Red Gold Tea Caddy Tutorial

Colonial Tole Tea Caddy Tutorial

PSP 7 and PSP 8

The terms of use are here

This tutorial gives directions for PSP 7 and 8. You will need to be familiar with the Text Tool, Layers and the Materials/Colour Pallette. There is a tutorial for using the PSP 8 Materials(Colour) Pallete here. Just hit the Back arrow to return.

You will need:
teacaddyalpha.zip, selections from Alpha Channels,
Fleurons font
A gold gradient, or
in PSP 8 you can use the metalbrass gradient.

Where there are differences, PSP 8 directions are given in red.

NOTE: Each step which needs a new layer will use the format with the name of the new layer, and then the selection for that layer. So Whatever layer - whatever.sel, means make a new layer Whatever, and then get the whatever.sel file by going to

PSP 7: Selections - Load from disk or Load from Alpha Channel
PSP8: Selections - Load/Save Selections - Load Selection from Alpha Channel.

1. Open the caddyalpha.psp image or make a new image 245 x 300 pixels. The first layer is the Caddy layer - get your selection - 01caddy and Flood-Fill with #700505. Go to:

Noise - Add 15%, Uniform
Adjust - Add/Remove Noise - Add 15%, Uniform
Effects - Geometric Effects - Twirl - 720^o
Effects - Distortion Effects - Twirl - 720^o
Repeat these steps again (add Noise, Twirl)

You'll notice that the caddy now has the jaggies, so go to

Selections - Modify - Contract 2 pixels
Selections - Invert
Hit CTRL-X to get rid of the jagged edges

That looks good, but it could look better make a new layer, Caddy 1,

Flood-fill with the red and then go to
Layers - Arrange - Send to Bottom

2. Rim layer - 02rim. Flood-fill with a gold gradient.

3. Top layer - 03top. Flood-fill with the red colour and then repeat the steps in Step 1. Keep selected!

4. Ring layer. Go to

Selections - Modify - Contract 5 pixels
Flood-fill with the gold gradient
Selections - Modify - Contract 5 pixels
Hit CTRL-X to delete the central part.

5. Neck layer - 04neck. Flood-fill with the red and add the Noise and Twirl effects as before.

6. Neck Rim layer - 05neckrim. Flood-fill with the gold gradient.

7. Neck Top layer - 06necktop. Flood-fill with the red colour.

8. Pineapple layer. After you've made this layer, use the Text Tool

with the following settings:

Fleurons Font - Size 72
Stroke turned off - Fill (gold gradient)
Bold Checked
Floating and Antialias checked
Type Capital X

PSP 8
Make the Background your gold or metalbrass gradient
Turn off the Foreground in the Materials Pallette
Click on the Text Tool--here are the settings:

Type in Capital X
(PSP 8 doesn't show the image, but it will be there)

9. Design Layer - Open the decoration.psp image you downloaded. Copy the image (CTRL-C), go to your Caddy image and Paste (CTRL-E). Place this in the upper right hand corner of the caddy. Now go to

Layers - Duplicate
Image - Mirror
If necessary, use the Mover Tool

to place the image properly.

Turn off all the layers except for the Design layer and its duplicate. (In PSP 7, click on the eyeglasses in the Layer Pallete. In PSP 8, click on the eyes.) Then go to

Layers - Merge - Merge Visible
Then go to Layers - Duplicate
Image - Mirror
Use the Mover Tool to place

Congratulations! I hope you enjoyed making the Tea Caddy.

If you have any questions or comments, our email contact is here.