Karla Dudley « Creativity Prompt

Posts Tagged ‘Karla Dudley’

Park Adventures And How To Use Fonts As Die Cuts

Wednesday, September 1st, 2010

[Fonts: Impact and Adler; Digital Kit: KD Crush by Karla Dudley.]

As a scrapbooker, or a memory archiver, I find myself doing things I would never imagine doing, just for the sake of collecting visual memories.

This layout is a wonderful example of such irrational behavior.

The pictures in the layout were taken with a regular 55mm lens – no tele lens, no zoom – I was standing right in front of the huge bear.

Gladly, I caught Mr. bear on a good day…
(I hope he isn’t traumatized by the insane human who ran after him with a camera)

How To Create Digital Letter Die Cuts

In this layout I used Karla Dudley’s newest digital kit, “KD Crush”, which will be available tomorrow at the Digichic online store. The kit is based on a natural color palette, just in time for fall and includes beautiful papers, brushes and elements (including an alpha set).

However, I used it a bit differently by masking the patterned paper to a regular true type font.

Here is how I made the title for my layout above:

Choose any font, preferably a dominant one, such as “Impact” to give room for the digital patterned paper.
Type down your title, each word separately to allow maximum control over its position.
Decide what is the FINAL position and size of each letter in the title.
Simplify all the title layers (by right clicking on each layer and selecting “simplify”).
Merge the layers together (just select all the relevant layer and then right click on your selection and opt for “merge layers”. To select a couple layers together press the CTR or CMD key while clicking on the layers).
Insert any patterned paper and make sure its layer is directly above the title layer.
Mask the two layers together by pressing “CTR+G” or “CMD+G”.
You may now merge the 2 layers together to add a drop shadow or leave it as is.

Have you ever acted out of character just to take a picture or preserve a memory? Please share your story by leaving a comment here.

Check out Creativity Prompt’s new and unique self paced workshop: “Welcome Little One”. This workshop will provide you with everything you need, and then some, to make a fabulous handmade mini album to record the first moments of a new born baby.

Tags: Digital Scrapbooking, DT, Karla Dudley, photoshop, Tutorial
Posted in creativity prompt, Tutorial | 2 Comments »

A Visit From Home

Thursday, August 19th, 2010

[Digital Kit: KD Rousti by Karla Dudley.]

My mom and dad have flown 7,528 miles to visit me in California.

Both their main flight and in-land connection flight were 3 hour late. Each.

I was sooooo excited to meet them here at last so I can show them around and speak to them.
So when we picked them up at the airport at 1 a.m. last week, I was ecstatic.

My parents are currently staying at our place and I try to do my best in hosting them but it is definitely a challenge.

I am hopeful that when they leave they will return home happy and with the understanding that I did my best to keep them entertained, happy as well as healthy… Or in other words, they will know everything I do – even the stupidest thing – is done with the best intentions.

Therefore I will be less available during the next few weeks and there will probably be less posts up – but stay tuned because I have awesome things coming up on September.

I’d love to get your advise on how to entertain my loved and loving guests without becoming overwhelmed (and insane)… Please leave a comment and help me 🙂

P.S.

The layout I made was created with Karla Dudley’s newest release: KD Rousti. Check out the kit, it’s AWESOME!!! The photos were taken with my parents’ point and shoot camera at Point Lobos, CA.

Tags: Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, family, Karla Dudley, parents, Personal Notes
Posted in Design Team, Personal Notes | 2 Comments »

Employ Your Sense of Humor – Journaling Prompt

Monday, June 14th, 2010

[Font: VT Portable Remington; Digital Kits: KD Sun Kissed (background paper + frame), KD Handwritten Summer (accent brush), KD Stamp Alpha (title), KD Digi Essentials (stitches) – all by Karla Dudley.]

As far as journaling is concerned stop being so serious about it. Not every story has to be a masterpiece worthy of a Pulitzer prize.

Your sense of humor is also a part you would probably like to preserve for posterity.

Humor is especially called for in layouts featuring photos you took to capture a moment in life, rather than an actual story, a piece rather than the whole. When you look at your layouts you can remind yourself of that humorous moment or silly piece of life and read your journaling and have a good laugh.

After all, what more can you ask from a layout than making you feel better at time of distress?

My journaling reads:

The first step to a successful recovery is admitting you have a problem. I admit no such thing! I have absolutely no problem. It is completely reasonable to have a shoe to match every piece of clothing you own. It is totally natural to covet each shoe you see and do not already possess. It is purely logical to assume that painting your toe nails and wearing high heal studded shoes is enough to be considered fully clothed. It is customary to wear red open toe 5 inch heal and a patent leather flower to go grocery shopping, oh and it is totally acceptable to wear flip flops to negotiation meetings. All shoes are created equal. Yes. I do not have any problem!
April 2010

Digi Tip

To create the “stitched” strike-through line over the word ‘addiction’ in my title I used various pieces of the stitches image. All I did was to select a piece of the image with the rectangular selection tool and than with the move tool, to pick up the selected piece and lay it down on the title, next to the original image, slightly down. Than I used the move tool to nudge it sideways and repeated the process with another piece of the image. That gives the illusion of the sewing machine running back and forth. Sort of…

Do you use humor or sarcasm in your layouts? How? Please share with me and leave a comment.

Check out Creativity Prompt’s self paced workshop: “Capture Your Dream”. In this workshop you will capture, follow and make your dream come true as well as document your journey in a fabulous mixed media mini album.

Tags: Digital Brushes, Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, DT, humor, Journaling Prompt, Karla Dudley, scrapbook layout
Posted in Journaling Prompt | 2 Comments »

Give Yourself Permission To Live Out Loud

Thursday, June 10th, 2010

[Font:Adler; Digital Kits: KD Sun Kissed (patterned paper and accent flowers), KD Digi Essentials (stitches), KD Digi Essentials (alpha brushes) – all by Karla Dudley.]

Today I ask you to please:

Give yourself permission to reach for the rainbow.
Give yourself permission to dream big and aspire to make all your dreams come true.
Give yourself permission to climb mountains and run marathons and lie by the beach with a book.
Give yourself permission to love truly and unconditionally and utterly.
Give yourself permission to be loved, appreciated and even admired.
Give yourself permission to laugh until you are in tears.
Give yourself permission to cry your heart out and go through an entire box of tissues.
Give yourself permission to wear nice clothes, wear make up and do your hair, even if you stay at home.
Give yourself permission to go to work in your flip flops, no make up and feel beautiful.
Give yourself permission to make silly faces.
Give yourself permission to express your thoughts and ideas.

Give yourself permission to live out loud.

Because any other way of living is a waste of time.

What are you going to give yourself permission to do today? I urge you to share and hold yourself accountable to at least one token of loud living.

Unleashing The Creative Child Within You

Back when we were kids creativity came naturally to us. Everything was possible and our prolific imagination was the only limit we knew.
Through the years we have grown apart from our inner creative child and along with that – have lost our pristine and utter joy of creation.

In this e-book I will pave your way back to your inner creative child, brick by brick.

“Unleashing The Creative Child Within You” will explain why you became distant from your core creativity and will reveal the secret to getting it back.
With exercises designed specifically to help you find the inner child within you, regain its confidence and unleash it – you are bound to get your mojo back faster than you think.

Your inner creative child wants to come out and play, so don’t disappoint it and get “Unleashing The Creative Child Within You“.

Tags: Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, DT, Inspiration prompt, Karla Dudley, life
Posted in Inspiration prompt | 3 Comments »

Nip and Tuck Your Digital Brushes

Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

[Font: Adler; Digital Kits: KD Happy Day & KD Digi Essentials 5 (the number 7) – all by Karla Dudley.]

I may be prejudiced but I think my niece has the brightest, most beautiful smile I have ever seen.

I’d send some celebrities over for a red carpet seminar if I could. I really would.

Anyways…

This is the third birthday that I have missed and I am forever grateful that my sister takes the time to take the pictures as well as send them my way. I value these pictures so much, in fact, that I always immediately try to put together layouts with the stories behind the photos. As I only live vicariously through these photos, the stories I can tell aren’t so long and detail oriented. I mostly just try to capture the moment visually – as I imagine it had been.

In this layout I used Karla Dudley’s new kit: KD Happy Day, almost exclusively (minus the digit ‘7’). On the right corner of my layout you may find a word-art image: “Celebrate today, it’s yours”. If you take a moment and look at the kit, you won’t find this image as it shows on my layout. Why? Because I had engaged myself in a minor digital surgery… Nipping the second part of the sentence and tucking it underneath.

Rearranging a digital image is basically the same as snipping a clear stamp off and repositioning its parts to conform to your design and needs (or inking up a different part of the stamp each time). Here is how to do that:

How To

Open your image on Photoshop Elements. (If you are concerned about writing over your original image, use the ‘open as’ option.)
Pick the rectangle selection tool and by clicking and dragging, choose the part you wish to sever. When you are done you will see the marching ants sign around the outline of the image. Make sure you haven’t accidentally picked any other part of the image. If you did – just choose it, while clicking the ALT/OPT key, to deselect.
Make sure the layer of the image is selected – it will be highlighted if so.
Pick the move tool and click and drag the part you have selected to its new place – it’s that easy. (You may also delete it altogether by clicking the DELETE key while it’s selected).
Be careful not to get addicted and makeover your entire stash of digital images.

Have you ever tried to alter your digital stash (or your traditional stash…)? Please, do share. Just leave a message and brag.

Tags: Digital Brushes, Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, DT, Karla Dudley, tip
Posted in creativity prompt, Tutorial | 4 Comments »

My Wedding Photo Book

Monday, May 10th, 2010

In less than a month, on June 4th to be exact, my husband and I will be celebrating our three year anniversary.

We got married in a Kibbutz in Israel, in a gorgeous garden in the woods and we also took some picture just before the ceremony at the village where Nadav’s parents are living – Addi.

I made a photo album just after the wedding, the day we got our photos from the photographer. I used a “custom made” program (the only one available at the time) where they offered pre-made templates and I just dragged the photos in and added the journaling.

When we moved to Dublin, Ireland – just a few months after our wedding, I left the photo book at my parents house. I didn’t want to ship it with all our belongings. Time have passed and in the meantime my parents got attached to the book and are treasuring it.

Just now, I finally took the time to make another photo album. This time I went for the “Digital Scrapbooking” option at Shutterfly, where you can design your own layouts with a photo editing software and control every single element that goes into your photo book. I love that idea.

I was working on my album for 20 hours in total (9 of which – sitting straight in front of the computer without getting up). Most of the time went for picking photos and writing all the journaling in reverse because Photoshop doesn’t handle Hebrew.

For a cohesive look I chose a color palette: Gray (#333333), Orange (#FF6600) & Kraft (from KD Capture and Record kit). I chose a bunch of digital kits that match the color palette and the idea behind the book (For instance, the stitching represents the connection between my husband and i). Clearly I went for Karla Dudley’s kits. I used: KD Digi Essentials, KD Digi Essentials 2, KD Jillian, KD Spring 10, KD Chesca, KD Blakely, KD Tweet, KD Capture and Record and KD Fly Girl.

If you want to take a peek at my finished book, you can do it here.

Have you used the Digital Scrapbooking option on Shutterfly? Have you used another service? Please share.

Tags: Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, Karla Dudley, photo book, Shutterfly, wedding
Posted in Personal Notes | 12 Comments »

Think Outside the Box – Literally + Selective Coloring With Photoshop Elements

Thursday, May 6th, 2010

One way to get out of a creative rut is to use our stash – not as intended…

Use a “girly” collection for a boy’s layout or vice versa [as I did below].
Use a Christmas collection for a 4th of July layout.
Use a travel collection for a wedding.
Use patterned paper as a background and plain cardstock as an accent.
Use paper flowers as journaling blocks.
Use a winter themed paper for a summary layout.

Just ignore what the “box” says and create.
Free your mind.

In this layout I used Karla Dudley’s new kit KD Fly Girl for a manly layout of my husband shooting hoops at the beach:

[Fonts: Marketing Script, VTPortableRemington; Digital Kits: KD Fly Girl by Karla Dudley.]

And in this layout I used Karla’s KD Fly Boy kit to create a girlie-girl layout featuring my princess niece:

[Font: Rough Typewriter; Digital Kits: KD Fly Boy by Karla Dudley.]

Photoshop Elements Tip – Selective Coloring

On my “I heart You” layout I turned my photos to black and white (by de-saturating them) and kept just the vibrant yellow color of the ball.

The azure sky and turquoise ocean are beautiful, but they are distracting from the story I want to tell.

By removing the color of everything but the ball – I am drawing attention to it and hinting that the focus of my story is there.

There are 3 ways to get that look – choose the one most comfortable to you:

Method 1

Duplicate the photo’s layer (press CTRL+J on a PC or CMD+J on a MAC).
Make sure your upper layer is highlighted and de-saturate the colors all the way to the left (press CTRL+U on a PC or CMD+U on a MAC).
Make sure your upper layer is highlighted and choose the eraser tool (work with the default circular brush). Lightly erase just the object whose color you’d like to retain.
Merge both layers when you’re done.

[P.S. This is also how I “colored” the heart red on the kit’s PNG file.]

Method 2

Duplicate the photo’s layer (press CTRL+J on a PC or CMD+J on a MAC).
Make sure your upper layer is highlighted and de-saturate the colors all the way to the left (press CTRL+U on a PC or CMD+U on a MAC).
Make sure your upper layer is highlighted and choose the Quick Selection Tool. Click on the object whose color you wish to retain until it is highlighted completely by the marching ants. If you “slip” just unselect by pressing ALT on a PC or OPT on a MAC while simultaneously clicking on the part you don’t want selected.
Press delete.
Merge both layers together.

Method 3

Choose the Quick Selection Tool. Click on the object whose color you wish to retain until it is highlighted completely by the marching ants. If you “slip” just unselect by pressing ALT on a PC or OPT on a MAC while simultaneously clicking on the part you don’t want selected and duplicate your selection (press CTRL+J on a PC or CMD+J on a MAC).
Deselect (press CTRL+D on a PC or CMD+D on a MAC)
Make sure your lower layer is highlighted and de-saturate the colors all the way to the left (press CTRL+U on a PC or CMD+U on a MAC).
Merge both layers together.

Are you using your stash in an untraditional way? Please share your ideas/ projects with us.

Tags: creativity prompt, Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, DT, Karla Dudley, PSE, Selective Coloring, tip
Posted in creativity prompt, Tutorial | 2 Comments »

Picture Imperfect – Creativity Prompt

Monday, May 3rd, 2010

Me And My Little Quirks - Picture Imperfect

[Fonts: Urania_Czech; Digital Kits: KD Digi Essentials 5 (alpha brushes and coffee stains), KD Jillian (patterned papers) – all by Karla Dudley.]

In telling your story, the first thing you need to tackle is embracing imperfection.

Our true story, life story, isn’t about all the moments we were meticulously dressed, our make up perfectly applied and our hair glamorously done.
Our true story is about real – day to day – life.

It is the way we are when we wake up in the morning after a sleepless night.
It is the funny faces we allow ourselves to make only when we are surrounded with loved ones.
It is the way we deal with hardships.
It is the things we struggle with and eventually achieve.
It is the glow we have after completing a workout in the early hours of the day.
It is the laughter in our eyes when we make it to the top of the hill or when we meet a long lost friend.
It is about looking in the mirror and smiling because we accept ourselves the way we are.

This is who we truly are!

This picture was taken with Nadav’s cell phone camera.
I was jet lagged after a looooong flight and setting up my laptop at his parents’ guest room.
I was tired, cold, a bit dehydrated and making a goofy face (on purpose).
The picture is far from being perfect but it represents me. It portrays a side of me I want my future kids to see.

So I made a layout out of it.

Go ahead and embrace your imperfect pictures. Let them tell a true story.

Design Drill Down

As both me and the photo’s quality were sub par (hello understatement of the year…) I worked around it, making the photo look more “artistic” and “organic”.

I turned it to black and white, cranked up the levels settings, used funky alpha brushes instead of just a font and blurred and manipulated the background plus i added a touch of color to highlight my “true colors”…

The heart, lips and e-mail symbol make a visual triangle of red and the purple mat against the yellow background helps the photo pop up – as it is the main element.

The embellishment under the photo mat softens the quirky look and the bookplate “grounds” the page and also conveys the theme… Its small size is also purposeful story-wise.

There is also contrast between the soft and traditional look of the background pattern and the embellishment and the modern, funky look of the photo, myself and alphas.

Have you scrapped an imperfect picture that tells a true story lately? share your thoughts with me and leave a comment.

Tags: creativity prompt, Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, DT, imperfect, Karla Dudley, yourself
Posted in creativity prompt | 2 Comments »

National Scrapbooking Day Blog Hop

Saturday, May 1st, 2010

[Fonts: Erika Ormig, Marketing Script; Digital Kits: KD Frame Essentials 1, KD Digi Essentials (masking tape), KD For The Boy (background paper), KD Fly Boy (paper airplane), KD Stamp Alphas 1 – all by Karla Dudley.]

Today is National Scrapbooking Day and to jump start the day some creative bloggers and I have gathered together in a special blog hop.

Each of us is sharing a layout with her interpretation to the subject – “Cross Country Road Trip”.

Go on and browse all the blogs to see their amazing layouts, to leave some loving and appreciative words behind and to participate in the drawings (On the table there are a copy of my e-book Unleashing The Creative Child Within You and My Mind’s Eye LUSH minibook with papers and who knows, you may hop and find some more goodies in your way)…

We invite you to join us and create a layout (all paper, all digital, or hybrid) about a trip to anywhere in the 50 United States [or anywhere else if you’ve never been to the States] and to submit a direct link to your wonderful layout on Rosann’s blog by May 15th at 11:59pm EST for a chance to win the goodies.

If you are new to my blog, make sure to pick up some of the FREE printables I am giving away each Friday. I’m sure you’d love yesterday’s woodgrain journaling labels!

Blog Hop Order

Rosann => Submit your layout here for a chance to win!
Jana
Terri
Kim
Sharon
Lacey
Karen
Avital => YOU ARE HERE

Enjoy!

Tags: Blog hop, creativity prompt, Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, DT, Karla Dudley, National Scrapbooking Day, New York, scrapbooking, Travel
Posted in creativity prompt | 29 Comments »

Be Playful – Creativity Prompt

Wednesday, April 21st, 2010

[Fonts: Rough_typewriter, Barnes_erc_; Digital Kits: KD Tweet, KD For The Boy, KD Frame Essentials – all by Karla Dudley.]

All work and no play? not in my (scrap)book!

Scrapbooking is important.
Telling the story is important.
Perpetuating memories is important.

saying that, scrapbooking is also a hobby.
As a hobby it’s supposed to be awesome.
As a hobby it’s supposed to be fun.
As a hobby it’s supposed to conform to OUR rules – not vice versa!

So I am very much into inserting some more playfulness into the process.

In this layout, with help from Karla Dudley‘s playful designs and a playful free font I have injected a much needed gaiety and cheerfulness into my layout.

The bird, for instance, is actually made out of 3 different images from the KD Tweet kit, that I layered and locked into one layer. You may need to adjust the angle of the image a bit (move your mouse cursor next to the top edge of the bounding box until it looks like a rounded arrow, then click and drag slightly up or down). I also “built” the bird-swing by using different images together, not necessarily the way one would traditionally use them.

You can mimic this idea/look with traditional “hard-copy” products by layering embellishments together or using things a bit differently than usual.

It made me smile. It might make you smile too!

Photoshop Elements Tip
How did I make the labeler-like strips?

Easy!

Use the rectangle shape tool to draw a short and wide strip. Make sure your shape color is black.
Choose the type tool and pick a typewriter font, make sure your font color is white.
Click on your rectangle and start typing. Click twice to commit.
Choose the move tool and pick 2 layers – the shape and the type (make sure they are both highlighted).
Click on the ‘align’ button at the top of your window and align the 2 layers together, both vertically and horizontally.
Lock the layers together to keep the alignment.
Repeat.

How do you insert playfulness to your layouts? Share by leaving a comment (or a link to your playful layout)

Tags: creativity prompt, Digital Kits, Digital Scrapbooking, DT, Karla Dudley, play, tip
Posted in creativity prompt, Tutorial | 3 Comments »

Posts Tagged ‘Karla Dudley’