Knotted Bead Strands with PSP Tubes

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After writing the tutorial on making pearl strands I thought I'd try something to see if I could make knotted strands the same way. Quality pearl necklaces are hand knotted between each pearl and it's an effect I've wanted to duplicate for a while.

You will need my golden knots tube for this tutorial. Export the PSP image in the zip file as a tube, set the placement to continuous, selection to incremental, and step to 30. I suggest naming it Teph's Golden Knots.

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Open a new image, somewhat large, about 500x500 pixels.

Select the picture tube tool and choose your pearl or bead tube then set the Step to about 3 pixels larger than what you'd have used for a regular stand. Generally 30 will work.

Draw a strand of pearls, there should be some gaps between the beads.

Add a new raster layer.

Now switch to the Golden Knots tube, set it to the same Step as the bead tube.

Starting at the center of the gap between the first and second beads, draw a line of knots following the centers of the beads. It's a bit tricky but you don't have to be perfect.

As you can see, the last few knots aren't placed very well. Just use the lasso tool to select around the knot you want to move and place it where you want it.

While all the knots could be placed one by one, I find using the tube much quicker since I only have to move one or two knots, not dozens.

And that's it.

If you want smaller pearls change the "scale" in the options but do NOT change anything else. PSP will adjust the step internally to fit the scale you've chosen.

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©2001 Lynn A. Davis