Digital scrapbook pages -
a great way to use your digital photos

Take a trip down memory lane by browsing your photo collection. Can you remember the day they were taken? The emotions surrounding the events? Perhaps you can even smell that sweet baby scent, or the freshly mown grass? Hear the wind whistling through the tree tops? Photos keep those memories alive for you, and its fun to share your memories with family members or friends isn't it?
But what if you are not around to tell the stories? Or you look at photos of your grandparents, and wonder why the photo was taken and when.

Creating digital scrapbook pages that tell those stories is a wonderful way of documenting your life for your own enjoyment and to pass on those memories to your own children and grandchildren.

So what is wrong with just putting your photos in an album? Digital scrapbooking enables us to add to the story, to incorporate journaling or notes, to get creative with colours and incorporate other items that will capture the event.

The Benefits of digital scrapbook pages

You can play with filters and create special effects when editing your photos (always remember to save the original first) or just improve a photo that isn't quite right.

Items that would be too bulky or heavy for a traditional scrapbook layout can be photographed or scanned so they can be included. When finished your pages can be shared by uploading them to the web or by e-mailing them to family and friends. And don't forget to print them out and enjoy them even when you are away from the computer.

You can include one-off items, such as your child's first painting, without damaging the original.

You can create your own page backgrounds that are just right, rather than making do with a purchased paper that doesn't convey quite what you wanted it to.

You can create your own elements or embellishments from photos of actual objects that mean something to the story.

Taking photographs for digital scrapbook pages

For future events it is worth keeping some things in mind that will help you to create pages that tell the story in full.

Take photos of "things" as well as people - items that you can use to set the scene

• Take both landscape and portrait shots - to give variety to the pages
• Take a sequence of photos - tell the story in pictures
• Take group shots and individual portraits
• Take photos that show texture - for backgrounds
• Get in close to the action
• and lastly take LOTS of photos - to give you plenty to choose from when creating your digital scrapbook pages

What does a digital layout consist of?

Perhaps a quick overview of what digital scrapbook pages consist of would be helpful?

1. First we need a background for our page. Plain or patterned, smooth or textured, the background sets the scene for the layout. You can create backgrounds digitally in your software, or use photos that you took especially for this purpose.
2. Next we need the photos. Well actually you can create a layout with just one photo, or use scans of items like my daughter's mother's day card, as I did in the layout above.
3. A title might be required for your page, perhaps in an ornate font.
4. The story can be told in lots of words or just a few. It can be typed on the computer or handwritten and scanned in.
5. Embellishments that add to the story. Again these can be created digitally or you can use photographs you have taken of objects.

Have fun!

Return to top of digital scrapbook pages

Return to digital photography projects home page

ADD TO YOUR SOCIAL BOOKMARKS: Blink Del.icio.us Digg
Furl Google Simpy Spurl Technorati Y! MyWeb