the eraser tool.)

When you are all finished, click on Layers in the top menu and choose Merge/Merge All (flatten). Save your image and that's it! I hope this tutorial was helpful to you!