podq live

Thank you thank you to all who have found and used the Travelogue Theme for WordPress over the past couple years. I was elated to find that it has been ported to several other systems as well, and occasionally run across a site using it, which really makes me giddy!

I realize that there have been many problems trying to access it, download the PSD files, or locate the fonts. Time has a way of changing everything. I have finally gotten around to locating the original source files I have, and will reupload them, along with the updated 2.0 (finished before I left) so that they will again be available.

I have a few ideas churning around in my head for a future version of Travelogue, but it has not even begun to be truly mapped out yet, so if you have any ideas, requests, or suggestions, please feel free to let me know.

Thank you again to all who have found and used this theme, as it encourages me to continue to learn and produce new things myself.

There have been many requests on how to edit and insert a customized picture into the polaroid in my Travelogue theme. It does take a bit of Photoshop know-how, perhaps in the future I’ll make it easier to do. That said, it really isn’t all that difficult, just follow these steps:

1. Copy the picture you want to insert as the polaroid, but do not paste it yet.
2. Turn off the top three layers that serve as an intro to the PSD.
3. Open the “Polaroid” layer set, and find the layer with the current image in it (should be the fourth one), click it.
4. Paste your new image in. It should appear as a new layer above almost everything, but below the polaroid. If not, move the layer around until it does.
5. You may wish to rotate your picture layer to make it appear straight inside the box. This is kind of a “tweak it till it’s right” step.
6. Now Ctrl + Click on the vector mask (the little grey looking box next to the actual preview) of the old polaroid picture layer. This should load up a selection of the outline of the inside of the polaroid. Hopefully you can get the step in correctly, it’s the tricky/important one.
7. Finally, making sure that your new polaroid picture layer is still selected, click on the “Quick Mask” button at the bottom of the layers palette, should be the second one from the left, a grey box with a white circle in the middle.

If all done correctly, you should now have a perfectly masked new polaroid picture! Just pop into ImageReady and export that slice with the new pic! Oh, how to do this? Well…

1. Save the file you have just edited.
2. Go File > Jump to ImageReady. Photoshop will now open up ImageReady with your file.
3. In the toolbar, select and hold the Slice button (looks like a knife) until other buttons pop up, then select the Slice Select button (looks the same, but with an arrow).
4. Select the slice that contains the polaroid. You should only have to click on it.
5. Go File > Save Optimized As, and change the bottom drop-down to “Selected Slice Only”. Then save it where you want!

And that’s it, you should now be set. I would highly encourage you to learn Photoshop, if you have it at your disposal. You will be a better webizen for doing so. Good luck!