John,
I haven't looked at or seen any tutorials, although I imagine they exist. A lot of the effects are done with gradient transparencies. The bitmaps serve a purpose in this respect:
Sometimes you need to feather a certain piece that is right along the edge of another piece, or is right on the edge of the subject itself. What you don't want is for that feathering to extend beyond the subject, you want only the part within the subject to be feathered. To accomplish this you create the shape with the feathering, and then do a Arrange, Create bitmap copy. Then you place the bitmap copy where the original was and delete the original. Next, you draw a line through the bitmap right along the part of the shape where you want to remove the feathering, so you end up with a clean edge on that part of the shape, but still have the feathering on the rest.
I hope that makes sense. Also, this applies to shadows too.
ron
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by JohnLogan1973:
Great work as always Ron I still think your better at the metalic look of things then me but i'll keep trying untill I get it right

I'd like to know if there is a metalic turtorial and if there is where it is, guess your the best person to ask this and if there is no turtorial can you give me some tips, I saw in a image you made that you use bitmaps can you tell me something about that or where the turtorial on it is .

Thx and keep posting those great images.

JohnLogan. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>