Creating a Funky Striped Paper

Open a new 12x12 inch, 300 dpi document.

Find the Gradient Tool. It is located behind the Paint Bucket on the vertical toolbar. Right-click on the Paint Bucket and switch to the Gradient Tool.

Notice that the menu bar at the top has created a gradient between your foreground and background colors in the vertical tool bar. This is in the Options bar. If it's not visible, select Window> Options.

The gradient you see is called the Gradient Selector (A). Click it to edit the gradient. Change the Gradient type to Noise and the Roughness to 100%.

Under that, you'll see the Color Model with three sliders on Red, Green and Blue. Play with the sliders until you get a selection you like. Then hit "OK."

The Linear Gradient button (B) is selected by default. Click and drag the mouse from the upper left corner to the bottom right corner while holding down the Shift key. When you click off the mouse, the document will fill with the pattern you just created.

You could stop right here if you are happy with the funky stripe. Or, go a bit further and add a texture and other effects!

Layout by Betsy Lombardi

Tutorial written by Betsy Lombardi