In earlier versions of Photoshop this new channel would have been simply named '#4.' Why #4? Because technically it is the fourth channel in the document following the red, green, and blue channels. You should now have a new channel in your channels palette called 'Alpha 1' (fig.With your tattoo still selected, click the Save Selection as Channel button at the bottom of the channel palette (fig.If an alpha channel called 'Alpha 1' already exists, delete it by choosing Delete Layer from the Layer menu or by dragging the 'Alpha 1' channel to the channel palette trash bin at the bottom. Click the Channels tab in the Layers palette (fig.Choose 'OK' and notice that there is now a marquee (marching ants) around your tattoo. You should see a dialog box like the one if figure 4. From the Select menu choose Load Selection. Make sure your tattoo layer (called 'p' unless you renamed it) is selected in the Layers palette.What is currently black on-screen (the tattoo) we want to be opaque. Remember, in an alpha mask, black is transparent and white is opaque-which is the inverse of what we now have on-screen. Good so far, but we don't want our entire body covered in white, so we need to create an alpha channel so that just the tattoo shows up on our body and the rest is transparent.I'm using the letter 'p' from the Tattoo typeface which is a pictogram of a scorpion. Using the type tool (shortcut 'T') place a single symbol using your chosen symbol typeface in the shoulder area of the UV template (fig.Open up the Upper_body_template.psd file in Photoshop and prepare it using the same steps you used in Creating Your First Shirt (fig.Mythos, a font from Adobe, also has some nice pictograms. Any dingbat or symbol typeface will work for this example. I'm going to use one of the designs from a typeface available on the Web called Tattoo (fig. Pick something small and relatively simple-we're not quite ready for a multi-colored dragon running the length of your avatar's back. We need to find a nice design for the tattoo.

Make sure you have your template set up as described in Creating Your First Shirt.

Photoshop tattoo tutorial