Showing posts with label Inspiration. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Inspiration. Show all posts

Friday, February 25, 2011

Inspiration

Hey my friends! I hope you are all doing well and carving out some time to create! :) Here are some layouts I have worked on recently.


"Snow Jumping" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


"My Cup of Tea" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


"First Snowman" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


    "The Story" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


      "Shutterbug" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


        "Mother & Daughter Time" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


          "Bowling" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


            "Pedal Cart Racing" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


              "Crazy Hair Day" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:




              "Four Years Old" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:



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              Thursday, January 20, 2011

              Project Joy 365 - Layout 2

              I am still having so much fun with this project! It has been a great couple weeks, filled with lots of photos, fun and laughter.

              We have found JOY in:
              • Lincoln Logs
              • Experimenting in the kitchen
              • Leaving notes of inspiration
              • Laughing out loud watching Wipeout
              • Reading books
              • Playdates with friends
              • Balloons
              • Silly pets
              • and so much more!
              Here is my second layout for January. I have decided to call my spreads 'Part One', 'Part Two', etc., since I don't know how many pages or photos I will end up with each month. My photo numbers do not correspond to dates, but rather just give the reader a match between the journaling and the photos for that spread.

              "2011 - January - Part Two" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:




              I made these pages into some more Quick Start freebies for you! EnJOY!!


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              Wednesday, December 15, 2010

              Inspiration

              Hey my friends! I hope you are doing well and enjoying your Holiday season! :) We have been having so much fun with our North Pole visitors! They sure do keep us in the Holiday spirit!

              Here is some recent CT work I have done. I hope you are finding some time to scrap amidst the craziness that Christmas can sometimes bring!!


              "Not Ready to Party" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:



              "Ellie & Heather" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:



              "Life Light Up" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:



              "Happiness Is" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


              "Loves Birds" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


              "Let It Snow" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


              "Christmas Tree" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:



              "First Eggs" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:



              "Snow Beautiful" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


              "How to eat a Bagel" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:


              May your day be blessed! :)
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              Tuesday, December 7, 2010

              Project Joy 365 - Inspiration

              I can do nothing but laugh in amazement at the inspiration God puts in my path as I embark on this JOY journey. Check out this recent post from a site called 'A Holy Experience'. She has eloquently put into words so much of what has been in my mind and heart as I have been putting together my plans for Project Joy 365.

              10 Point Manifesto for Joyful Parenting

              May your day be filled with JOY!!
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              Monday, November 1, 2010

              CT Inspiration and a freebie

              Hello scrappers! I hope life is treating you well and there were no tricks in your life this past weekend! :) Just a quick post today with some recent CT stuff and a fun freebie for you!!

              Owl Tree Studio has some fabulous goodies in it's November line-up. Here are the pages I made for this month:


              "So You" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:

                "Memories" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:

                Jennifer has also been working on some fabulous products. Here is a layout from her most recent collection - Red Red Wine:


                  "Cherish The Moments" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:

                  And of course, I haven't forgot the freebie!! Jennifer designed a great collection a couple of months ago called Cherish. I made a fun cluster freebie for you from this great collection!!


                  "Sisters Friends" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:





                  Enjoy! Have a fantastic day!! :)
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                  Thursday, September 30, 2010

                  Staying Upadated and New Freebies

                  Hey my friends! I hope this post finds you happy and well! I wanted to make you aware of something I discovered the other day. Maybe you are all way ahead of me and know this already, but thought I would share for those of us that are in the dark!!

                  I recently realized that pages I 'liked' on facebook have not been showing up in my news feed. I did some searching around and found out my account, by default, was set to only show 200 friends and 'likes' in my feed! This makes no sense to me? Why would I add a friend or page if I didn't want to see them in my feed? Guess it will be one of those facebook mysteries! The other thing it made me realize is that many of you following the SpeedScraps page may not be getting updates either.

                  To fix the problem, go to the bottom of your facebook page and click 'edit options' (lower right) and set the 'maximum friends allowed in feed' to a higher number. It appears that 9999 is the max. I think the critical thing is to make sure the number you choose exceeds your number of friends plus the number of pages you 'like'.

                  Another way for you to make sure you know when there are new blog posts here at SpeedScraps is to add your email address to my 'updates'. You can find this option on the right hand side, at the bottom of the information there. It says 'receive email updates' and has a spot for you to enter your email address. This adds you to a google group I created. As part of that grou you simply get an email each time I make a blog post - nothing more - no spam or anything!!

                  Before I get to the great freebies I have today, I want to say that this is the last time I will be posting my freebies at DigiScrapDepot. So, if that's how you arrived here, you may want to 'like' SpeedScraps on facebook or add your email address if you want to continue to be notified of what's going on around here. DigiScrapDepot is a wonderful site, I have not had any problems there and it has been a great resource for bringing people to SpeedScraps. I am just in a process of trying to 'simplify' my own life and eliminate the extra work that is involved in bringing you some great freebies.

                  So, what do I have for you today? Something I think is really fun! I have created something I call 'Quick Starts'. The concept behind these collages is that they are a bit more than a sketch, but not quite a layered template. Each file is a png that can be used to create a very simple, yet stunning layout or can be used as a starting point for a more involved, embellished layout. Each set contains 20 cohesive collages. They can be used individually for a single layout, put two together to make a two page spread, or use the whole set to quickly and easily create a beautiful album!!

                  Here is Set 1:


                  And some inspiration:


                  "Cereal Box Fairies" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:
                  "Play (Little Miss Independent)" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:

                  And Set 2:


                  And some more inspiration:

                  "Everything Beautiful" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:
                  "Park Play" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:

                  Download Quick Start Collages 1

                  Download Quick Start Collages 2

                  Stay tuned in the week to come! I will post some tips and tricks for using these quickly and easily in PS and PSE!!

                  Have a great day! :) I would love to see what you create with these!
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                  Thursday, July 22, 2010

                  Layout Anatomy - Session 4


                  This photo brings back such happy thoughts from our recent vacation. We drove about 3 miles down this dirt road, looking for a geocache, only to find out it was a dead end. When we turned around to drive back out, there were literally thousands of small yellow butterflies along side of the road. They were not there on our drive in. The girls got out and had fun chasing them and trying to catch them (with no luck).

                  Photo Notes: A subtle vignette goes a long way in adding depth and focus to a photo.

                  Here is my photo, using the exact same edits, except the one on the right has a vignette added (in Lightroom). The vignette deepens the color tones in the photo and also helps draw your eye to the subject.


                  Layout Notes: Use clustering wisely on layouts to create a sense of balance.

                  A layout is a bit like a teeter totter. If you place too much on one side or part of the layout, it can feel a bit out of balance. On this layout, the cluster in the upper right corner nicely balances the title and photo cluster in the lower left corner.

                  "Chasing Butterflies" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:
                  Have a great day! Thanks for stopping by! :)
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                  Wednesday, July 7, 2010

                  Layout Anatomy - Session 3

                  Hello scrappers! I hope you are all doing well! I have just returned from a fun filled family vacation and am ready to get the creative juices flowing again! I was so happy to see some of you using the Woodland Cottage collection while I was away. If you have made a layout, please share it on the SpeedScraps facebook page...I love seeing what you create!

                  Now for a bit of layout anatomy. If you are new here, you can find the original Layout Anatomy post here. It tells a bit about my thoughts and purposes of the layout anatomy posts.


                  This is one of my favorite photos I have ever taken. It is at the beach in Holland Michigan, where I grew up, and contains some subjects that are pretty special to me. :)

                  Photo Notes: Don't be afraid to get down and get dirty.

                  When I took this shot, I was crouching down as far as I could go, without sitting or laying down in the sand. When I came home and opened the photo for editing, I realized the silhouette of my husband and daughter was chopped off at the knees because my position was too high. Had I laid down on my stomach, I think it would have changed my perspective enough that most of their legs would have been in the silhouette.

                  I was able to somewhat rescue their silhouettes by using the dodge tool in Photoshop and slightly lightening the sand behind my husband and daughter.


                  Layout Notes: When your viewer looks at a layout, they often 'read' it like they would a book. The eye tends to move from the upper left corner of the page then down to the lower right.


                  With this in mind, I chose to put my title in the upper left corner and my other design element, the date code, in the lower right. As the eye travels from the title to the date code, it now passes right across the subject of my photo.

                  Have a blessed day!

                  "First Sunset" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:
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                  Wednesday, June 9, 2010

                  Layout Anatomy - Session 2


                  If you missed my first Layout Anatomy post, you can find it here. It explains a bit about my intentions of these posts! :)

                  My friend Chanell at the Instinctive Scrapper created a free kit that she is giving away! In honor of her first creation, I thought I would make a layout with it! My favorite part of the collection has to be the great alpha and the word art Chanell made from it. So, I started with that as my inspiration.

                  The quote she used reminded me of this tiny little bouquet that Regan had made for me earlier in the spring. I had purposely snapped a couple pictures of it to create a layout.

                  Photo Notes: Break free from the habit of centering all the subjects of your photos. Off center photos can create a more interesting feel. They also leave you with a great place for some journaling or word art when making scrapbooking pages.

                  Ali Edwards shares shares some great tips for this here.


                  Layout Notes: For help with placement of items on your layout, turn on your grids. In Photoshop, the shortcut key is Ctrl ' (single quote). In PSE, go to View>Grid.

                  In each program, you can adjust the number and spacing of the lines that appear in the grid using Edit>Preferences>Guides, Grid & Slices (or just Grid for PSE). In the preferences dialog, there is a field 'Gridline Every'. If you set the value to 33.33 and change the measurement to percent, your grid will give you a great 'rule of thirds' overlay, no matter what your document size.



                  Where the heavier gridlines intersect, highlighted with black circles here, are the main points of focus for the page. Putting items of interest at or near these intersections is one way to make sure the viewers eye is drawn to the most important part(s) of your page.


                  For my layout, I placed my flowers at one intersection, or sweet spot, and then followed the same horizontal line to place the top row of my word art.

                  Have a great day! :)

                  "Sweet Simple Things" digital scrapbook layout by Christy VanderWall uses:
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                  Wednesday, May 12, 2010

                  Layout Anatomy

                  Anatomy \A*nat"o*my\, noun; pl. {Anatomies}. [F. anatomie, L. anatomia, Gr. ? dissection, fr. ? to cut up; ? + ? to cut.] The act of dividing anything, corporeal or intellectual, for the purpose of examining its parts; analysis;

                  Welcome to my first session of Layout Anatomy! This feature of the blog will, hopefully, give you some tips and tricks for making layouts that you love. It won't be a complete dissection of every layout, but a brief tip or two about the creation of a given layout. I will also try to include some photography tidbits in these postings as well.

                  Disclaimer:                   I am of the mindset that there is no 'right' or 'wrong' when it comes to making layouts. So the things I share here are not 'rules' on how to make a great layout, they are just little glimpses inside my mind as I create a layout. I believe in the sentiment 'do what you love and love what you do'. I have learned, however, that some people know what they love when they see it on other peoples layouts, but struggle when it comes to making their own layouts. So, my hope is to help you in your own journey to making layouts that you love.


                  Photo Notes: Take notice of not only your subject, but the surroundings and background as well. Sometimes simple changes in your position or zoom can mean less editing later.

                  When I first started taking photos of my daughter splashing in the puddle, part of our playground area was in the frame of the photo (left). This would have been distracting later, if I had decided to use the uncropped photo on a layout. It could be cropped or cloned out in Photoshop, but instead, I took two steps to the left, changing the angle from which I was shooting, and zoomed in a bit more. This removed the distraction from the rest of the photos (right).


                  Layout Notes: When picking color schemes or style for a layout, look at photo details for inspiration.

                  If I had to pick color schemes by simply looking through my supply stash, I don't think I would ever get any layouts done, as I would find myself overwhelmed by the choices. My typical inspiration for colors comes directly from my photos. In this case, the only thing that had a lot of color, besides the greens in the trees, was my daughters rain boots. Not only did they inspire me with their colors, but the whimsy, doodled circles inspired the style of my layout as well.


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