So you’ve just gotten married and taken
a honeymoon and now have 100s of photos to scrap. Or you want
to create an album for each of your children or grandchildren
and have a deadline of a birthday or Christmas. Or you want to
create a special album for a loved one or any other myriad of
topics for an album. AND you want to do it fast, but have it look
great.
Here are some ideas that will help you create
beautiful pages in a short amount of time:
1. Use mini album kits
2. Use a mega kit or a couple of coordinating kits
3. Choose three coordinating fonts from different font styles
(Script, Decorative, Handwriting, Stamp, Serif, Sans Serif, Modern
and Old Style) and use only those when journaling or titling
4. Use word art for titling
Let’s talk about mini album kits first.
At DSP there are two sizes of mini albums, 4x6 and 8x8. Pages
are also in two formats: png or jpg. A png page is a Plopper ™
and you merely plop your photo under the page and resize as needed.
Add text and save and you are all done. A jpg page allow you the
choice of photo placement, as the photo is layered on top of the
background. Mini album kits are great for new scrappers who want
to create beautiful pages but don’t have the know-how and
for veterans who want to create an album but not have it take
a long time. Essentially the designer does the hard work of creating
the composition and interest of the layout for you.
Mega kits are useful in creating themed albums
like ABC albums, baby albums, wedding albums, travel albums, etc.
DSP has mega kits for all of these themes, plus many, many more.
The reason a mega kit is so fast to use is that all of the elements
you need are in one kit and the design of the album is very cohesive.
To go even faster, create two page spreads like
this: Do one page of the two page spread, then duplicate the page,
delete the photos and journaling, but keep the same backgrounds
and elements. Add new photos and rearrange the elements to coordinate
with the other page. Very fast and easy second page!
If you already have a DSP kit, look in the store
for Add-On (Extras) packs. A page kit and one or two extras packs
make a mega kit. Many popular page kits also have coordinating
mini albums! I love using a mini album and page kit together to
reuse pages from the mini album kit but change them a little with
elements from the coordinating kit.
Font choices are important before you get started.
Text can add or detract from a layout, and choosing fonts and
creating titles and journaling are the most time-consuming part
of a layout for me. When I do use a mini album kit or mega kit,
I choose three fonts to use and three colors (light, medium and
dark). I add the colors to my materials palette for easier access
and then only use those fonts and colors in the album. Having
the choices before I get started saves time later. Examples of
my favorite font choices:
• Stamped font, handwriting font, script font
• Script font, sans serif font (Century Gothic) and serif
font (typewriter font)
Word art is a fast and easy way to add pizzazz
to your album. Interesting and beautiful titling is a skill to
master, and even then it’s time-consuming. I use word art
to add visual interest and a wow factor to my albums. Sometimes
a mega kit comes with word art (example is the Inkster ABC Mega
kit by Suzanne C. Walker) and sometimes I use word art from the
DSP store (my favorites are Scraps of Words Children and Family)
with a mini album kit.
Mini albums or mega kits, along with preselected
fonts and word art help new and veteran scrappers scrap lots of
photos in a short amount of time and with designer flair.
© Stacey Jewell Stahl October,
2005
