How to frame an image in Photoshop

Hi,

perhaps you are looking for the ACTIONS panel:

You can also use layer styles to get those results:

To demonstrate how you can design your own frames, if you add a stroked ellipse above the images layer, then you can experiment with layer styles to give what you want.  The first example below sim,play adds a yellow color overlay, a drop shadow, and most importantly, a Bevel & Emboss.

The second example is slightly more complicated.  I placed a wood texture layer at the top of the stack, but to make the layer styles work, we need to cut out just the bit we want by using a layer mask.  I did this by turning off the image and wood layers but leaving the Stroked Ellipse layer turned on.  That gave us the mask we needed in the Channels panel.

Ctrl clicking the channel loads the selection, so then turn the image and wood layers back on > select the wood layer, and add a layer mask.  You'll need to invert the mask with Ctrl i.

You can then play with layer styles on the wood layer.

Note that with the gold effect above I used a W shaped Gloss Contour in Bevel & Emboss, but we need a straight line curve for the wood layer.

I may be wrong but I wonder if you were using Photoshop Elements before Rather than Photoshop.

Yes, I'd say you are right. Photoshop is the full professional tool and most people need training to use it effectively. But Photoshop Elements is more for occasional users, who don't have time to spend learning. So a lot is left out and some things are easier in Elements. But in full Photoshop much more is possible!