Written by Steve Patterson. In this Photoshop tutorial, we'll learn how to add a timeless, classic vignette effect to a photo, perfect for wedding and engagement photos, anniversaries and other family portraits! Creating the effect is easy and once you're familiar with the steps, it takes no more than a couple of minutes from start to finish. I'm using Photoshop CS5 here but any recent version of Photoshop will work.

Here's the photo I'll be starting with:

Here's what the final result will look like:

Let's get started!

Download our tutorials as convenient, printable PDFs! Get over 280 Photoshop tutorials!

Step 1: Add A White Solid Color Fill Layer

With the photo newly opened in Photoshop, we'll start by filling our document with white, which will become the color of the vignette border. Normally, we would simply add a new blank layer to the document and then use Photoshop's Fill command to fill the new layer with white, but let's do something different. Click on the New Fill or Adjustment Layer icon at the bottom of the Layers panel (it's the circle split diagonally between black and white):

This opens a list of all the fill and adjustment layers we can choose from. Select a Solid Color fill layer from the top of the list:

As its name implies, a Solid Color fill layer lets us quickly fill the document with a solid color. As soon as you choose Solid Color from the list, Photoshop pops open the Color Picker so we can select the color we want to use. Choose white, either by clicking in the top left corner of the large color selection box on the left or by entering 255 for the R, G and B values near the bottom center of the dialog box:

Click OK to close out of the Color Picker, and the document is now filled with solid white:

Step 2: Select The Layer Mask

So why did we use a Solid Color fill layer here instead of just adding a normal layer and filling it with white? The reason is because the next thing we need to do is add a layer mask to the white-filled layer, but Photoshop's fill layers, like the Solid Color one we just added, already come with a built-in layer mask so there's no need for us to add one ourselves! If we look in the Layers panel, we see the fill layer, which Photoshop named "Color Fill 1", sitting above the original image on the Background layer, and we see the layer mask thumbnail directly to the left of the layer's name. Click on the mask thumbnail to select it. A highlight border will appear around the thumbnail letting you know the layer mask itself is now selected:

Step 3: Select The Elliptical Marquee Tool

Select the Elliptical Marquee Tool from the Tools panel. By default, it's hiding behind the Rectangular Marquee Tool, so click on the Rectangular Marquee Tool and hold your mouse button down for a second or two until a fly-out menu appears showing the other tools available in that spot, then choose the Elliptical Marquee Tool from the list:

Step 4: Drag Out An Elliptical Selection Outline

With the Elliptical Marquee Tool selected, click inside the document and drag out an elliptical selection outline in the center of the document. You can move the selection outline around to reposition it as you're drawing it by holding down your spacebar and dragging it to a new location. Release your spacebar to continue dragging out the selection. Don't worry about its exact size, shape or position for now because we can easily fix things up later. All we need at the moment is an initial elliptical selection outline:

Download our tutorials as printable PDFs! Learning Photoshop has never been easier!

Step 5: Fill The Selection With Black

Go up to the Edit menu in the Menu Bar along the top of the screen and choose Fill:

This opens the Fill dialog box. Change the Use option at the top of the dialog box to Black:

Click OK to close out of the Fill dialog box. Photoshop fills the selection with black, and because we had the layer mask selected on the Solid Color fill layer, the black effectively punches a hole through the fill layer, revealing the original photo on the Background layer behind it:

The layer mask thumbnail in the Layers panel shows us the area we filled with black:

Go to page: 1 | 2