What's covered in this section:

* What Exactly is Digital Scrapbooking?

* Digital Scrapbooking Resources

* About the Fonts

* Selecting Scrapbooking Software

WHAT EXACTLY IS DIGITAL SCRAPBOOKING?

The term "digital" seemed so foreign to me at first. I saw the layouts online and loved what I saw! In some of the layouts, the children had wings. In others, the images were blended into the background. I adored paper scrapbooking (and still do!) but wondered, "Just exactly how are these ladies doing this?"

That was around the beginning of 2006, and I was playing with graphics on a Yahoo group board. I was playing with Photoshop Elements 2.0 (just 'cause that's what I had) and creating simple graphics and with inserting and linking them to different parts of the web. I'm crazy, but I actually ENJOY the challenge of it! I didn't realize at the time that I was actually teaching myself to scrapbook digitally, too.

So what is meant by "digitally" scrapbooking? Simply layering digital images together (yep!, just like paper) together and "gluing" them together by saving the layered stack as a single file. Sounds easy, huh? Well, it is...once you have taught yourself to get around in your graphics program. That's the worst part...learning whatever software you might be using or would want to use.

And the best part?? You can easily "undo" any mistakes, and they're history! Now try that with real scissors and glue!

Above is an example of layering digital graphics to create a scrapbook page. This page was created by layering the 6 items shown:

* journaling (type)

* staple

* postcard

* photo

* background "paper" (which is simply an enlarged photo)

To create the background paper, I enlarged a photo to 12" in height, cropped it to 12" in width, and adjusted its opacity to 50%.

I layered the smaller photo over the background and then layered the postcard over the smaller photo. I then layered 2 staples, one over the smaller photo and one over the postcard, and then typed the journaling as the top layer. I applied shadowing for realism and then saved the file as a .jpg, which merges the layers together and creates one large digital photograph.

Above is another example of layering graphics to create a page. This page was created by layering in the same way as the previous page, layering the 7 items shown:

* journaling (type)

* button

* tag

* 2 tags

* photo ("cut" out using a mask)

* background paper

I first enlarged the photo to 12" wide and used a photo mask to "cut" the photo to the shape of the mask, leaving the underlying paper to show through. (Using a photo mask will be covered in another lesson). I then layered the photo over the background paper, layered a tag on the left, layered another tag on the right, and layered a third tag in the center. I then layered a button over the paper and then typed the journaling as the top layer. I applied shadowing for realism and then again saved the file as a .jpg, merging the layers together.

Please feel free to view the lessons here at your own pace. In the next lesson, we'll discuss several digital scrapbooking resources.

DIGITAL SCRAPBOOKING RESOURCES

There are many great resources online which I'd like to mention here.

Scrap Girls www.scrapgirls.com offers the free e-book 15 Things You Need to Know to Become a Great Digital Scrapbooker and free downloads featuring samples of their products.

DigiScrapDepot www.digiscrapdepot.com offers tons of "freebies," or free downloads from many various designers. You'll find lots of wonderful graphics there. Also, Free Digital Scrapbooking www.freedigitalscrapbooking.com has many "freebies" to download.

The gallery at Digi Shop Talk www.digishoptalk.com is just wonderful to browse. It must be the largest online gallery, and if you can't find inspiration there, you must have your eyes closed!

You'll also find lots of ideas and tutorials at Digital Scrapbooking Magazine www.digitalscrapbooking.com, which is now no longer in print but offered online only (which makes me sad! It was my favorite!) You can sign up to automatically receive their newsletters if you'd like.

There are several wonderful tutorials and free downloads on Jessica Sprague's website www.jessicasprague.com. This is a wonderful site!

ABOUT THE FONTS

There are fonts to match every mood, theme, situation...you name it! And the majority of them are free! Some great sites to browse are DaFont www.dafont.com, Font Space www.fontspace.com, Scrap Village www.scrapvillage.com (click on the Library link and then Fonts), 1001 Free Fonts www.1001freefonts.com and Urban Fonts www.urbanfonts.com, to name a few. There are so many neat fonts I believe you could use a different font for each layout you make and never use two of 'em twice!

There are many more great sites on the 'net; those I've mentioned here are a sampling to get you started. In the next lesson, we'll discuss different types of software.

SELECTING SCRAPBOOKING SOFTWARE

There seems to be as many programs for digital scrapbooking as there are stars in the night sky! Just Google "scrapbooking software" and see the results...whoo!

I've seen several programs mentioned, but the most widely used I think would be the different software packages from Adobe. They make both Photoshop and Photoshop Elements (on message boards, you'll see these written as PS and PSE).

Adobe's Photoshop (PS) is a professional graphic designer program www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/photoshop/. I've always used the easier software from Adobe, Photoshop Elements www.adobe.com/products/photoshopelwin/. My understanding is that they call it "elements" because it features graphics "recipes." What takes several steps (and the knowledge to know what you're doing!) in PS has been set up to take only one step in PSE. I've used PSE version 2.0 and then purchased 5.0 but still go back to 2.0 'cause I like it so much! Adobe has just come out with version 7.0, which you can purchase for $79 with a $20 rebate now through amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-65026616-Photoshop-Elements-7/dp/B001DMBWXS. All in all, PS and PSE are good for designing digital products as well as scrapbooking. If you're not interested in creating graphics, you may not want to invest the money or time (headaches?!) in this software. If you are considering PSE and would like to investigate more, I just found a good reference manual online for version 2.0: http://www.photocourse.com/download/PSE2-samples.pdf.

I also have Jasc Paint Shop Pro 9.0 (which I purchased when version 11.0 was just coming out). PSP (as you will see it written) is not near as user friendly as PSE. I've had a hard time trying to figure out all the bells and whistles of 9.0 but purchased it because it's very popular with a few designers over Corel's versions of PSP. (Corel bought PSP from Jasc, and everyone says that Corel's versions are not nearly as good as Jasc's.) It is quite an intense program, and I use it for adding textures, etc. The manual that came with the software is about 2" thick, and perhaps someday I'll sit down and learn the software! To be honest, I wouldn't recommend spending the money for PSP to anyone.

Scrapbook Max www.scrapbookmax.com is another popular program ($40) I've seen mentioned a lot. Its popularity comes from the free trial and online tutorials, plus there is a helpful forum where you can ask questions. Acdsee www.acdsee.com/offers/acdsee10pe also seems popular and also offers a free trial ($30).

Other digital scrapbooking software includes Memory Mixer www.memorymixer.com, Ulead's My Scrapbook http://www.ulead.com/mse, Photomix www.photomix.com and Lumapix's FotoFusion www.lumapix.com or www.scrapbook.com/lumapix for a free trial.

You can even download free software! Scrapbook Flair www.scrapbookflairsoftware.com or www.scrapbookflair.com is a free program to download with a community to support it!

You may have software on your computer right now which you can use to scrapbook. Most photo-editing programs should be able to work with layers. If you already have software like this, you're in business!

Choosing the program that is right for you is a hard decision to make, that's for sure. The good news is that most of them work with the same types of commands.

Questions or comments? Please email me at sondra @ sondra-scraps.com, and I'd be happy to help!

In Tutorial 2, we'll talk about the main program commands necessary to get started.