Paint a Frame Around your Photo

How to Paint a Frame Around your Photo. Click on any image to enlarge.

This technique offers many possibilities for creating a fun and different look to your photo. Here are the steps I used to create this image:

1. Open your image and duplicate the Background (Cmd/Ctrl J). Make sure your Layers Palette is open (go to Window>Layers).
2. Go to Image>Canvas Size. Add one inch of canvas to the width and the height.
3. Click on the top layer (the duplicate). Next we're going to tilt the image by going to Free Transform under the Edit Menu or hit Cmd/Ctrl T on your keyboard to bring up the Free Transform command. Grab ahold of one of the "handles" on the corners and slightly tilt your image to the left or right. 
4. When you are satisfied with the tilt hit the check mark on your Toolbar.
5. Set your Background and Foreground colors to their default. Press D on your keyboard. 
6. Select the Background Layer. Press Option-Delete on a Mac or Alt-Backspace on a PC to fill the Background Layer with Black.
7. Select the brush tool on your tool bar. 
8. Pick a brush style from your Brush Picker. Now here's where you can get really creative. For my example I chose a "stipple" brush but you can play with all of the brush styles and sizes for a different effect if you wish. 
9. 
10. What we're going to do is paint a line around our image to create a brush stroke frame. I selected a light gray color for my brush but you can have some fun with other colors if you wish. You can change your brush color by clicking on your foreground color to bring up the color picker.
11.  Or you can choose the eyedropper on the tool bar and then pick a complimentary color in your image for your frame.
12. Now we're just going to paint around the image with the paint brush. Make sure your image layer is selected (not your black background layer). With the brush style, size and color now chosen click once in any corner of your image. Press and hold the Shift key down, and click on the next corner. Repeat until you have completed your painting around all four sides of your image. 
13. That's it! Have fun!