CreativeStable

Last tutorial (Basic Banner Tutorial), we covered some of the basic things I do to make a pretty decent looking banner. Due to time constraints I did not go over in much detail how to do the rounded corners.

Open photoshop and open a banner you would like to work with. For continuity's sake Im going to re-use the banner I used last time.

Okay, so moving on. Select the rounded rectangle shape tool. You may need to click and hold the mouse, and select it from the flyout menu as shown below.

There is a few things we need to check before creating our shape. First of all, take a look at the top horizontal menu and make sure "shape layers" is selected and not "paths".

Corner radius will change the amount of curve for the corners. A higher number will give bigger rounded corners, and a smaller number will give small curved corners. I am going to set this to 20.

Again, make sure "create new shape layer" is selected in the options beside radius.

Make sure the Style is set to "default none"

Okay, everything is set! Keep in mind that the color of the shape does not matter at all.
Go back to your banner, and draw a shape onto your canvas, going as far to the sides as possible (but dont go past!).

Quick tip: If you hold down the space bar while you are dragging, it will MOVE the object while you are creating it.

Your layer palette should look something like this:

Click on your shape layer, and drag it below all the other layers.

Now, we are going to make a clipping mask. Hold down ALT and click between the shape layer and the layer above it. You will end up with something like this:

Now, do it to all the layers. Click between them holding alt. Make sure to start from the bottom and work your way up. This puts all the layers INTO the bottom layer.

Voila... rounded corners! Now, all blending options you add to that shape will apply to the layers above it. Right click the shape layer and select "blending options". Here you can add a stroke (make sure to set it to "inside"). A stroke is the equivalent of a border. Make sure to save your file as a .PNG. jpgs do not support transparency.

In Conclusion

This may seem like a long and time consuming way to add rounded corners to a banner, HOWEVER, it greatly improves your workflow once you are a bit more experienced. You don't muck with ANY of the original images so it is really easy to go back in and fix things. You can easily change the shape and it won't be a ton of work to re-create your artwork. Shape layers are VECTOR based so they can be scaled. It also makes adding effects super easy and gives you a nice clean look.