There are many ways to approach designing your scrapbooking layout, and as you progress with your scrapbooking you will develop your own style and a process that suits you. Until then.....here are a few basic steps to help you get underway. You will probably find it easier to use some recent photos than starting with your oldest ones, as they are fresh in your mind and easier to associate to than a family history projet for example.
Choose the Photos for your Layout Most scrapbooking layouts will centre around a theme, person or event. For example a birthday, a visit to the park, or your grandmother. This will depend of course on how many photos you have. Sometimes you may have only one photo for a particular topic you want to scrapbook, and we will cover this in a later topic. So our starting point is to select the photos that we want to record in this particular layout. Put all the photos you have for the topic together even if you don't think that you will use them....you never know.
Choose the Cardstock and Paper for your Layout When I first began scrapbooking, I used to go crazy buying patterned papers that I liked. I have since learned that to avoid having a stash of out of date papers that you will never use, take the photos that you are planning to scrapbook to your local store or online store and match the colouring, patterns and textures in your photos to papers that best enhance the attributes of your photos. I usually keep a good range of plain cardstock in my stash as this will not go out of date, but there are so many beautiful patterned papers being released all the time that I find this is the best technique.
It is important to remember that your photos are the focal point of your layout and to choose papers that compliment them not take away from them. Too many colous will make your page look too busy and distract the reader. In most cases I make a double page layout and use 2 pieces of plain cardstock as the base of my layout, a co-ordinating plain cardstock for matting my photos and 1-2 patterned papers in various ways to embellish the page.
One of the aims of scrapbooking is to preserve your photos so it is important that you choose acid free papers. Want to know what acid free means click here to see the explanation of many scrapbooking terms.
Choose a Central Photo for your Layout When you look through the photos that you have chosen for your layout, you will probably find that you will be drawn to one more than the others. This should be the photo that your layout is centred around and be the main focus. Sometimes it is nice to print this photo in a slightly larger size to emphasis the importance of the image.
Design your Basic Layout Set your 2 plain sheets of cardstock on your workspace in front of you. Then start by sitting your central photo on one of the pages. Start adding the other photos and moving them around on the pages until you are happy with a basic design layout. This is why you keep all the photos together even if you don't think that you will use them, as once you start moving them around you will more often than not change your mind about which photos you will or won't use.
You may find layout sketches useful when you are first starting out to help with getting your pages balanced and pleasing to the eye. These are available in many scrapbooking books, magazines or websites. Visit our page of helpful links page to get some great sketch ideas.
Crop your Photos It is not always necessary to crop your photos especially now with digital photography as most of the time we crop out unnessesary or distracting items at the time we print our photos. But you will find that as you progess with your scrapbooking you are more particular about how your photos look. You may need to crop a distracting background, a person you don't know on the edge of your image, or simply to make something fit on your page. Check out our cropping tutorial for more information on how to crop your photos.
Matting your Photos Matting a photo makes the image stand out from the rest of your layout. I tend to use a lighter colour cardstock than my base colour as the card I matt my photos with. This however is not a hard and fast rule. Also by varying the width and texture of your matt will add visual interest to your layout. Visit my matting tutorial for more tips and techniques on matting your photos.
Embellish your layout Now that you have your basic layout design, your photos have been cropped and matted, it is time to start embellishing your layout. Embellishments can be memorabilia from a trip such as the tickets or programs from a show, certificates your children have won, or pieces of their artwork. They can also be bought items such as flowers, tags or stickers. It is important to use items that match your colour scheme as well as the theme of your layout. It is up to you how many embellishments you use....just remember your photos are the focal point of your layout, and the embellishments are just there to help tell the story.
Journalling Journalling adds a strong personal touch to your layouts, and records memories that you can look back on forever. Whether you like to hand write your journalling or use a computer make sure to include all the details regarding the layout that are important to you...including the date.
Congratulations...............you have succesfully completed a scrapbooking layout!! I hope that you have found this tutorial a useful resource, please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or ideas for future tutorials at sales@justscrapandstamp.com.au
