Saturday 12 October 2013

Saturday Spotlight wk 3

Welcome to the Saturday Spotlight!

This week I have chosen 'Loved One' by Suzanne Magner (suzannah3).

I just love the effects used here. Suzanne is so good at blending and always produces stunning pages. The feeling she has created with this page is amazing. And the rich colouring...just gorgeous!
You can find some other examples of her work on Daisy Trail



I am a working mum and married with 4 sons. I have one daughter-in-law and 2 beautiful grand daughters. I am a Diversional Therapist and also an Allied Health Assistant in physio, speech and OT work. I work in the local hospital in Queensland, Australia where I live. I have been scrapping for about 2 and a half years.

I created this page with a lot of emotion after listening to a patient reminiscing about the love of her life - her husband. After a lot of exploring of my inner emotions, I wanted to create how I would feel on the outside if I lost the one person in my life who has been part of it since my teenage years, where this beautiful friendship of love and respect was broken.
The white marking down the side of the face was representing a mask - a shadow of grief. I have used a lot of blending throughout this layout. I love to explore new techniques and ideas, always testing and challenging myself.

The kits I used are : Hello Fall by Natalie, Cottage Arts Click Mask 35 and Paris by Butterfly designs.

Thank you for sharing Suzanne x

Tuesday 8 October 2013

WOYWW 257

Doesn't the week whizz by? Wednesday again and time to join in the desk hopping game hosted by Julia. So here's what I've been up to over the last few days;

I've been inspired to make this page by the freakily (is that even a word)?! warm weather we're having... in the South of the UK that is. I can't believe this fuchsia is still in flower. Normally, by now, it would be shrinking away from the gusty winds and cold air, and going a dull and crispy brown! 
When we have an extended summer like this, we call it an Indian Summer. I have absolutely no idea why...is it because it's still summer in October in India!!! There is probably a really obvious explanation that I have completely missed lol. But would be great if somebody could tell me the answer.
I've used elements from kits by Amy Wolff and One Little bird.



This next page I did for a challenge I'm running on my blog.
It's my son and his girlfriend. They're doing gorge walking...which I have scrapped about a lot now. This will probably be the last one I do as I am getting sick of looking at people in wetsuits lol!
Just for a change to my usual style, I've put them in a fantasy type background which I quite like as it adds to the fun of the page and when Matt and Debs are around, we always have fun!!!


The kit I used is called Fairy Garden by Alvetina on the scrapbird blog x

Thank you for dropping in for a look at what I've been doing. I love reading the comments that are left.I will come and have a snoop at everyone's work desks this evening after work. Happy WOYWW! xxx

Monday 7 October 2013

Cut out fantasy - challenge

I've made this page for Matt & Debs by cutting them out and putting them onto a fantasy type background.
It's a fun technique and I've seen loads of good examples on Daisy Trail. I think it lends itself to scrapping the fun photos you have and makes a change from the norm.




I then thought that maybe this could be this week's challenge :)!
Purely for fun again...although I may have to put one or two favs on my blog lol x
Simply create your page, using the cutting out (also called extraction technique) Upload to Daisy Trail in the normal way - Simples!

Here are a couple of tips that work for me. They are poss not technically correct and certainly not 'expert advice' simply what I have found gives the best result ...through lots of trial and error!




1. Zoom in really close and use the largest brush setting. Grow tolerance off. Obviously you will need to use smaller for the really fiddly bits. But for some reason, using the largest brush seems to get the smoothest results...for me anyway.

2. When trimming large areas with a good contrast to the background, use the grow tolerance setting, but only have it on about 30. Any higher and I find it will start 'snatching' bits of what you want to keep...very annoying!
3. Make sure you select the best output type i.e. Alpha edged for images you want to blend into your background and Vector for a clean cut appearance. I've used Vector for my example page.
4. Of course you can play around with the 'inflate' and 'smooth' sliders, but I just wanted to keep it simple. Maybe I should cover that next time......
























Place your finished cut out image onto your fantasy background and voila....job done lol! 
I've used a kit called Fairy Garden by Alvetina, available on the Scrapbird website.

Thank you for taking part last week. And a huge thank you if you have joined my blog. Looking forward to seeing your designs :) x