Hi there guys. Today, I am going to try and teach you how to make a userbar. Its rather simple, but this tutorial shows you some things you can add to make it look better.
This is what the end result will look like. If you get a little stuck on this tutorial, you can always download the .XCF file to help you.
OK, to start, open up a new project with the dimensions 350 wide x 19 high pixels.
Now select you gradient tool. Set your foreground and background colour to something that matches the picture that you are planing to use. Set the gradient to "FG to BG".
Now drag the gradient across the userbar. Hold Ctrl to get a straight line. You can also drag it down instead of across. See what looks better on yours.
OK, we are now going to add some scanlines. If you haven't already made or don't know how to use scanlines, please have a look at my scanline tutorial found here.
Make a new layer and add the scanlines, see the tutorial listed above for more details on how to do this. You will get something like this.
I then lowered the layer opacity to 35. You can do what you think looks the best. It should look like this now.
Now click on the elliptical marquee tool.
Make a new layer and make a elipse from one corner to the other. Make it stretch just under half way of the userbar.
Fill it with the colour white.
This gives the userbar a 3D effect. Lower the opacity to around 50.
Now for an image. I am going to use this one.
Open up your image in The GIMP. If its to big, you may have to resize it. Make a new layer and paste it in.
Now we need the userbar font. If you haven't already got it, you can download it here. Two fonts are included but we are only going to use the one called "Visitor TT1 BRK".
With the font Visitor TT1 BRK type out with a font size of 10, what you want to say, in white onto your userbar. Move it about untill you are happy.
Right click on your text layer and choose "Alpha to Selection"
Now create a new layer and place it under the other text layers. Call it something like "Black".
Then go to Select ---> Grow, and grow the selection by 1px. Then bucket fill it with black.
Now for a border. Create a new layer and select all (Ctrl + A). Go to, Edit ---> Stroke Selection.
Put in these settings. Make sure your foreground colour is black.
Save your image, I prefer the PNG format, and your done!
Thanks for reading my tutorial. I hope you liked it. Here is another outcome that I came up with.
Using a this picture instead of using the gradient tool I came up with this. This is just another idea of what you can do with this tutorial.
Hungry for more? I have made a new tutorial showing you how to animate your collection of userbars into one image! You can view the tutorial by clicking here.
