(before and after) Style credits to this picture can be found in this post: Makeup Forever!
A lot of people have been asking me to do more Photoshop video tutorials showing how I process my images, especially my headshots. It really varies most of the time though, depending on each picture and how much I want to process it. Today’s picture a few people asked me to share how I processed some parts of it and also how I added the bokkeh background.
Please feel free to comment or email if you have any questions or suggestions and let me know if you found this tutorial helpful. Have a great weekend! <3
» You can view all of my current tutorials on my tutorials page.
Yesterday I did a tutorial showing how you can move and position an avatar on a sim where you don’t have rez rights. The link to that is here: Moving Avatars. After I did that post, a few people on different social networks shared how you can move and position yourself on a sim where you can’t rez. I am attaching both videos in this post to make it easier and I’ll also give the instructions below that.
If you are a habitual “Googler” like I am you probably noticed while doing searches that certain search results have the author’s picture and name beside it like mine do in the search results displayed in the image below. This is called Google Authorship. Google introduced Authorship around the end of 2011 and slowly more and more bloggers are taking advantage of this. What exactly is Google Authorship? It’s a way to give your search results a face and name by providing your Google+ profile headshot and your name within the search results.
I am going to use two search terms that I get a lot of clicks from as an example. First one is “Windlight Settings” and the other is “Blog Meme” which of those search results would your eyes jump to automatically? I also noticed that because of Google Authorship, if you just google my name “Strawberry Singh” my Google+ Page pops up on the side with pictures and some recent posts on there. Authorship really makes your search results stand out and clearly shows that you are the author of that content!
How to setup Google Authorship:
Use the Structured Data Testing Tool to see if Google Authorship has already been setup for your blog. If not, then follow the next steps.
Create a Google+ Account for yourself, and remember to put a clear, sharp headshot as your profile picture on Google+ because that will be the image showing up in search results.
Follow the instructions on the Google Authorship Page to link your Google+ Profile to the content you create.
If you have a self-hosted wordpress blog, you can also use any of the Google Authorship plugins to help speed up the process.
If you get stuck in the setup process, the hostgator blog has very simple to follow step by step instructions. They use the Yoast SEO Plugin to set it up on their blog, which is the one I use as well.
After completing all the steps, you should be able to start seeing your name and picture popping up on search results when using Google. Once you’ve done all of that, don’t forget to add a Google+ badge to your blog so people know you are on Google+ and can add you to their circles.
Benefits of joining Google+ for Second Life Residents
I hope you found this post informative. If you have any questions, feel free to email me and don’t forget to follow me on Google+ I have a Google+ Profile as well as a Google+ Page for my blog.
Today I thought it would be a fun idea to do a meme where everyone can share a bit of their talents.
Meme instructions: Blog a tutorial and teach me something that you think I might not know about (even if I do, doesn’t matter, do it anyways). The tutorial can be something within Second Life (how to build, create tattoos or clothes, pick up guys at info hubs, tie your virtual shoelaces, whatever…) or something in Photoshop or on any social network (just focus on something sl-related somehow). Make it informative, make it hilarious, make it whatever you like! I’d just love to learn something from you that you may be good at and are willing to share. Remember to leave your link in this meme’s post so others can come by and learn too!
I decided to teach you guys how to create animated gifs using photoshop that you can use in your blog posts or on plurk.
I did a video tutorial, but you guys totally don’t have to do that for your tutorials, you can just write out the steps. I’m going to try and do that myself below as well. This is the link to the video: http://youtu.be/fQ_suHnRnWk
Steps to Creating Animated GIFs using Photoshop CS5
Create a new document and put each frame of the animation on a different layer.
Open the Animation window, by going to the Window menu and then choose Animation.
Modify each frame as desired, if needed.
Select the delay time for each frame.
Save your GIF. From the File menu, choose “Save for Web and Devices” and choose GIF from the drop-down menu. Select Preset GIF 128 Dithered and hit save.
Please note that animated gifs do not work on Flickr, so I had to upload this week’s picture to my blog itself, I usually host my blog pics on flickr. So that’s my meme and tutorial for today. You can find more of my tutorials on my Tutorials page.
Please remember that you can participate in any of the memes at any time. You’ll find them all under my Blog Challenges category along with other memes and challenges I’ve done over the years. If you do an image for your meme and put it on flickr, feel free to share it in the Blog Memes Flickr Group.
I’m a day early with this meme again as I’ll be in meetings on Monday. I might be posting the memes for the next several weeks a day early as my real life will be a bit hectic as the school year ends. Thanks for participating and I hope you guys have a productive Monday! <3
EDIT: A few people have messaged me asking what I used to record my screen as they would also like to do a video tutorial. I used Camtasia but there are a few other free options such as Camstudio, Fraps, Jing, etc… and people are sharing more in this plurk.
Credits:
*Skin: Glam Affair – Margot – India 02 – Dark brown (@ Collabor88 May)
Eyes: Mayfly – Deep Sky Mesh Eye (Desert Dawn, w4) by Arkesh Baral
Mesh Eyelids: Slink Mesh eyelids by Siddean Munro
*Hair: /Wasabi Pills/ Selene Mesh Hair – Chocolate by MissAllSunday Lemon
Top: Peqe – Crop Top (S) by Inex Hax (@ Catnip Carnival) (slurl)
Necklace: Cae :: Catnip :: Necklace by Caelan Hancroft (@ Catnip Carnival) (slurl)
Pose: Adorkable Poses: Zoo by Adorkable Peapod (@ Catnip Carnival) (slurl)
If you have a Facebook profile for your Second Life avatar, you probably already know that the SL community on Facebook is very friendly and active. Everyday that I login to my SL facebook, I am greeted by at least 5 to 10 friend requests from other SLers. I always accept, as long as I can clearly see that they are in Second Life, because to me that’s what social networks are about: friending and socializing and sharing. However, as your friend list grows bigger and you like more and more facebook pages you will start to lose control of your newsfeed and might even miss important things in there that you definitely do not want to miss. So I thought I would do a quick tutorial on how to fix a few of your FB settings so you don’t miss anything important from close friends or your favorite facebook pages.
Close Friends:
I have a few close friends on Facebook and I want to make sure I don’t miss what they are posting because I’m always curious about what’s going on in their lives (and also cuz I’m a total stalker). So all you have to do is go to their profile and hover over the “friends” button on their cover page and you will get the above menu popping up. From there you can activate “close friends” and make sure “show in news feed” and “get notifications” are also checked. But don’t worry, Facebook doesn’t tell your friends that you’ve done this and are stalking them in any way whatsoever. This way you won’t miss anything they post on Facebook and can stalk them like a pro!
Favorite Facebook Pages:
Did you know that Facebook doesn’t always show you every update a Facebook Page makes? So if you’re a fan of a Facebook Page and you want to support them or just want to stay in the loop, getting notifications is the best way to do it. All you have to do is go to the Facebook Page you want to follow (here’s a link to mine). Hover over the “Liked” button and make sure to activate “Get Notifications” and “Show in Newsfeed” this way you’ll never miss any posts from them. I’ve done this to a few pages I want to keep track of: the Second Life facebook page and also some pages of designers and bloggers that I don’t want to miss posts from.
