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In this Issue
Letter
from Team Digital – Fran Cornelius (PQ)
 May
2011. Imagine a place
where you have the power to separate what is important from what is
unimportant. Imagine a magical place where people from all around the
world hang on your every word and offer sage advice. Imagine a place
where you can learn: where to buy the perfect camera bag, how to make
realistic drop shadows, and how to fold toilet paper into the shape of
a rose. Imagine no more. You're here. Digital Scrapbook Place.
The depths of the friendships that are available at DSP are amazing.
The camaraderie that awaits anyone who is willing to venture into the
forums is phenomenal. On a daily basis, people at DSP meet to give and
receive both emotional and practical support, as well as exchange
information. Yes, women from all over the world get together in the
morning and chat while they sip their morning cup of coffee, then they
come back in the evening and chat and enjoy a glass of chardonnay.
If getting butterflies to fly in formation seems like an easier task
than what you are facing, come to DSP and get involved in a thread. If
you are celebrating the biggest event of your life and you want someone
to cheer along with you, come to DSP. If Adobe Photoshop CS5 keeps
crashing and you are on the verge of suicide because you do not know
what to do, come to DSP. We have the answers. At Digital Scrapbook
Place women from all over the world gather and share their lives, their
experience, and their knowledge.
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Site
News and Features
New
to DSP?
Posting
Your First Layout:
Are
you thinking
about
posting your first layout? There's a special first layout
challenge each month for you. Post your first layout to DSP this month
and you
may be a random winner for a free page kit!!
You'll find all the information here.
What’s
Going On
If you need to
know what is going on, you need the What's Happening at DSP
thread or the Calendar. You
can also find out what contests and challenges are due in the What's Due
thread.
What's
DUE
If
you are
looking to find out what challenges are due when then the What’s Due
thread is the thread you need to check out. In this thread,
you can find out what contests and challenges are coming
up. So
- get going on a few challenges, Ladies, there are tons of great ones :)
The
Buzz for Newbees and Oldbees
Chat for new members (and old members too!)
Every Wednesday at
10 pm EST
Everyone Welcome!
If you are new to digital scrapbooking or new to DSP, or if you've been
around DSP for a while but love to meet and help new members, join us
in
chat!
DSP is a big busy site! Are you beewildered? Do you have questions? How
to get around the site? How to enter challenges? Where to start? Join
us in chat to find out more about the site and digi-scrapping! We'll
orient you to some of the features of DSP and answer questions to help
you feel more comfortable getting around and finding what you need.
Welcome
to DSP! We know you will love it!
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Crops
and
Events
For the next stop
as we
Scrap the Map, DSP is heading to the Baltimore MD/Philadelphia PA area
on June 25, 2011 and YOU are
invited!
We're going to the heart
of Amish country in Lancaster, PA! Just 1.5 hours from Baltimore or
Philadelphia. Come
meet CEO Margie Lundy!
Check out and maybe even WIN, great products from DSP and our
sponsors Adobe Systems and Fulltime Families!
Register
now!
Even more crops are
scheduled in July, August and September. For locations, dates and
other news,
check out www.scrapthemap.com
and in our DSP Forums!
Don't
forget, if you are planning a get together to put it in the Gathering and Support
forum. There’s nothing like meeting DSPers in real
life to learn new things, take great pictures and have a good
laugh!
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New Kids on the Block
New
Kids on the
Block (NKOTB) is a contest for those who are new to digital
scrapbooking and
want to learn more based on quality feedback and constructive critiques
from experienced scrappers. It is also a chance to meet new friends,
become part of the DSP community and belong to an alumni group when
it's over. The contest begins May
1,
but the final deadline to sign up is May
7.
There's
plenty of fun for those of us who have "been around the block", too. Be
sure to cruise the NKOTB
Galleries
and comment on the
layouts.
Constructive feedback is what its all about! Come and join in the fun
of the NKOTB Adoption Agency.
It's a fun way
to support the New Kids and make them
feel welcome in the DSP
community.
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Member
Spotlight – happybeingamom
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This
month, the DSP
Member Spotlight falls on super-talented happybeingamom.
Her gorgeous paper-style look makes for a gallery full of inspirational
layouts.
Her family features strongly in her layouts, so it is no surprise to
hear that they are her inspiration. When asked how she would describe
herself, Happy’s answer was: ‘A wife and mother.
Relationships with the ones I love are very important to me.’
‘For my two youngest I have been doing layouts of each month
of their lives up until 24 months old. I just love doing such a series.
I wish I can get back the memories and do it for my older children as
well.’
She prefers starting with a photo as her inspiration for a layout but
says she loves the kits the designers make and spends a lot of time
looking for a perfect combination of the two.
I am sure you will agree it is time well spent when you look at all
those lovely layouts with just the right kit and photo combinations. Be
sure to spend some time in happybeingamom’s gallery and read
more about her on the DSP Spotlight Page.
Once you are inspired, join in with the Scraplift The Spotlight Challenge
for your chance to win a lucky draw DSP Store Voucher.
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Featured
Designers
Lauren
Bavin
Get
It Off Auto: Telling the Story Using Aperture Value
While your camera may
take superb photos on Auto you are really just “taking a
photo”. To extend those memories what we want to aim for is
to “make the photo”. The old adage “A
picture tells a thousand words” comes to mind, but the goal
would be for that photo to use your words not the words the camera
decides are appropriate.
One way we can use to
tell the story is by adjusting the aperture your camera uses to take
the photo. Aperture in simple terms is a measurement of how wide the
hole is that opens when you click the shutter button. The effect of
this opening is to allow more or less of the photograph to be in focus.
A wide open aperture allows for a very small portion of the photo to be
in focus, the remainder will be out of focus. This is known as a
shallow depth of field. It is quite confusing because the numbering
system used is similar to that of fractions. So the larger the number,
the smaller the hole and the more of the photo is in focus and
conversely the smaller the number of the aperture, the wider the
shutter opens (bigger hole), and accordingly less of the photo is in
focus.
In the left side image
of the Cosmos Daisy you can see only the centre of the flower is in
focus and even the petals closer to the camera are out of focus, and
the foliage is so out of focus you can barely distinguish the shapes.
Alternatively a large
numbered aperture such as f16 or 22 will mean that much more of the
image is in focus as you can see in the right hand side image where the
entire flower is in focus and you can easily see the foliage. The
ability to manipulate the area of your image which is in focus can have
a great effect on the story you are telling with your photographs.
I find one easy way to
remember the effects of each type of aperture is that those images
taken with an aperture with a big number tell the big picture, and
those with a small numbered aperture tell of the small details.
BIG
NUMBER =
TELLS THE BIG PICTURE = LOTS IN FOCUS
SMALL NUMBER = TELLS OF THE SMALL
DETAILS = SMALL AMOUNT IN FOCUS
In the following example
I demonstrate how adjusting the aperture can result in a quite
different “story”. The story I want to portray is
that I like to enjoy a wine, juice or coffee on my deck which has a
lovely sea view.
In the top photo with
the wide open aperture of f1.8 the focus is clearly on the glass of
juice, making the focus of the story on the juice. Its a nice glass of
juice for sure and tasted as nice as it looks. If I were telling a
story about the juice and how delicious it was this would be perfect,
but in this instance its not really the story I want to tell as well as
the bottom photo with the aperture of f22 which brings the view more
into focus as well and captures the bigger story.
By leaving your camera
on Auto when you TAKE your photos you are letting your camera decide
what story you are telling... go out and MAKE your photos and tell your
OWN story!!
Lauren Bavin
Head Designer
Lauren's
Links:
Team
Digital Bio
Personal Gallery
Forum
DSP Products
Blog
Teresa
Loman
Inked
Edges Tutorial for
PS
I have always loved the
look of “REAL” hands on scrapbooking but due to the
cost of it as well as all of the work involved in it, I never got into
it. Probably a good thing because my craft room simply does not have
the space for the addition of one more craft. I do enjoy looking at the
paper scrapbooks that my girlfriends have put together and always enjoy
the craft shows on TV that showcase paper scrapbooking. One of the
looks that I love is the look of inked edges. Now I’ve seen
them do this on TV for paper scrapping and it looks like one big giant
mess to me. Thankfully, it’s not so messy in digital
scrapbooking using Photoshop.
Here is a page I made up
using my Mary Alice Page Kit, Add on Pack, and Paper Set. I want a nice
big catchy word for a title.
 
I used the type tool and
a font that I liked to create my title. It’s kind of boring
as
just plain black.
I copied the word over
to this great green paper where I used it as a template to cut the
title out of the paper. There are several ways to do this in Photoshop
but this is how I did it. With my word layer being the active layer, I
clicked on “Load Selection” under the
“Select” tab at the top of the screen. You will see
“marching ants” around the word. Then I went to the
“Layer” tab at the top of the screen and clicked on
“New” and then “Layer Via
Copy”. I then slid this new cut out of the word over to my
page.
Well now the word is
there but not quite easy to see. That’s where the inked edges
come in handy.
The first thing I want
to do is create a new layer for my inking. I generally do this in the
layers list at the right of my screen. Clicking on the square icon at
the bottom and to the left of the trash can will add a new layer to the
top of my layers list.
I need to create a path
for my inking. To do that I have to select the outline of my word. In
this case, that is layer 32. So with my cursor/pointer and holding down
the “ctrl” key on my keyboard, I am going to click
on the layer 32 thumbnail.
 
And LOOK! How cool is
that? Those “marching ants” show up. Yeah, I know
this is a much easier way to select a layer than what I used earlier in
this tutorial. Be sure that your new layer remains the active layer in
your layers list.
Now we need to make a
path.
To do this, I click on
the “Path” tab that is right there along with my
layers list to the right of my screen. I click on that little circle
icon with the lines coming off of it.
That creates a work path
on the path list and creates an outline around my word.
Now to ink our path. For
this page, I want my ink to be brown so I set my foreground color to a
brown that is in the dot paper. Using the paint brush tool, I select a
brush that I think will be good for inking.
I adjust the size,
amount of space as well at the shape dynamics to get the desired inking
look.
After clicking on the
solid outline circle outline at the bottom of the paths box, the path
is then stroked with my ink. To delete that work path after the path
has been stroked, simply drag it to the trash icon at the bottom right.
We could leave it like
that with the ink hanging off the edge but I want it too look like I
held up each letter in my hands and inked with a sponge just the edges.
(If I were really paper scrapping, that is.) To do this, I go back into
my layers list and select my word layer again.
There’s those
marching ants again.
With my ink layer being
the active layer, I select “Inverse” which is an
option under the Select tab at the top of the screen. Then I hit delete
on my keyboard and my extra ink is all gone. Going back to the Select
tab and clicking “Deselect” will get rid of those
pesky marching ants.
My page and screen now
looks like this.
I can add a drop shadow
to the word layer to get the effect of cut out paper for that word.
Here is my finished page
with the inked edge, cut out paper, word title. Looks good
doesn’t it?
Copyright
2011 Teresa
Loman for www.digitalscrapbookplace.com
Photos
are courtesy of
Julizza Holub of JH Capturing Creations Photography. See more of her
wonderful portraits at www.capturingcreations.com
Teresa
Loman
Senior Designer
Teresa's
Links:
Team
Digital Bio
Personal Gallery
Forum
DSP Products
Blog
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Some
Useful Links:
 blogger  facebook  flickr
 twitter
New Products
•
Club Digital • Freebies
•
Mentoring
•
Contact Us
Forum
Search
• FAQ
• Site Map
• Team Digital
• DSP Blog
• Tutorials
• DSP Calendar
• DSP Terms of Use
• The
Shop
Product Information
• Shop Site Map
• Store Search
• What's Happening at DSP
• Challenges and Contests
• Questions
Scrap
the Map •
DSP Scrap the Map Forum
WHAT’S
DUE
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Store
News
Follow
us on Twitter!
****************
Sales
*****************
1
–
National Scrapbook Day Sale
8
–
Mother's Day Sale
16
– Missed
'Em
Monday Sale
Enjoy
20% - 40% off Select Products
Missed
'Em First time around?
Here's your
chance
to grab some old, but still great,
DSP products from past years at
great discount prices.
Discount varies according to the release date of
the product.
19-22
– Teresa Loman and Lauren Bavin are Featured Designers.
Enjoy
20% off Select Products
27-30
– Memorial Weekend Sale
**************** May
Merryness *****************
1 – May
Day
3 – Teacher's Day
5 – Cinco de Mayo
7 – Tourism Day
8 – Mother's Day
11 – Twilight Zone Day
13 – The Only Friday the 13th in 2011
15 – Chocolate Chip Cookie Day
18 – Visit Your Relatives Day
24 – Victoria Day (Canada)
30 – Memorial Day
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Club
Digital
Are
you a member of the club?
Soft
and elegant tones
abound in
May's issue of Club Digital.
Included this month as usual are two versatile page kits, which can be
accessorised with the coordinating backpack and a useful paper
alphabet.
Added to that you will find a useful floral overlay and some useful
Dream-themed Word art along with some ornate corner stamps. Don't
forget
the three photo quick click to make scrapping a breeze.
Club
Digital
now comes in a choice of resolutions - Choose 200ppi
or 300ppi version when you download.
This
month's content includes
- Dragonfly Haven Page Kit
- Peaceful Day Page Kit
- Stamp Fleur Overlays
- Fat Paper Alphabet
- Corner Celebration Stamps
- Lofty Dreams Word
Art
- Gently Goes Backpack
- All Around Three Quick
Click
Club
Digital is the hottest club in town!
Get
your monthly fix of the best digital scrapbook products for an
incredible price! Something to suit every style and level of digital
scrapper!
Every
issue of Club
Digital includes two page kits, one plopper or overlay, a quick click
template, an alphabet, some wordart, a font, and png stamps! As a Club
member, you also receive an exclusive
coupon for the DSP Shop and can
enter an exclusive contest
just for members (with great prizes)!
Over
$27 in value for the incredible price of only $5.99/month! (Or
as low as $4.99 with longer subscriptions!)
Club Digital
is
just $17.97 for three months ($5.99/month), $33.00 for six months
($5.50/month), or $59.88 for a full year ($4.99/month)!
Plus,
Club members can WIN!
Purchase a
three month subscription and you're entered to win a free
upgrade to a six month subscription!
Purchase a six month subscription and you're entered to win a free
upgrade to a twelve month subscription!
Purchase a twelve month subscription and you're entered to win a $30
coupon for the DSP store!
Here
is a selection of layouts created by the DSP Team Digital using this
month's Club Digital Selection.
Click here
to
find out more about Club Digital
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It's
Shop Time!
Featured
Product – Recipe Book Mega Kit
This kitchen themed mega
kit is packed full of elements, backgrounds and recipe cards to make
great art from all your food memories and recipes.
Available in 200ppi and 300ppi.
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Shop
Time Inspiration
It’s
time to SHOP… let’s get those baskets at the
ready.
You
know you
can
do a search for anything using the advanced search feature
located at the top right of your store page, right above the search
box. For example ‘green Lauren’ will just
return Lauren’s kits that have green in them,
‘hearts tina’ will return Tina’s kits
with hearts in them. Try it, you’ll like
it!! You can also check out the Site Map
for some fabulous links.
Gift Certificates.
Send anyone the perfect gift!! Gift Certificates are a
wonderful way to
say - Happy Birthday, Merry Christmas, I Love You, or even
Just Because!
Did
You
Know...
...you can get to the store by typing shop.dsp.me in your browser URL
bar? Get to the store even faster!
Do
you love
the
product you just purchased and want to tell others? Please consider
doing a review
... pass the good word along! We love to hear from you.
Here's
some store
inspiration for this month.
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Artful
Activities – Creating Memories from Moments
When
you first join DSP you want to devour every little bit of information
there is and it seems a bit overwhelming at first but the absolutely
best place to visit first off is the 'What's Happening'
page, it's packed with useful information to help you choose to
participate in a designer run challenge or contest or make a date to be
at one of our awesome chat sessions. To find out the daily and weekly
fun at DSP check out the calendar
of activities, there's never a dull moment at DSP and you're sure to
find something to your taste to challenge
you artistically.
Contests,
Challenges and Chats
Stay
current on challenges with the What’s Due thread,
which will keep you up to date on all the challenges on the site and
when they are due.
- Designer Exclusives
–
Our Designers are the best there are and they are really generous, if
you enter one of their challenges you’re more than likely to
receive a chat and/or posting bonus just by using their nominated kit
for the challenge. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain
– like more stash for less bucks with these great challenges.
- Inspiration Station (IS News)
This is a call to all dedicated DSP scrappers to ‘strut your
stuff’ and inspire us with your creations. Just choose any or
all of the calls for layouts the current month and you could be
showcased in our Newsletter or Blog. We have a few rules so check them
out and then join in the fun. Check out the current edition of Inspiration Station News or
here for Previous Issues
- Project 365
– a project for how YOU scrap. Check out our Project 365
chats
and the Project 365 store category.
- Scrapolution
– It’s a DSP evolution, a scrapping revolution, and
our New Year’s resolution:
It's a SCRAPOLUTION!!
It’s all about YOU, our members, our friends, making
scrapping goals and Team Digital supporting, guiding, encouraging,
joining, and cheering you on every step of the way. Check out the
current themes and prompts.
- Scrap with the DET
– Digital Elite Team and DET Alumni
Our past and current Elite group of scrappers have some great
challenges going at the moment and you’re sure to get well
chosen CC should you need it – learn from the best
- Elite Challenges –
be sure to check out the challenges run by our DET Alumni and DET.
- The Grannies If
you’re a Granny or a Granny In Training (GIT) or just a
Wannabee, you might like to see what other Grannies are up to, what
challenges they have going. There is never a dull moment when you join
this happy band of digi-scrappers.
- IOTW – Item of the week
– Abby
The Item Of The Week is priced to sell, so create a LO using the IOTW
and be in a draw to win a free kit.
- SNL –
Saturday Night Live –
CherylB & Renee S
This is where anyone can create their own digital scrapbook kits to
share with other SNLers, from elements and papers to word
art.
This
is just a
small selection of popular challenges that DSP currently has running
but be sure to check all of them out here.
And we have a special blinkie to place in your signature to always
remind you where to find the best scrapbooking challenges on the web.
Check the end of the first post in the What's Happening thread
for the blinkie code.
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DSU
Information
Start
here! This free class is an online article that walks you through
digital scrapbooking step-by-step and explains all the basics from
software and graphics to printing and sharing. It is always available
from this page and www.digitalscrapbooking101.com!
CURRENT
CLASS SCHEDULE (Click here
to see all DSU class descriptions)
It’s
not too late for these classes! Late
registration is open until the 5th. To register for these or future
classes,
please visit
the DSP Shop!
May
Classes
 DSU110
–
Adobe Photoshop:
Introduction to Digital Scrapbooking
DSU130
–
Corel Paint Shop Pro:
Introduction to Digital Scrapbooking
DSU160
–
Adobe Photoshop Elements:
Introduction to Digital Scrapbooking
DSU195
–
Wacom & Creative Fun
DSU198
–
Storytelling
DSU220
–
Adobe Photoshop:
Brushes (Pre-requisite - DSU110 or similar experience)
DSU270
–
Adobe Photoshop Elements: Brushes (Pre-requisite – DSU 160 or
similar
experience)
June
Classes
DSU110
–
Adobe Photoshop:
Introduction to Digital Scrapbooking
DSU160
–
Adobe Photoshop Elements:
Introduction to Digital Scrapbooking
DSU195
–
Wacom & Creative Fun
DSU211/311
–
Adobe Photoshop:
Creating Digital Elements for Beginners and Advanced Users (self-paced)
DSU221/321
–
Adobe Photoshop:
Montage (self-paced)
DSU261
– Adobe Photoshop Elements: Creating Digital
Elements
Be
sure to
visit DSU
for information
regarding these and our other great classes!
We
would love to
hear your suggestions on future classes too.
Send your ideas to dsu@digitalscrapbookplace.com.
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Desktop
Calendar Plopper
May 2011
Specially
designed
ploppers
for your
computer
desktop. These calendars were made by Lauren Bavin, Head Designer.
Download the
ploppers
by clicking on the image above (Sizes:1024x768,
1280x1024, 1440x900, and 1680x1050
are included.)
Add
your
pictures, angle and
size them as you please, add journaling, and save
it as a jpg. Then update your desktop wallpaper background by browsing
to your new image! Voilà! Favorite photos matched
with this month's calendar to help keep you up-to-date all month! Look
for a new one each month in our newsletter!
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the top)
Newsletter
Challenge
We
are always
striving to make our newsletter more interesting and useful. If you
have an idea, let us know about it! If it's an article idea, a feature,
even something you'd like to write, shout it out to us. So, put your
thinking caps on and come up with some new features, article ideas, or
something fun you'd like to see in our monthly newsletter. Then email
it to comments@dsplace.com.
(Please type "Newsletter IDEA" in the subject line of your email.) We
can't wait to see your ideas!
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Newsletter
Freebie
Exclusively
for
our newsletter readers, Senior Designer, Teresa Loman has created
this charming Plopper. Choose
200ppi
or
300ppi!
Thanks
so
much, Teresa!
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to the top)
Many
thanks to the newsletter Team:
Fran, Kim, Lauren, Lynnette, Mandy, Margie,
Mars, Teresa and
Chris.
If
you're not a registered member of our site why not Join Now!
All new members receive a FREE GIFT. Feel free to pass this on to your
friends!
You
are
receiving this email
because you signed up to receive it at www.digitalscrapbookplace.com.
You can subscribe or UN-subscribe from this newsletter on our site.
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