Creating a Landscape or Garden Plan With Photoshop and Google Maps

It can feel rather daunting to tackle a project as big as landscaping your own yard. Between scheduling services and booking times and finding the right person, landscaping becomes a much bigger challenge than it needs to be. If you've got a good handle on how to use the web and how to use photoshop basics, you can make your own landscaping plan easily and for free!

For this project, I've been working on naturalizing my front yard so it can provide more resources for my local environment and help sustain the lives of the critter that keep the world going. Since I'll be doing all the work with no extra help, I've broken down my yard into little mini-garden sections that can be planted one at a time. Eventually, my goal is to have a totally native garden that can give back to nature... Plus, it's always fun watching the birds and the bumblebees flying around!

If you don't know how to use Photoshop, have no fear! This Instructable will walk you through all you need to know in order to execute the final project. There are a ton of different ways to do things in Photoshop, so if you find another way of working with the program, do what feels best for you!

Image by Pxfuel

A computer with internet connection

Adobe Photoshop (Any version is fine, this Instructable uses CC)

List of plants you'll be using for your landscape/garden + Approximate size and spacing of each plant

Not everybody has access to the blueprints of their house, and blueprints don't always show the dimensions of your yard. That's where Google Maps comes in to save the day. While Google Maps is great for getting around and finding directions, it's also a perfect source for getting a rough idea of your home's dimensions and layout. Please be sure to use a desktop computer to do this, as the instructions will be different for mobile users!

Start by opening your browser and going to maps.google.com and enter the address of the property you'll be making your plans for. (For this instructable, I'll be using a few different addresses.)

Once you get to the general area with your location marked on the map, click on the button on the lower left of the map area that says "Satellite" to show you the satellite view of your home.

Zoom in as far as you can without hitting street view. You'll want the property to be shown as if you took a picture perfectly above, so make sure the property is centered and looks straight. If the satellite view is rotated too much, hold down the alt or command key and click the left mouse button to rotate your view.

Once you've got everything centered nicely, take a screenshot of the entire map. *Make sure you include the lower right corner of the map with the date, country, and scale under the little yellow person icon.* You can also just take a screenshot of your entire screen if that's easier for you.

• To take a screenshot on a Windows desktop, hit the PrtScrn (Print Screen) key on your keyboard
• Took take a screenshot on a Mac desktop, hit Shift + Command + 3

After you've gotten your screenshot, open up Photoshop. (Note: You can totally use any image editing tool to do the bulk of this Instructable! As long as your program allows you to use layers, you're good to go.) As a reminder, I've included the basic keyboard commands to do each of the next few steps, but if you have your own way of doing them, just use whatever method you're most comfortable with.

Create a new document with whatever dimensions you need. I like using a 8.5 x 11 (letter) size because it's easy to print without having to rescale it.

Insert the screenshot into your new document. You can do this by going to "Fileor hitting Alt + v if you used the PrtScrn key on Windows. You can also simply drag the file from your browser into the document on Photoshop. That's part of the magic of the program... You can do the same thing a million different ways with the same results!

Make sure your layer is rasterized. Open up the layers panel on the right of the screen (you can also go to the top of the screen to WindowIf there's a little grey rectangular icon on the lower right corner of your layer preview in the layers panel, right click on the layer and hit "Rasterize layer." If there isn't an icon like that, ignore this and move on!

Now that you've got your image on the document, we'll get rid of the unnecessary information so you've got a nice uncluttered area to work with. Google Maps makes the perfect tool for this project because the map is equipped with a scale that's included in your screenshot! In order to keep everything scaled accurately (so you don't overcrowd or add too much space to your garden plan), you'll need to make sure you resize the scale along with your image at the same exact proportions.

Hit the M key on your keyboard to pull up the Marquee tool on Photoshop. Go to the lower right of the screenshot and drag a rectangle out over the map scale, then hit Control + C + V (Windows) or Command + C + V (Mac) to copy the scale and paste it as a new layer. Open up the layers panel on the right of the screen, double click on the layer title and rename your layer "Scale."

Next, we'll get rid rid of all the unnecessary information on the screenshot so you'll just have the area of your property and the scale on the document. Make sure you navigate to the layers panel and select the screenshot layer. Drag a rectangle out over the area around your property that you'll be landscaping, and add just a bit of space around the edges just to be safe. Once your selection looks good, hit Control + Shift + I (Windows) or Command + Shift + I (Mac) to invert your selection, then press Backspace (Windows) or Delete (Mac) to clear the image of everything you don't need.

Finally, we have to resize the image along with the scale so it takes up more space on the page to give us a bigger space to work with. Hit Control + T (Windows) or Command + T (Mac) and hold down the Shift button while you drag the image out to resize it. Make it whatever size feels right without cutting off any space and leaving some extra white space around your image since it never hurts to have a little wiggle room.

There's no doubt that your image is going to look a little blurry, but worry not. We're going to draw out the lines of the property so the workspace is less cluttered and easier to navigate!

All you need to do is use the tool of your choice to trace the lines of your working area, or the areas you'll be landscaping. You don't need to trace the house unless you'll be landscaping up to the edges of the house, so focus on the property boundaries, driveways, sidewalks, and any other obstacles or ground disruptions.

Drawing out the lines can be done in a number of different ways, depending on what you're comfortable with, how familiar you are with certain Photoshop tools, and how much or little detail is in the shape of your landscape borders. Here are a few different ways you can draw out the area:

• The pen tool. I use the pen tool most often because I can get smooth curves and sharp lines without having a super steady hand. However, the pen tool can be a little finicky and tough to learn, so this is not recommended for beginners. To use the pen tool, simply draw out your lines, right click and hit "Stroke," and repeat as needed.

• The paintbrush tool. This is the best tool for beginners. Hit the B key on your keyboard to turn on the brush tool and you'll see a hollow circle as your cursor. To adjust the size of the brush (the thinness or thickness of your lines) just hit the [ key to make the stroke thinner or the ] key to make the stroke thicker.

• Build out the area with shapes. If your area is fairly simple, you can use shapes like rectangles and circles to roughly sketch out the general area. Go to the left of the page and click and hold on the square shaped icon of the toolbar to choose the shapes you need, and then drag them across the shapes in your landscape.

You can choose any method you'd like, just be 100% sure you're staying within the boundaries of the property!

It's time to set up your scale. For the sake of ease, I've created a scale you can use in your own design. Download the file here, and then open it in Photoshop.

Drag the shape layers to the document with your layout and move them over the scale from Google Maps.

Transform the layers so the yellow square fits exactly with the line in the Google Maps scale. If you'd like to keep everything organized, you can group the squares by selecting all the shape layers and hitting Control + G (Windows) or Command + G (Mac). Be sure to name the group "Scale" so it doesn't get confusing later! If you need any shapes with different dimensions, use the existing squares to add/subtract/divide with each other to get close to the desired dimensions.

Take a look at the list of plants you've gathered and start searching for images of each plant. Make sure you have each plant listed along with its approximate size and spacing needs like so:

• Yellow Coneflower - 18-24 inches
• Cardinal flower - 8-12 inches
• Serviceberry - 15-25 feet

Got your list? Cool. Time to start sourcing images. Google your first plant and find an image to serve as a thumbnail. Go with whatever you prefer here. I like finding images that show the bloom color and roughly how woody the plant may be, but again, it's all up to you!

Once you find an image you like, copy it and paste it into your design document in Photoshop and name the layer after the plant. Since we're working at scale here, we need to scale the image of the plant to the landscape. Follow these steps for each plant image to get all your plants to scale:

1. Select the Circular Marquee Tool and make a circle over a section of your plant in the image
2. Invert the selection and delete the excess of the image on the layer
3. Open up the scaled square layers
4. Move the plant image over the scaled squares and transform it to fit with whichever dimensions you need

For example, I'll find a picture of a yellow coneflower that I like, crop it into a circle, and then scale it to 50-75% of the 2.5 foot square. For the cardinal flower, I'd scale it about 75-100% to the 1 foot square. The serviceberry would be double the size of the largest scale square, so I'd duplicate the 10 foot square layer, put it right next to the original 10 foot square layer, and then scale the serviceberry layer across both squares.

Do this for every plant you have planned for your design. If you need to add more plants, just Google the spacing and add the plants just as above.

You've got your property lines drawn out, you've got your plant icons ready, and you've got your scale. It's finally time to start planning your garden placement! This is where you can truly let your creativity flourish.

Start by selecting your first plant layer and duplicating it by hitting control + J (Windows) or command + J (Mac). The new layer will be an exact copy of the plant with the layer automatically named "(Layer Name) Copy." Hit the V key on your board to choose the move tool, and move your layers into place. Place as few or as many of each plant where desired, and do the same for all desired plants.

Try to keep in mind that plants are living creatures, and that each species has specific needs that may not suit the needs of others. Here are a few key things to remember when laying out your plants:

• Tall plants cast more shadows, so either place equally tall plants around them or place plants that can handle partial shade next to them
• Take note of the direction of the sun and the amount of light your plants will get
• If there are steep inclines on your property, try to place plants with strong root systems along the steep areas to prevent erosion
• Do a search on the web for companion plants to find species that are beneficial towards each other when planted for the best possible chance at survival
• Try to include at least 3 canopy levels in your plan to ensure you local birds have a place to hang out

Happy planting!

This plan based on Grow Native! Bird Garden plan available for free online here