Beth here…two days in a row! Anyone who has seen our gallery knows I LOVE making cards…any holiday, any occasion, any reason, and I’ll make a card. Here’s one I recently made for a friend who is going through some tough stuff.
Normally I make hybrid cards, adding a bit of stamping and textural elements to my digital creation after printing. However, you can make them completely digitally and then print or e-mail to the recipient. Easy, quick…thoughtful!
Over the years I’ve worked out a system that works well for me (w/Photoshop Elements):
- In image editor create a new image the size of the front of the card (File>New>Blank File>enter size options). My preferred sizes range from 4.25″ x 5.5″ to 5″ x 7″ at 300 dpi.
- Create a layered, digital collage like any digital scrapbook layout and print on white cardstock. I often will flatten and print 2 card fronts on one 8.5″x11″ piece of white cardstock.
- Using a paper trimmer, trim edges and mount with adhesive on folded blank cardstock in a coordinating color.
Specific steps for the card above:
- Using the “Together” paper from Nature’s Sketchbook 4 Papers as my base, I layered paper #15 from Nature’s Sketchbook 3 Papers on top.
- I added Photo Art blend #12 (from set no. 1) behind journal #3 (from Nature’s Sketchbook Journals 5) and used a luminosity blend mode and a grunge eraser brush to erase unwanted portions of photo blend.
- Using a photograph of a bleeding heart flower, I layered this on the left side of journal, enlarged it to fit the page and erased extra edges. Opacity of the photo was set to 75%.
- I then layered the elements on top, duplicating the small bleeding heart and small heart from Build-an-Element 1 with a luminosity blend mode.
- I did the same with the two hearts on the right side
- Enter journaling using Type Tool. Place each line on another layer if special spacing is needed, such as putting “heart” on top of paper hearts.
Below are a few recent favorites…more cards and techniques from the team can be seen in our card-making gallery here
