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Digital Scrapper

Scrapper’s Guide

April 2010

Linda Sattgast

Kayla will show you how to create unique photo overlays that can turn any photo into an eye-catching work of art.

Then Susie and I will teach how to create some fun, artistic elements to jazz up your pages, and finally, Susie will give you a scrapbooking idea in her design video that will encourage you to think differently about the way you take and scrap photos.

Some Changes

You’ll notice a few changes in this month’s Premier newsletter. Instead of a guest designer, the Scrapper’s Guide Album Team put together the kit and a photo album with a theme—Recipes! If you’re not interested in cooking, never fear; the kit can be used many different ways!

We also will be featuring different members of the Scrapper’s Guide Team so you can get to know us better.

AND we’re providing the templates in PNG format as well as layered files to make it a snap to scrap!

Have a great month, and I hope you reach your scrapbooking goals!

Love and scrapbooking success,

I read an interesting quote recently:

“Play is the most important element in discovering who you are. Play will lead you right into your deepest desires.” Keri Smith

What a fascinating concept! And yet . . . how does it line up with this quote:

“There’s a difference between interest and commitment. When you’re interested in doing something, you do it only when it’s convenient. When you’re committed to something, you accept no excuses, only results.” Art Toruck

If you think about it, these are two sides of the same coin. Of course we must pursue our goals with utmost commitment, but if we don’t also take the time to play, our creativity runs dry, and we get dangerously low on joy.

Then commitment becomes one step in front of the other, instead of striding ahead with energy.

So take some time to enjoy life today, and relish the renewed enthusiasm you’ll get for the commitments you’ve made!

Speaking of Play . . .

If scrapbooking is your passion, then learning new things about Photoshop or Photoshop Elements has to be way up there in the list of things that brings you joy. We have some great videos for you this month.

Welcome to the April 2010 Digital Scrapper Premier!

Wow - what a wonderful collection of layouts I found in the Premier Gallery this month! It was quite a challenge to choose a favorite from all the beautiful pages there. I did finally select the bright, eye-catching layout by rt619 as this month’s top pick.

I really liked the way rt619 drew attention to the sweet photo of her daughter with her well chosen embellishment groupings, but my favorite part of this layout has to be the great title, which includes chipboard letters created from a variety of Miss Mint’s beautiful papers. RT619 did a great job of balancing the busy papers grouped onto the letters with lots of white space in her layout. Congratulations, rt619, on a fabulous digi-page!

Top Pick Page by rt619

My oldest daughter 23 years ago. Page completed using Miss Mint’s, Lucky Ducky. This is a wonderful kit that truly is versatile. Thank-you Miss Mint and Scrapper’s Guide.

Congratulations to the other outstanding top picks, pictured here in alphabetical order. Click on each of the thumbnails to see the gallery pages for these other great layouts.

Lucky Ducky by Miss Mint

coppercurls

slewerenzJobaScrapsjmljensen

barb_b

Top Picks - March 2010

by Digital Scrapper Designs

This month’s kit contains:15 patterned papers

5 solid papers1 set of brushes

1 set of doodles (including 3 borders,3 cupcakes, cake, cookie jar,

3 flowers, 7 frames, heart, 2 journaling lines, rolling pin.

swirl, teacup and teapot)13 buttons * 1 row of buttons

4 bows * 1 border flourish sticker1 scalloped circle

1 tiered cake sticker3 coffee pots

3 cupcake stickers1 doodle flower sticker

1 flower with button1 cookie jar * 1 sugar jar

4 journaling circles6 ribbon word strips

6 ribbon journaling strips2 lace doilies * 1 lace strip

2 grunge edge overlays1 pearl string * 5 scalloped strips

1 recipe card * 3 ribbons4 rickrack * 1 rickrack wrap

1 journaling teapot1 teapot tag

3 teapots * 6 ties

No doubt about it. The Scrapper’s Guide Digital Scrapper Designers have created the yummiest kit ever for our Premier members this April with the Sugar and Spice Kit!

This delightful collection is jam packed with soft pastel papers and boasts a huge assortment of tasty treats, patterned teapots and fun doodles. While this is the perfect kit for designing a treasured recipe book, you’ll find the versatile papers and darling drawings will also add the perfect touch to baby books and a wide variety of other digital project.

Sugar and Spice

This month we’re interviewing our own Mary Newman, who is not only the Scrapper’s Guide Customer Service Manager, but a multi-talented artist and designer as well. Mary has created some wonderful artwork for Scrapper’s Guide, including her Express Your Love kit… a whimsical set of heart-themed doodles, frames, overlays and stickers. You’ll find more of her artistic creations in this month’s Premier kit!

SG: Mary, how did you get your start in art?

Mary: I guess I’ve been creative all my life. I’ve just always loved art.

SG: What was your first creative work?

Mary: I remember when I was very little, I took a permanent marker and wrote on my mother’s antique dresser drawer. (Laughs) My mom wasn’t very happy with me!

SG: What did you draw?

Mary: It was a squiggly line!

SG: So… that’s where you got your start with doodling…!

Mary: Yes… in grade school I loved doodling. I was always drawing Snoopy and doodling frogs!

SG: What about later in school?

Mary: SG: And in college…

Mary: I majored in graphic arts … that was back in the day when everything was done old school… design, typesetting and layouts were done by hand. After two years of college, I left school to marry my husband, Doug. We started a family, and I kept up my creative pursuits whenever I had the opportunity. I tole painted for 7 years where I cut my own wood on a bandsaw. After we purchased our home, I became interested in gardening and flower arranging. As a small child, my mother taught me to sew and before I came to Scrapper’s Guide, I worked at an interior design company making high-end draperies and pillows.

Getting To Know

Mary Newman

SG: Wow… you’re a multi-talented gal, aren’t you?

Mary: Well, I’ve always been sort of crafty and creative. I like to think outside the box… I can work with pretty much anything. I like to take found objects and turn them into other things.

SG: Your house is a showcase of your creativity…

Mary: Oh, I love antiques… old things… things with character and patina. I’ve done a lot of remodeling and home improvement work, and I like to decorate my spaces with little design “vignettes” here and there. I love arranging antiques and found objects in all the nooks and crannies. One of the things I enjoy is rooting around in antique stores and thrift stores looking for interesting discoveries. For years, I was so into history and antiquities… I wanted to be an archaeologist. Now I just go to flea markets!

SG: Talk about your scrapbooking…

Mary: I was a traditional scrapper for about 10 years. I liked working with paper, making pages, making cards…handmade gifts… then computers happened…

SG: You met Linda in the early 1990s…

Mary: And she taught me everything I know about digiscrapping! She made it so easy to learn that I could translate my hands-on abilities into digital creations. I started out using Photoshop Elements, and within

six months I had moved on to Photoshop, and I keep learning and growing all the time.

SG: What do you enjoy most about working at Scrapper’s Guide?

Mary: In addition to assisting our wonderful customers, it’s great to be able to expand my skills, and put my creativity to work. I’m enjoying working on illustrations,

making brushes, elements and other tools, working with the design team. It’s always fun when you can make a living doing what you love!

SG: Thanks, Mary, for sharing your story (and your skills!) with us. We can’t wait to see what you’ll create next!

The inspiration for our April Premier Album, Sentimental Sweets, comes from my love of combining family photos with favourite family recipes.

Baking has always been a big tradition in my extended family. My mother and her sisters cooked cakes and biscuits (cookies) every week, so there was always something homemade in the cupboard

for morning and afternoon tea. I grew up on a farm in the 1960’s, ten miles from the nearest grocery store, which had limited supplies. We used to make everything ourselves so it was fresh and delicious.

When I married my husband, my mother-in-law said to me, “You’re a girl after my own heart.” She was referring to my love of baking. She loved baking too and was thrilled to have a daughter-in-law who would carry on the tradition. We had them over every Sunday for afternoon tea so I would do all the baking on Sunday mornings.

When my kids left home, I put all their favourite recipes in a book for them so they could still cook the things they loved. I have over 70 cookbooks and magazines, and I write a menu every week, which goes on the fridge detailing what I have planned for the next seven days.

Baking Traditionsby Susie Roberts

April 2010

This month’s inspiring collection

of 18 QuickPages (7 double-page

spreads, a title and end page,

plus a front and back cover)

can be downloaded along with

the coordinating Sugar & Spice

Premier Kit and will allow you to

complete a beautiful album

of your own in no time at all!

Sentimental Sweets

Watch a video on how to use

templates.

QuickAlbum

All layouts on these pages were completed with

the

April 2010

QuickAlbum

See Premier Gallery for larger versions.

SentimentalSweets

created with the Sugar and Spice

Premier Kit

Photo overlays can take a regular photo and turn it into a piece of art, making it a perfect focal point photo for any layout. Also, once created, they are something that you can use over and over again with your photos and layouts!

Photo: Kayla Lamoreaux

by Kayla Lamoreaux

Photo Overlays

Video Lesson 1 Video Lesson 2

Cute Cutouts

by Susie Roberts

There are so many ways to create cutouts like those in this month’s Sugar and Spice kit. In this lesson, you’ll learn two simple methods to transform Mary’s doodles into cute cutout shapes using the Shape and Selection tools.

Page: Susie RobertsDoodles: Mary Newman Kit: Sugar and Spice by Digital Scrapper DesignsFont: Brandy Wine

They say, “A Picture Paints A Thousand Words,” so learn how to make your photos tell most of the story. PLUS you’ll go through the steps to create a simple template that can accommodate any photo orientation to tell your story in pictures.

Page and Photos: Linda SattgastKit: Sugar and Spice by Digital Scrapper DesignsFont: Precious

Page and Photos: Susie RobertsKit: Sugar and Spice by Digital Scrapper Designs(paper recolored)Fonts: Optima and Pappo’s Blues Band Official Font

by Susie Roberts

Photo JournalingVideo Lesson 4Video Lesson 3

Paper Roses

by Linda Sattgast

Use paper from digital kits to create one-of-a kind whimsical paper roses! You’ll get to sharpen up your Photoshop skills in this tutorial as we apply various techniques to create a cute paper rose!

Extra Tidbits

What ideas can YOU come up with to make things with the Polar Coordinates filter?

Cool Filter!

The Polar Coordinates filter is a pretty astonishing filter when you realize how much it can do by throwing pixels in a circle!

In my lesson Paper Roses, I show you how to make a rose using Polar Coordinates, but I want you to think of other ways you can use it. Here are two examples:

Daisy Petals

1. Create a square document the size you want the daisy to be. With the Ellipse tool, draw 6 long, skinny ovals evenly spaced across the center of the page.

Select all the oval layers in the Layers panel and choose Merge Layers from the Layers panel flyout menu.

2. Use the Transform tool to stretch the ovals to the top and bottom of the document, but leave the sides as they are. Confirm the change.

3. Choose Filter > Distort > Polar Coordinates. Check Rectangular to Polar and click OK. You now have the start of a great daisy! Just group fun paper with the daisy shape and merge down. Then duplicate and rotate it to make the daisy more full.

4. Here you can see my finished daisy, complete with button and decorative type.

Type: vThe circular type was created the same way. Type your text in a square document. Rasterize (Simplify) it. Make sure no text goes off the edge of your document. Then stretch it up and down to the edges of the document, and use Polar Coordinates to make the type circular, suitable for dressing up a daisy!

Introducing Premier Membership

Every month you’ll receive:• A deluxe scrapbooking kit including at least 12 high resolution coordinating 12 x 12 pages, and a generous array of matching elements

• A QuickAlbum, made from the same kit, with a set of “QuickPage” templates, PLUS a front and back cover to help you scrap an entire album in a flash. We’d love to see your pages using this month’s kit!

•Four in-depth training videos for both Photoshop and Elements, plus any associated files, such as layer styles, photos, brushes, etc. used in the lessons. You’ll learn:

* How to fix or enhance your photos * How to use Photoshop tools for scrapbooking * Digital scrapbooking techniques used by the pros * Design tips for making exceptional scrapbook pages!

• PDF manual for each video with all the step-by-step written instructions, making it easy for you to follow along and try out the techniques yourself.

• Access to exclusive members-only bonuses, archived Tips of the Week and Bonus videos, and of course, the exclusive Premier Forum.

Premier Membership - all this for only $8.99/month

© 2010 Scrapper’s Guide. All rights reserved. If you have friends or associates who are interested in this information, please refer them to www.scrappersguide.com where they can sign up for their own Digital Scrapper Premier subscription. Do your part to prevent digital piracy so we can continue to offer you valuable products like Premier.

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