Digital Framed Art

When I saw the collage stamp in March's Trees Digital Kit, I knew that I wanted to create some art suitable for framing. You can do something similar with the actual rubber stamp and gelatos, ink, or watercolor pencils, but creating this digitally lets you make it in different sizes. I'm making mine roughly 8 x 10 - a nice size for a home decor project, but it can also be resized to fit on the front of a card!

1. Create a new document; give it a white background.

2. Drag the collage stamp image onto it and resize as needed.

the collage stamp

3. Command+Click (Mac OS) or CTRL+Click (Windows) on the thumbnail in the Layers Palette. You'll see 'marching ants' around the stamp image.

4. Click the eye icon in the Layers Palette to hide the stamp image.

'marching ants'

5. Create a new layer.

6. Select a round fuzzy-edged brush and a color of your choice and start coloring the image - only the areas within the 'marching ants' will change color.

start coloring

7. Switch colors as needed to complete the image.

add more colors

Tip: Create a new layer for each color - this allows you to delete a layer that you don't like and also lets you play with opacity for each layer to help refine your finished art.

8. Once finished, Command+D (Mac OS) or CTRL+D (Windows) will stop the 'marching ants.'

9. Add additional elements for added interest: a background layer, a stamp image or two, a matted sentiment and fiber, for example.

finish with a background, sentiment, stamps & fiber

Print out your creation and frame it. Hang it on a wall or give it as a gift. Resize it to fit on the front of a card, print it out, matte it and adhere it to a card base.

Bonus idea
After Step 3 above, Shift+Command+I (Mac OS) or Shift+CTRL+I (Windows) will inverse your selection, so that when you color the image, you'll be coloring the background and the image will remain clear. This results in a 'stencil-like' effect.

stencil technique

I hope you'll try these ideas and make your own framed art or cards.

Until next time, thanks for stopping by,

- Ron

Creating Digital Art

Happy Thursday and Happy October!

Have you seen this month’s kit, Lock and Key? Wowza, it’s spectacular! I was reading throughout this month’s Scrap Rap on Tuesday and literally gasped when I saw the book on page four. My first thought was “Wouldn’t that cover make a great piece of framed art?”

But what if we did this digitally? (C’mon, you knew that was coming, right?) Then we could make it any size we wanted!

So, this is how you can do what I did . . .

1. Create a 6”x6” document in Photoshop.

2. Open the following backgrounds from the Lock and Key Digital Kit and drag them onto your new document. Resize as indicated.

Background.....................Size
Turquoise plain.................6x6
Brown patterned...............5.75x5.75
Dark Brown patterned......5x5
Cream plain......................4.5x4.5

Tip: if you hold the Shift key when you drag the background, it will stay centered in the new document. Also, hold the Shift key when resizing to maintain the proportion of the background.

3. Add a bevel to all layers except the turquoise. Use the settings I outlined in step 8 last week (click HERE to see last week’s blog). You can also add a drop shadow each of the layers, if desired.

4. Open the stamp graphic and drag it onto the left side of the cream layer; resize as needed.

5. Open one of the keys and drag it only the right side of the cream layer; resize as needed.

6. Recolor the key - from the Image menu, choose Adjustments -> Hue/Saturation (or Ctrl+U on Windows, Command+U on Mac). This will give it a warm brass color. Add a drop shadow.

Click 'Colorize' before adjusting the Hue, Saturation, & Lightness

7. Add the twine that ties down the key. I used Xtra08 from the Welcome kit (April, 2011).

8. Select the cream layer and then click the new layer button, This will create a new layer UNDER the stamp image.

9. Use the eyedropper tool to select a turquoise color from the turquoise background.

10. Select a fuzzy round brush and make is small (~25 pixels). Also lower the opacity (~45%) and begin to ‘color’ the image. Increase the size of the brush once you’ve colored in all of the small areas.

Tip: Don’t worry about being perfect or too precise - a few blank areas give it a more natural look.

11. Repeat steps 7-9, choose a burnt orange color and color the area outside the emblem area.

12. Print it out - photo paper would probably be best for something like this - and frame it.

Quick, easy, and beautiful art.

Now go make one of your own and hang it on a wall or give it as a gift.

See you next week!

-Ron

Digital Doorways

Happy Thursday, faithful readers! I don't know about you, but I'm having lots of fun with this month's Random Doorways Digital kit! (But then, if you know about my obsession with love of doors, this doesn't surprise you!)

I was thinking about making some digital layouts with some of my door photos (yeah, I've got quite a few door layouts already, but most of those are paper layouts and they don't use this fantastic kit!), but I decided that I didn't want a 'typical' layout, I wanted something different, artsy even. Something that might be suitable for framing that could hang in my home somewhere.

So, I opened a new scrapbook page in Photoshop and started playing. Truthfully, my first few attempts were pretty bad - sometimes, it takes me a little while to get into a creative groove, especially when I'm experimenting with 'artsiness' as I go! But the cool thing about digital is that I never run out of supplies, so it really doesn't matter how many times I have to start! Really, this is one of my most favorite things about digital crafting!

Then, an idea popped into my head - 9 squares, like a patchwork - let's see if that would work…

I used the guidelines in Photoshop to draw horizontal and vertical lines at 4 and 8 inches. Then I opened all the Random Doorways backgrounds and added them, as 4 inch squares, to the layout, like a patchwork - I didn't use the 2 backgrounds that look like corrugated cardboard - I like them a whole lot, but they didn't really work so well with this layout, so I had to use one of the backgrounds twice (but I recolored it and rotated it the 2nd time so that it would be a bit different (another really cool benefit of digi!)

Here's what I ended up with as my 'starting' canvas:

A 9-Patch of backgrounds to start off.

Next up, I searched thorough some of my door photos and picked a few of my favorites, added them onto my layout and resized and cropped so that each one fit in a square. Here's the first one in position, so that you get the idea:

Now we add photos over each background.

Once they were all in place, I started applying layer styles to the photos - this requires a bit of experimenting, since some layer styles work better than others, depending on the patterns and colors in the parts that you're working on. But after a few minutes, I had something that I liked:

Now let's apply some layer styles; play until you're happy!

Last step, I wanted to add a title of sorts, but still keep that artsy, funky feel. I decided on the 2 different fonts for this kit, in white, on the 2 red squares - the white showed up best on them. I decided that I would rasterize the text layers (um, in non-geek-speak, that means to convert them from text to graphics so that I can do a few other things to them) and hit them with a couple of spatter brushes in eraser mode to distress the text just a wee bit.

And here's my finished layout:

Add a title and you're done!

What do you think? It's not your typical layout, and I know that it won't appeal to everyone, but it really is what I was going for, and I'm quite happy with it. In fact, my plan is to print this out and frame it!

Until next time, go and create something wonderful - and don't be afraid to experiment or try something new - you never know what you might come up with

POP! Goes the Wreath

Happy Monday from Karen!

When member and Guest Blogger, Annette Dragon, shared this project with me, I couldn't WAIT to share it with you. My mind is spinning with ideas already...I hope this project inspires you, too!

***For blog readers who don't know what a POP is: It stands for "Pound of Paper". Club Scrap sells half pounds of paper from each monthly collection...the pieces range from 1x4 to 5x7 in size, and are great for projects, like this, when you don't want to cut into full size sheets of paper.

POP Paper Wreath Tutorial

by Annette Dragon

Supplies needed:

POPs - about 70 (larger pieces from 4x6 to 5x7" in size)

Corrugated cardboard - about 6 inches square

Ribbon - 20 inches (1/2 meter)

Hot glue gun 
Craft glue or glue stick
Scissors
Ball ornaments (or other decorative element for center of wreath)
Compass - optional

Instructions: 
Gather POPs in coordinating colors.

Roll a single POP into a cone shape. Staple the end approximately 3/4 inch (2 cm) from the tip. Repeat with remaining pieces for a total of about 70.

Trim the cardboard corners to make a circle (or you can just leave it square). Use compass to draw two evenly spaced circles in the center of the cardboard piece as guidelines for the two layers of cones.

If your wreath will be hung where the cardboard backing can be seen (i.e. through a glass door or window), cover the cardboard backing by gluing on extra POP pieces.

Attach the hanging ribbon/bow to the top back of the cardboard. Trim ends with scissors. 

With stapled tips facing toward the center, hot glue one cone each at the North, South, East, and West points along the outermost drawn circle. Continue gluing cones to fill in the spaces until the outer layer is complete.

Repeat step 5 for the second layer using the innermost circle as a guide. 

Arrange and hot glue colored balls at the center.

That's it - hang and enjoy all season long!

This project can be designed to go with any home's decor, and can be adapted for almost any size. I hope you enjoy giving the wreath a try!