Winner gets a free laptop and royalties to the new skin design. =)
I decided to go ahead and enter, here is my final piece which i like best out of 4.
Here is the link to my gallery of all 4 i submitted:
http://rod-blake.deviantart.com/gallery/
Slogan:

"Because Toshiba works even when you don't"



If you would like to enter go here
http://news.deviantart.com/article/126165/
RULES:
Gotta be a member of Deviant Art...its free to join.
You have to dl the template you have to work from.
You must use Photo Shop as the finished image must be a editable PSD.
It must be a 300 dpi and 16.07 x 10.53 inches for printing.

There are more rules and info on the link above.

Have fun!

Hey Rod,

Good Luck! Nice design and slogan is great!

Thanks Pixelbean! =)
I tell you though there are a lot of very nice skins being created for this contest.
You can check them out here.
http://browse.deviantart.com/contests/2010/toshiba/

I feel kind of bad using PS though ...lol =P

I like your skin Rod. You're right though, there's a lot of competition but a lot that are no so good either.

These ones are really nice though.
http://browse.deviantart.com/contests/2 ... 6#/d2wvw6a
http://browse.deviantart.com/contests/2 ... 0#/d2wuudk

Couldn't you create it in GIMP and then save as PSD and check in Photoshop if it opens correctly?

edit
I just read the rules. I can't enter, not from the US. But you can enter using GIMP. They only need the end result as layered PSD but it can be created with any program you like.

I could have tried that i suppose but i am not sure layer modes would render the same.That and some of the filters.

I will try and open the PSD files i created in Gimp and see what they look like. =)

I think yours is one of the best, the blurb really sets it off! I don't know Toshiba's colors, so don't know if that would affect their decision.

Thanks 2-ton! =)

I tried opening the PSD in Gimp and as i suspected, it not only took 12 minutes to open, it opened with all layers set to normal, and at a size of 474.0 mb. =)
The blur was also not quite right, and i tried to reset the layer modes and the blur to no avail. It's just not the same render. =\

I think though that the Toshiba developers will be adding text and a background to the design.Because the bg and the top layer in the template are layers you are not supposed to edit but you have to keep in the submitted PSD file. (if your design is chosen).
The template you are required to use has 3 layers
top layer (do not edit leave on top), and fully transparent.
middle layer (Art work layers here)
bottom layer (background black set to their opacity), and almost transparent.

So i assume they are going to use PS to add Toshiba and their logo to the design. =)

I downloaded the template. It's a background layer, a layer for your artwork and a template layer.

If you make it in GIMP you can just merge all the layers of your work together and save it with 3 layers as .psd.
I can't see how that can go wrong. They just need to be able to open it in Photoshop right?

That's true, i did try to open it in Gimp without merging all the artwork layers...so you are probably right.
I am sorry i missed the rule about having to be from the USA...that's kinda strange actually.I wonder why?