Try It Tuesday - Chevrons

Chevrons have been pretty hot in design for a while now but how do you make them?  We did this in our facebook speed scrap last week but I thought I would share here on my blog as well just in case you were wondering.  You're going to love how easy this really is!  I know I did!  So let's start out with a 12x12 canvas.  Let's turn on our grids too by clicking Ctrl+' (thanks, Dana!) to make things easier.  Now use your shape tool to create a rectangle (I used 1"x3" but you can use whatever size you like).  Move that rectangle up to the top corner and place it half on and half off the page.  Duplicate it enough times to space it evenly (in this case 1" apart) across the top of your page.

In order to get the chevron shape, we'll need to change the angle of these rectangles.  An easy way to do this is to click Ctrl+T which will bring up a transform menu at the top of your screen where you will find a place to change the angle.  Let's start with the rectangle farthest to the left and angle it -45degrees. 

Select the next rectangle and change it's angle to 45degrees.  Continue this pattern all the way across your page. 

We're starting to see the chevron pattern now but those gaps aren't exactly what we're looking for.  What you'll need to do now is click on the 2nd rectangle from the left and use your left arrow key to move it closer to the 1st rectangle until you've created a perfect chevron.  Continue this process all the way across the page.  You'll find that once you've done this, your chevrons don't exactly reach across the page anymore.  That's okay, simply duplicate the last couple of rectangles and move them to the right to complete your pattern.  Once you've completed the pattern, merge the layers together and center them on your layout.

Of course, if you have one row of chevrons, you'll probably want more, right?  Anyone ever read the book "If You Give A Mouse A Cookie"...same concept!  LOL!  So go ahead and duplicate that chevron layer.  To make it easier to see the alignment, let's change the color of that second layer of chevrons by creating a transparent layer (Shift+Ctrl+Alt+N) right above it and fill it with a different color.  Simply clip (Ctrl+G in PSE, Ctrl+Alt+G in CS) that new fill layer to the 2nd chevron line and merge (Ctrl+E).  Now simply move that layer down the page until it's lined up where you want it.  You can line it up directly below the first row of chevrons of you can leave some space between them.

To fill your page, simple select both layers from your layer bin, right click and select duplicate layer then use your down arrow to move the duplicate lines down the page.  You will probably need to move a set of lines up as well to fill in the empty space at the top. 

Once you have your page filled, you can merge all of the 1st color chevrons together and all of the 2nd color chevrons together to make it easier to clip your papers to them for a 2 paper stripe.  Or you can leave each line individually there to clip multiple papers to them so that each stripe has it's own paper.

All that's left to do now is to clip your papers to your chevron stripes and you're on your way!

I left some space between my chevron stripes so I could have a third paper peeking through from behind.  The fun thing is that when you add a shadow to the chevron stripes, it almost looks as if the background paper is embossed between the stripes!  Kind of fun!

Credits:  Serenity by me

Give it a try!

Have a great day!

Comments

[Jeanne]

Great tutorial, Wendy. I haven't done anything in the digi realm in so long! This looks great.

[Janet]

Wendy, Thank you so much for this tutorial. Speed scrap last night showed one technique to make my own paper and today making chevrons! You are a wonderful teacher!!!!

[Myoriah]

Thanks for this tutorial. I was able to take your instructions and in the software for my cutting machine to make a chevron design to use on a card. LOL! It is going to take me some learning to find my way around Photoshop. I lost my tools and had a heck of a time finding them. I may go back to using Paintnet which your instructions would work for.

[Sandi]

great, fun tutorial, thanks for sharing. hugs