Creating a Simple Border

The title is pretty much self explainatory and all, but this particular border can be created in any version of photoshop! We will isolate the part of the image that we want while giving the rest of the image a soft, translucent view to it.
Click here for sample psd file!
Note, you'll need winzip, winrar, or FREE 7-zip software to unpack this .7z file. You can download 7-zip here
(Click me for high-res copy!)

Step 1

Get an image that you want to apply a border to! You are welcome to use the stock image that provided, if you want. Copy your background layer by pressing command/control+J
Fist, grab the rectangular marquee tool and make the selection of all the things that you want to keep within the image! Like so:

Then press command/control+shift+I to invert the selection so it looks like the image directly above (or to the right) this text.

Step 2

Create a new layer by pressing the new layer icon at the bottom of the layers panel
and then fill your selection with your foreground color by pressing option/alt+backspace (delete on mac) or with your background color by pressing command/control+backspace (delete on mac). I chose this color and my result looked like so:

Step 3

Now that our color has been chosen we need to drop the opacity of our layer to anything between 10-80 %. I chose 45% as my magic number and once you're done and you image is still selected, press command/control+D to deselect the image and take a look at your work! You might say there is something missing or maybe not that color. If you wish to pick a new color, bump the opacity of the layer up to 100% again and reload the selection and simply pick a new color and fill it!

Note: The image is still selected although it doesn't need to be. If you selection is lost you can command/control click on the thumbnail of the layer to reload its selection.

Step 4

What really is missing? Some will say it looks fine, some say it's terrible looking! You decide ultimately, however, I'll show you some tricks to give it border. Reload the selection by
command/control+clicking on the layer thumbnail and then create a new layer above our color layer. Go to Select > Modify > Border and select the amount of pixels that you wish, I chose 5px. The image on the right is a 100% close up of the image so you can see what the border selection does, you can modify the outside or inside border by adding/subtracting elements of the image by grabbing the marquee tool and holding option/alt to subtract or shift to add.

Fill with your desired color by using the hot keys mentioned in Step 2 (it's the easiest way) and then deselect the image and take a look!I chose the have the border slightly smaller but I liked the look of the original outside border! You can separate the two copying the original layer and then by subtracting the outside layer and then going to Select > Modify > Contract 1px. Invert the selection as mentioned in Step 1 and by deleting (press delete) the rest of the image! Go to your copy of that layer and simply grab the eraser tool and erase the inner border! (Sorry for the lack of picture support!)
My final result turned out to look like this!