Challenge Spotlight: Wild About Styles
It’s already the third Tuesday in February – which is almost over! – and time for YOUR chance to shine! Today we’re looking at one of our new Challenges, Wild About Styles, which is hosted by Wetfish Designs. It’s an intriguing Challenge where Wetfish provides a free-for-the-month set of Styles for use in the Challenge; this month the set contains 12 different maps. Yes… Maps. And the goal is to use more than one for your layout. She’s even provided us with a sample layout!
Let’s see how our GingerScrappers used the Styles for their layouts… Remember, each layout is linked to the Gallery so you can take a closer look and perhaps leave a comment. Just click on the Scrapper‘s user name (it’s bold, underlined and in living colour) to jump right to the layout. They’re posted in the order they were uploaded to the Challenge Gallery; there may be others in the Forum thread that aren’t in the Challenge Gallery, as I discovered last month.
Our first participant is nimble4u. She’s used at least 6 – no, make that 7 – of the Styles, applying them to each of the papers from the Tinci Designs template she chose. How’s that for following the rules? 😉 I don’t read Dutch, but she’s obviously travelling.
Alasandra has used so many I can’t keep track. She has applied them to her frames and some of her embellishments; that really customizes her layout. She, too, used a Tinci template (I have hundreds of them, so I recognize them right away) and the theme of her layout is travel, but in a more generic sense.
I’m sensing a pattern… lm44west also applied the Styles to the papers here. Her paper layers don’t have distinct shadows so it’s a bit difficult to separate them. I *think* she’s applied a different Style to each of the characters in her title.
Pixel Palette‘s used a subtle hand for her layout; by blending a large map with a floral paper she’s created movement in a layout about the single most impactful moment in travel history. She also applied Styles to her title and behind her smaller photo.
I could totally see this layout by greenfiend27 on a classroom wall somewhere. It’s literally an “animals of Australia” poster, complete with a map-Styled frame.
KatL has used two map Styles for sure. Her aerial photos are well-showcased with map mats.
With another variation on a theme, pbhill has used several Styles applied to her paper mats… and that great banner! The Styles she chose draw from the colours in her photo.
Katherine Woodin is most of us right now, am I right? So much of the continent is snowed in and freezing. She applied a Style to her background and title, and when I zoomed in I think she’s even blended map Styles into her photos. Very interesting effect.
Anybody who knows msbrad (Michi) knows she LOVES to travel and takes hordes of photos. She was a teacher in another life, so she also follows rules. 😉 Lots of different maps are visible here, even if you don’t zoom in! I love how she’s got a bike with tulips sticker to echo her bike with tulips photo. Made me smile.
Jill went simple, applying a Style to her background then blending a photo into it. She Styled her title, and perhaps the word strip in her cluster. The hiking/camping elements she’s clustered look so real!
At first I thought trinanne had only used a single map Style here – which is PERFECTLY oriented to her subject, but then I took a closer look and she’s applied a semi-transparent map Style to the frames around her photos. That bread bowl… now I’m hungry!
I’ve downloaded the Styles, and now I’m inspired to create a layout. Are you?
Just below the Color Picker setting is Step Back/Fwd. This allows you to decide the keyboard shortcuts used to Undo or Redo. I like the most basic, CTRL>Z and CTRL>Y – fewer movements and fewer keys to remember!
In the screenshot below, I want to Erase part of the bow. But when I try to do it, I get a pop-up as shown. And if you look at the layers in the Layers Panel, each of the embellishments I’ve got on my canvas has a little box in the lower right corner of the thumbnail. That tells me the layer CANNOT be modified other than to resize and rotate.
Crop Tool Shield lets you see exactly what part of your photo or image will be included when you crop it. I find that Black and 75% lets me see enough of the image to know if I’m keeping the parts I want. You do you!
This combo might be useful for some activities but I really can’t think of one. 😉
Guides and Grids are helpful tools. Guides are single straight lines that can be pulled from the top or the left of the workspace and allow for precise placement of objects and type on your layout. Grids give you graph paper, essentially. I use both regularly for my layouts. For them to be most useful, you need to be able to see them without them obscuring your work. These tools can be solid lines or dashed lines for Guides, solid, dashed or dotted lines for Grids. I have old eyes so my settings are what will work best for me. By all means, experiment until you get what you need.
Here’s an image with two perpendicular Guide lines on it.
If you want to make it so your Guides and Grids don’t move when you accidentally mouse over them, you want to Snap To. To have them remain on your workspace regardless of what image you’re working on, Lock Guides.
When you look at the Layers Panel, in the upper right corner of the screen there is an icon that looks like 4 horizontal lines with a tiny blue triangle just to the left of it. When you click on that, the dropdown menu has an item at the very bottom called Panel Options. Click on that and you can set the size of your Layer Thumbnails.
