(Note: Click on image for a larger view)
In my
Respect Mother Earth tutorial, I took you through the specific steps I used to create the card you see to the left, but as I mentioned there is no reason you can't change things up a little bit to suit your personal taste. Here are a few adaptations you can use in creating just about any card with this layout:
Change the focal panel:- Instead of stamping the tree image repeatedly to create the panel across the center of the card, you can just as easily use a patterned paper or even a pretty wrapping paper. This can save you time.
- How about some texture? You can opt for running your center panel through an embossing folder instead of using an image. A pretty foil or shimmery paper would look wonderful with an embossed texture.
- Deckled edge? Any decorative edge could work just as well. Even an edge punch could be used to create some interest. Or you can choose to use no decorative edge and cut it straight.
- Substitute the center panel with a beautiful wide ribbon, maybe something velvety or glittered.
Change the orientation:- Who says the layout has to be horizontal? Turn it on its side. Or try looking at the layout in a mirror. Sometimes just a shift in the way you look at things can open up a whole new creative insight.
Change the colors:- With the exception of the base layer, my card was monochromatic in shades of green with gold as an accent. You can spice things up with more color. It doesn't have to be a lot to make a big difference. Just imagine my card with a yellow base layer and a red polka ribbon on it. That would have a totally different feel to it.
Making Multiples:- Okay, I'll confess. I had been creating several cards that incorporated the same central tree panel. Of course I didn't cut and stamp each panel individually. I cut, stamped and gilded several lengths from 12 x 12 cardstock. I did the same for the dark green layer below it. I glued them together and cut them to fit my cards as I needed them. When creating more than one or two cards at a time, it's always faster to work in "batches". Stamp a batch of main images and sentiments, cut a batch of ribbons, etc. Often you will end up with leftover scraps large enough to use on another card.
These are just a few of the many, many options open to you when you're creating cards. Your art is a expression of yourself and you are like no one else. So don't confine yourself to "cookie cutter" cards. Add your personal touch to the layouts you like and make them your own.
Ballo ergo sum
- Gitana, the Creative Diva
An artist's work area is not neat. To be so would be antithetical to the creative process. At least this is what I tell myself whenever I look at the sometimes unbelievable mess on and around the craft table in my basement workshop. "It's only temporary", I convince myself, "until this project is completed", but I know this is not true. It's not true because there's ALWAYS another project in the pipeline. More often than not there are several projects in various stages of completion on my table simultaneously along with bits and pieces leftover from completed projects that I just never got around to removing. This photo is evidence of that very thing. On the table you see four cards being laid out on a piece of cardstock. There is a foam wig stand that is in the process of being altered for a display and to the right of that there are four ATC's (artist trading cards) being held aloft by a doohickey (that's a technical term) with alligator clips at the end of it's arms looking for all the world like a very small Transformer. The cards and ATC's were in the process of being framed for submission to the Local 3 Biennial Spring Arts Festival, a show I entered when it last ran two years ago. (Click here to read the results of that show.) Because I had been so busy for the past two years volunteering at the senior citizens center, I really hadn't had time to do much work of my own so I initially had not considered entering the show. My husband convinced me to enter something just for the hell of it so I decided to frame these two series of pieces. I had to improvise creating new mats over the ones that came with the frames because they were designed for standard size photos, not for this kind of work. I placed pale green handmade paper with flower inclusions behind the underwater scenes and placed the "Night Flight" series on a rust colored handmade paper mat laid over the white mat in the frame. The white mat was stamped with watermarking ink and dusted with gold PearlEx to create a subtle pattern that worked very well overall.
This June marks a couple of milestones. First, my youngest daughter is graduating from high school and going off to college. Second, she is a member of the very first graduating class for The Green School, An Academy for Environmental Careers, a new high school here in Brooklyn that first opened its doors to students in September 2007. As its name implies, The Green School's focus is environmental responsibility and sustainability so, of course, its graduation exercises has to promote that mission. Also of concern is the budget so the event must be organized on a shoestring. To that end, I volunteered to create large floral arrangements with which to decorate the auditorium during the ceremony. The paper for these flowers was salvaged surplus that was previously printed with school notices, flyers, etc. and was designated for the recycling bin. Never mind that I have no floral experience and have never done anything like this before. I just jumped in, learned what I could as I went long and whatever I didn't learn, I made up on the fly.
If you follow this blog, you know that I am volunteering at a local senior citizen's center. Once a week for an hour, I lead a group of seniors in assembling a card kit that I create at home. Many times I will build in an element of choice so that they don't feel that their cards look exactly alike. Just before Easter, I created a card that featured a verse on the front that said "Easter Greetings" but knowing that not everyone there celebrates Easter, I created alternate greetings that could easily be substituted instead. Those greetings were "Hope You're Feeling Better" and "Where Flowers Bloom, There is Hope".
The card featured here was the prototype for a birthday card for my daughter's friend, someone whom she describes as a "tree lover" so she wanted the focal image of the card to be that of a tree. She had seen and liked several tree sketches I had done with oil pastels on the paper I use to protect my worktable. I had been testing several different packs of pastels to determine their viability so I just used the paper that was in front of me. They were only "throw-away" sketches to me (see below) but she liked them enough to "commission" me to draw a tree for her friend's card. 
