How to turn any photo into a puzzle: by Jacob

This tutorial will involve the use of the magic wand tool, multiple photoshop files, and some basic effects.

Step 1:Gather your photos

When gathering your photos you want to find any photos that you'd like to make into a puzzle. So I chose an underwater scene because it's a popular children's puzzle topic. I also chose a white puzzle from google images which I got from searching "White Puzzle" into the search bar.

Step 2: Opening the files

The next step is opening both photos in photoshop so that you can begin the actual puzzle making. You will want to go to File>Open>(wherever you saved the file). Once you have both files in photoshop you can move on to the next step.

Step 3: Moving the image

Click on the move tool in the top left hand corner and drag your puzzle image onto the image that you want to be the puzzle.

Use the Free transform tool on the puzzle image Edit>Free Transform and make sure the puzzle fits snugly over your photo.

Step 5:Selecting the pieces

Underneath the lasso tool you will find the magic wand tool which you will use to select the individual puzzle pieces.

Select one of the pieces by clicking into the center of the piece.

Step 6: Making the puzzle

Create a new document that you want the puzzle to be on. You will do this be going to File>New and then selecting the appropriate dimensions(must be bigger than your photo that you want to use as the puzzle). 

After you have done that go back to the image that you had the white puzzle overlapping the image. While still having that piece selected click on the layer that contains the actual image.

Now switch on over to the move tool (still having that piece selected) and drag it onto the document you just created. It should bring image over but in the shape of the puzzle selection.

Step 7: Moving the rest

Now go back to the overlapping image and click on the puzzle layer. Click on the magic wand tool again and select most of the puzzle pieces. You can select and move them all at once by making a selection on one piece and holding shift while you click on the other pieces.

Drag all those other images onto your blank file after selecting the image layer. Once they are on the new file they should appear to fit together like a puzzle.

Follow the above steps again to bring over what pieces you left out and just add them onto the new file.

Step 8:Adding the Drop Shadow

Select all of the layers on the new file by holding shift and clicking on each layer. Next hit cmd e to combine all the layers. Go to the Fx tool at the bottom of the layers pallet and open up the drop shadow. After selecting the drop shadow make sure the opacity is at 75%.

You have now completed the tutorial.