For the purposed of this tutorial I used Photoshop CS. I searched and searched for a tutorial on how to do a drop shadow frame. The only think that I could find was info for elements. Not having Elements I was out of luck so started to experiment on my own. I knew layers would be involved so I started experimenting with this first. Photoshop is relatively new to me so the technique I use here is only the way I finally got it to work, someone with more experience then I will probably know how to do it in fewer steps. This is my first tutorial so hopefully it is easy to follow.

Step One

Open your photo in Photoshop CS and duplicate the layer.

Step Two

Make a white frame around your photo by clicking, Image>Canvas Size (Fig 1). Then I just put a 2 inch white frame around the whole photo.

Fig.1

Step Three

Now turn off the first layer so you are working with the duplicate layer and click on, Layer>Layer Style>Drop Shadow. The layer style window will appear, (Fig. 2) so now you have to make your adjustments. I changed the opacity to 90%, the angle to 120, the distance to 50, changed the spread to 10 and size to 50. Click OK. This is the adjustment I used, personal preference will be used here and I am sure there will be variations between different photos.

Fig 2

Step Four

Finally turn the first layer back on and there you have it a white border with a drop shadow frame.

So there you have it an attractive drop shadow frame that will enhance any photo that you want to post on the web.