Watermark

International Digital Scrapbooking Day (#iNDSD)

 

 

For #iNDSD, another update, changes, corrections & additions, to: Resources for Digital Art Journaling & Collage | Shops: some brief reviews. Added Designer Digitals, Plain Digital Wrapper, and The Digital Press, and fixed some oversights. 

Resources for Digital Art Journaling & Collage | Shops: some brief reviews – NEW & UPDATED

 

 

NOTE: If I've overlooked a shop or other site that you think should be included, please leave me note in comments and I will pay a visit. It's very likely, given my long absence from the digital community, that I have missed something.]

For another project, I spent some time looking at several digital scrapbooking shops, and thought some of my observations might be useful, especially for folks new to digital art journaling or collage, and looking for images to work with.

My comments are very brief, but should serve as an introduction, at least. This post is focused only on shops that provide at least some digital art, art journal, altered art, mixed-media or collage-specific products and activities. There are many more shops that serve the digital scrapbooking world. 

Also, check out this post on Digital Art Journaling Resources at The Daily Digi.

First, some context: 

What's the difference between scrapbooking and art journaling or collage? 

Briefly, scrapbooking usually includes photos, and is often about people and events other than the scrapbooker (though there is much effort to encourage scrapbookers to scrap more about themselves.) Art journaling and collage may or may not include photos, and is about self-expression. Self-expression and/or art and design; art journalers and collage artists do a wide range of work on this continuum. 

Is there overlap between the two? 

Absolutely. It's entirely possible to use scrapbooking elements on a collage or art journal page, or art journal/ collage elements on a scrapbook page. Especially with art journaling, anything goes; you may use whatever you like, however you like. 

What are forums, challenges, and galleries, and why should I care?

Forums: Most digital shops have an online forum where digital designers and customers interact. Most have a few sections devoted to the shop and its products and designers; tips and tutorials; challenges and contests; and general conversation. Some forums are slow, some are very active. Forum participation is not required to be a customer, or to post to the gallery, but if you are a social person, or even just looking for more information about the hobby, a forum can be a fun place to be. 

Also, this world, nearly entirely female, is a happy, optimistic, supportive one. If you need some relief from the general crankiness of other online places, this will provide it. On the other hand, you may sometimes feel overdosed on sweetness and flee back to the darker corners of the internet.

[14 September 02016, edited to add: I think this has changed a bit, possibly due to more interest in digital art, art journaling and collage. I see more kits devoted to the struggles of life, and more conversation about that. I think this is a good, whole-some thing.]

Challenges: Most shops offer challenges to inspire their customers to actually use, not just collect, their products. Some challenges are very specific and require the use of shop products; some are more open-ended. Some offer freebies to challenge participants. I find challenges very helpful in giving me inspiration and new ideas for pages.

Galleries: Most shops provide an online gallery where customers can post their pages, and where designers' creative teams can show off what can be done with a particular kit. Most customers don't post their pages, and I didn't think I would when I began. But I do now. It's very rewarding to get and give encouraging comments, and it's inspiring to see what other folks are doing. 

NOTE: The existence of an art journaling category in a gallery matters because it makes it so much easier for us to find each other's work. Also, some scrapbookers are quite hostile to art journaling, and consider it an infringement of sorts on their hobby. They are annoyed to stumble over art journal pages in a scrapbooking gallery. This is a long-standing discussion which I will not attempt to resolve here.

[14 September 02016, edited to add: I think this has settled down somewhat in the last couple of years. In fact, I'm seeing some significant overlap, as traditional scrapbookers give more "artsy" approaches a try.]

Every shop has different forum and gallery guidelines regarding products, credits, and linking; be sure to find and read those before jumping in. Many shops require that any page posted to their gallery contain a certain percentage of that shop's product. An "open" gallery means that it's ok to post pages with products from other shops, but within the the guidelines specific to the gallery; some allow links to outside shops and designers, others do not. 

And now the shops, in alphabetical order:

 

My Journal

I am writing again, and doing several projects; too many, probably. Online, I'm doing  The Documented Life Project and Tangie Baxter's Art Journal Caravan and Symbology Project. I'm behind in all of these. In real life I'm taking two poetry classes through the  through the MOLLI Program at the University of Montana. I missed the first two sessions of both, made the next two and will make the final two. 

All this has gotten me back to my journal. Several of these projects have participants who are interested in the actual stuff of journals; hence, this post. All the art journaling and collage-making I do is done digitally, so my actual real-life journal has always been pretty plain. White lined or unlined pages and black ink with an occassional foray into colored paper and ink, often short-lived. Mostly just writing, but occasional doodling. And I rarely print my art pages. 

Now I'm trying something different, and enjoying it very much. 

I've used Circa Notebooks from Levenger for decades, both professionally and personally. I love the versatility of them. I can use paper of different sizes and move pages around easily, within or between notebooks. I can have several notebooks with different covers for different projects.

It has finally occurred to me that I can print out interesting pages to use for my writing. I have accumulated a vast library of digital images, and there is no rule that I must write on white paper. This is what my current journal looks like (click the images for credits & larger sizes at flickr):  

 

I'm using Tangie's Tangible Plans @ ScrapBookGraphics to make my pages. Here's my collection so far:

I'm loving using these. The images encourage me to loosen up and play a bit. You can't be too serious when there's a picture of a squirrel on your otherwise blank page. Making the pages was itself a fun creative activity. I didn't get serious about that, either; there is no fancy photoshopping here, just plunk the images down and print. 

I panicked for a moment when somewhat busy pages popped up as I prepared to take notes in my poetry classes, but I decided to just go with it, and it worked really well. Better for me, in fact, than a thin list of things I want to go back to. Why didn't I realize this when I was in school? 

 As you see, I'm also printing out some of my collage/art journal pages. I think I've discovered all the various ways it is possible to screw this up: put the paper in the printer the wrong way so that the backside prints upside down; don't get the paper into the punch securely so it's wonky in the book; don't be careful about measuring before cutting the paper in half. I seem to have a genius for this. 

It's worth it, though. If, like me, you don't have the space or energy for in-real-life mixed-media art work, but you wish your journal looked a bit more interesting, I recommend this approach. It's very fun. 

Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Treats

[This is one of a series of posts on resources for digital art journalers and collage artists.]

Tangie Baxter has a free ezine with lots of good info on art journaling and the Art Journal Caravan:

 

Captivated Visions is doing a series on {The Art of} Artful Digital Scrapping, including tips, tutorials, challenges and freebies:

 

Real Life Scrapped is an online community – forum, blog, and (open) gallery – that offers conversation and challenges, including a thread on Art Journaling/Altered Art Talk:

 

 

Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Shops: some brief reviews

THIS POST IS OBSOLETE & HAS BEEN UPDATED HERE.

[This is one of a series of posts on resources for digital art journalers and collage artists.]

For another project, I spent some time looking at several digital scrapbooking shops, and thought some of my observations might be useful, especially for folks new to digital art journaling or collage, and looking for images to work with.

My comments are very brief, but should serve as an introduction, at least. This post is focused only on shops that provide at least some art journal, altered art, or collage-specific products and activities. There are many more shops that serve the digital scrapbooking world. 

Also, check out this post on Digital Art Journaling Resources at The Daily Digi.

First, some context: 

What's the difference between scrapbooking and art journaling? 

Briefly, scrapbooking usually includes photos, and is often about people and events other than the scrapbooker (though there is much effort to encourage scrapbookers to scrap more about themselves.) Art journaling may or may not include photos, and is about self-expression. Self-expression and/or art and design; art journalers do a wide range of work on this continuum. 

 

Is there overlap between the two? 

Absolutely. It's entirely possible to use scrapbooking elements on an art journal page, or art journal elements on a scrapbook page. Especially with art journaling, anything goes; you may use whatever you like, however you like. 

 

What are forums, challenges, and galleries, and why should I care?

Forums: Most digital shops have an online forum where digital designers and customers interact. Most have a few sections devoted to the shop and its products and designers; tips and tutorials; challenges and contests; and general conversation. Some forums are slow, some are very active. Forum participation is not required to be a customer, or to post to the gallery, but if you are a social person, or even just looking for more information about the hobby, a forum can be a fun place to be. 

Also, this world, nearly entirely female, is a happy, optimistic, supportive one. If you need some relief from the general crankiness of other online places, this will provide it. On the other hand, you may sometimes feel over-dosed on sweetness and  flee back to the darker corners of the interet.

Challenges: Most shops offer challenges to inspire their customers to actually use, not just collect, their products. Some challenges are very specific and require the use of shop products; some are more open-ended. Some offer freebies to challenge participants. I find challenges very helpful in giving me inspiration and new ideas for pages.

Galleries: Most shops provide an online gallery where customers can post their pages, and where designers' creative teams can show off what can be done with a particular kit. Most customers don't post their pages, and I didn't think I would when I began. But I do now. It's very rewarding to get and give encouraging comments, and it's inspiring to see what other folks are doing. 

Every shop has different forum and gallery guidelines regarding products, credits, and linking; be sure to find and read those before jumping in. An "open" gallery means that it's ok to post pages with products from other shops, but within the the guidelines specific to the gallery.

And now the shops, in alphabetical order:

 

Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Workshops, Challenges & Prompts

[This is one of a series of posts on resources for digital art journalers and collage artists.]

Digital art journaling has come into its own; the internet is busy with offerings to keep us inspired.  

2013 is the fourth year that Tangie Baxter has offered the Art Journal Caravan, different each year and still worth many times the price, $49.95 for the starter kit and a year of tutorials, challenges, prompts, encouragement, support, and community. And freebies.

Tangie releases regular (monthly, this year) Caravan kits, which are available to members at a deep discount.

I joined the Caravan in March 2011, then purchased the "2010 Caravan in Review PDF" and did that year consecutively with 2012, and have begun 2013. This year Tangie is out-doing herself, with inspirations and treats and new challenges. 

This year-long workshop is designed for both digital and hybrid art journalers, so whichever you are you will find it useful. It may even inspire you to move into the other media on occassion. You can participate as much or as little as you like. There are forums and a gallery to share work, which you may or may not choose to do. 

One of the things I especially appreciate about The Caravan is that its home, Scrapbookgraphics, is an open gallery. This means that pages can be posted that were made with images from many different sources; we are not limited to using only Tangie's work, wonderful though it is. 

If you are going to choose only one workshop to do this year, this is the one. 

There are other good opportunities as well, which I will address in another post.

This is my photoset so far for Art Journal Caravan 2013:

www.flickr.com

Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Vintage Freebies 2

[This is one of a series of posts on resources for digital art journalers and collage artists. You may want to read Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Freebies Guidelines: The 4 C's before downloading goodies. You can find my first post on Vintage Freebies here.]

This is a list of sources I have used (and a few that I haven't) for vintage images. All offer freebies, but not everything on every site is free. And remember that free does not mean the same thing everywhere; please read the Terms of Use before downloading. This list is not exhaustive and I expect to be updating it as I find new resources. 

Enjoy!

Altered Bits 
Antique Images
Art Freebies
Artfully Musing 
art-e-ology
Artefacts

Bibliodyssey

Carol Anne's Boutique
-CatnipStudioCollage-

Far Far Hill
Flickr: VINTAGE PHOTO SHARING 
Flickr: Absolutely Free Collage Sheets
Flickr: free collage images
Flickr: Collage Images
Flickr: (almost) Totally Free To Use Images
Flickr: Digital Collage Sheets
Flickr: Vintage Catalog Pages for Collage
Free Images
*Free ♥ Pretty ♥ Things ♥ For ♥ You*
**FREE ViNTaGE DiGiTaL STaMPS**  

The Graphics Fairy
GreenPaper Free Vintage Images  

Magic Moonlight 
Magical Vintage de Johanne L

NadinePau-stock on deviantART

The Old Design Shop 
Olde Curiosity Shoppe
OLD PHOTO ALBUM

Shabby Blogs

Tangie Baxter Freebies

Vintage Vectors
The Vintage Moth 
Vintage Paper Goods 
Vintage Printable
Vintage Images 
Vintage Resources 

 

Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Vintage Freebies

[This is one of a series of posts on resources for digital art journalers and collage artists. You may want to read Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Freebies Guidelines: The 4 C's before downloading goodies.]

The internet is lush with vintage and public domain images. You can spend hours, days, weeks just perusing possibilities. In this post, I will point you to my two favorite sources; folks who have done the winnowing, scanning, and uploading work for us. I'll do a more comprehensive list in a later post.

First, the queen of online vintage graphics, Karen at The Graphics Fairy: Free Clip Art, Vintage Images & Crafty Projects:

Find over 3,000 FREE Clip Art images, & Vintage Printables, to MAKE craft projects, collage, DIY, scrapbooking, etc! Daily vintage image downloads since 2007.

 

Karen has been at this for a long time. Her archives are immense, and well-organized for searching. Her terms are more than generous:

The Graphics Fairy is an Angel Company. You are free to use all clip art and photos, with the exception of the banner and any guest photos, in any of your projects created for resale or pleasure. Please do not use more than 6 of the graphic images within any one project, or within a single page of a blog or website. A link to the Graphics Fairy is very much appreciated, when including clipart on your blog or website. 

Karen is good about naming files, though if you are downloading early ones you may need to rename for attribution. Occasionally she missed one. 

On the odd and intriguing side, we have BibliOdyssey: Books ~ Illustrations ~ Science ~ History ~ Visual Materia Obscura ~ Eclectic Bookart. Just a taste:

Really fabulous images! But – not everything is available. Biblio posts most images to flickr (peacay on flickr) and they can be downloaded from there, but pay attention to the license. Now and then he posts copyrighted work with permission of the artist, and these are not for general use. I've made that mistake myself. 

Also, downloading from flickr is tricky; I always change the file name so that I can credit it later. With Biblio images, I copy & paste the name he has given the image on the photo page itself, and add "Biblio" or "peacay" to the front of it, so both the original artist and Biblio get credit. 

WARNING: Biblio is a time-suck. A wonderful, fantastic, time-suck.

 

Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Freebies Guidelines: The 4 C's

[This is one of a series of posts on resources for digital art journalers and collage artists.]

Today I'm going to talk about digital image freebies: The 4 C's: Caution, Consideration, Credit, & Copyright. I'm aware that there are different takes on these topics; please add yours in comments and perhaps we'll get a good discussion going.

In later posts I'll provide links to sources; there are tons of them. My tentative topic list includes vintage freebies; designer freebies; public domain images; free stock images (which I've never used; pointers would be helpful); blog trains & facebook hops; and museums & libraries. 

 

aution

Freebies aren't entirely free. It takes time and effort to find, download, unzip and organize them. It takes hard drive space to store them. They don't always turn out to be what you expected. And really, even for the most prolific user of digital images, there is a limit to how many flowers and ribbons you can use. Or so I remind myself.

Not everyone who offers digital freebies is experienced at making and using them. You may discover – too late – that an image isn't high enough resolution to print well. Or that, though appealing on screen, it's badly scanned or poorly made, with stray pixels and bald spots. Or it might carry some malware that your virus scanner catches, or doesn't. Even well-meaning and experienced folks can make these mistakes. 

Also, some freebie sites are based in countries with different copyright laws than your own. Some individuals just aren't knowledgeable or careful about this. If it looks to you like this might not be legit, go with your instinct. 

Less distressing to you, perhaps, unless like me you're compulsive about credits, is the failure of some generous people to put their names on the files they offer (or to use a code used by so many people it's difficult to keep track: I have four "DD"'s on my credits list.) Actually, I've encountered this problem with items I've purchased as well.

You might spend a morning downloading and unarchiving files only to discover that you have no idea where some of these came from. Unless you're willing to take the time to backtrack through your browser history, you'll have no way to appropriately credit what you just took the trouble to save. 

Take a moment, as you are downloading, to notice and change or add to the filename if needed so that you can find the original again. 

I speak from experience. And I still occasionally miss some.

 

onsideration 

Information wants to be free, they say; and if information were a sentient being it well might want just that. But it isn't. At least, not yet. 

In the meantime, I prefer the philosophy that the originator of information, be it words or images or sound, should be free to decide just how free her creations will be. Art, in any of these forms, does not magically appear out of nowhere. Someone put work into making it, and they have every right to set some limits on how their labor is used. So I believe. 

And yes, that applies to vintage, out-of-copyright images as well. Anyone who has taken on the task of scanning old family photos knows that this is a tedious and time-consuming exercise. Doing it well, at high resolution, carefully straightened and cleaned-up and made the best it can be while maintaining its orignal patina, is exacting indeed. It is labor, and the same considerations apply. 

Pay attention to what the person offering the freebies says about how they may be used. Some are for Personal Use only (PU); some may be used for commercial projects as well (CU). Use care here; if you plan to post to your blog that has advertisements, an income-generating site, that might be considered Commercial Use even if you are not directly earning income from the use of the free images. All this, of course, applies to images you purchase as well. (Disclaimer: I Am Not A Lawyer)

Some people ask that you leave a little love if you download their work, and here I fail the standard myself. And I'm not good at the please link to let me know how you use it request, either. So I encourage you to do as they ask, and not as I do. 

 

redit

Here is where I try to make up for my failings in the softer, fuzzier leaving love part of my obligations. When I use someone's work, I credit it as well as I can manage; you can see how I do that on my flickrstream. There are other, less intensive ways to do this well. 

Credit is the only payment these generous people get for their work, so I try to make it as useful as possible. I try to remember the purpose(s) of credits: to acknowledge the originator of the image for her work and to help viewers find her and her work as easily as possible. With some experience, I have decided to follow the spirit of this, which sometimes presses up against common practice. 

For instance, I rarely link to shops anymore, having discovered that designers frequently switch shops, or they do a guest spot at another shop, or they have work at several shops. Or shops, even big, established ones, vanish overnight. So I link to blogs, or, recently, Facebook pages. Both seem more persistent, and provide links to the person's shop(s) and/or freebie resources. 

But do link, if you can possibly manage it. Of course, if you name the artist/designer, interested people can Google to find them, but this doesn't always work. Or at least, isn't always clear.

I don't provide an entire list of credits everywhere I post a page, but I always provide a link to the flickr image, so a viewer is never more than one click away from the credits. This makes it feasible for me to do this responsibly (at least I think so) without exhausting myself.

 

opyright

Simply put: just because it's on the internet doesn't mean you can use it. And: if it's on the internet, someone is likely to use it. Keep both of these in mind and you'll probably be fine. 

If it's yours, and you don't want it used, don't post it online. If it's yours, and you want to put it online but contain its use, upload only at 72 dpi, which will not print well. And remember that other folks are likely doing the same. 

If it's there, and you want it, look for the owner and see if it might be available. Ask. The worst that can happen is the owner of the image will say no. Or ignore you. Same thing.

If it's available, a freebie!, read the License and/or the Terms of Use. A Creative Commons License, now widely used, does not mean that anything goes; there are different licenses with different terms. Some require attribution (credit), some do not. Some allow commercial use, some do not. And some – the fun ones – allow you to remix or adapt the work; that is, to play with it as you please. 

There is a concept called Fair Use, but I'm not going to go into that because, as I said earlier, IANAL. If you are playing, making art for yourself, then my non-lawyerly advice is simply to avoid any possibility of copyright battles. Even if you are right, and even if (as is likely) you never get caught, getting caught can be exhausting both financially and emotionally. 

If this is a professional (or ethical, or spiritual) issue for you, my non-lawyerly advice is to consult an expert. 

Have I ever taken this risk? I have. Sometimes the artist within insists. Or makes a mistake, discovers it, and goes with it anyway.

But I still advise against it.

 

In summary, be careful, be considerate, give credit, and respect copyright. Freebie does not mean abandon all fair play. It means: Here's a present! Have fun! Help others find the present, too.  

 

The drop caps that decorate this post are freebies from DAILY DROP CAP. 

 

 

 

 

 

Resources for Digital Art Journaling | Shops: One Story Down [CLOSED]

[I'm doing a series of posts on resources for digital art journalers and collage artists. This is the second post on digital shops which focus on art journaling; I'm beginning with shops I've used and been happy with.]

One Story Down does not bill itself as an art journal shop ("We add great NEW digital scrapbooking & crafting products to the shop every Friday!") but it sure has pulled some of my favorite art journaling designers in its so-far brief existence, including the Ardent Sparrow [retired], Sarah Barber [retired], Sissy Sparrows [retired], and Paula Kesselring [now at The Lilypad] (whom I've written about previously.) There are several other designers as well, but these are the ones with which I'm familiar. 

This site is unique in its design, leaning toward clean and uncluttered, unlike some digital scrapbooking shops and forums that lean rather the other way. The forum is notable for the lack of blinkies in signatures, which I find refreshing. It's a new forum, but promising, and I see from a blog post that they are beginning an Art Journaling Workshop in the forum tomorrow, August 10th:

No recommendation from me yet, but I plan to participate and expect to enjoy it. 

Here are a few kits in the shop I am currently coveting (click on the name to go to the blog; click on the image to go to the shop):

From Sissy Sparrows:

From Sarah Barber:

From Tracy Martin & the Ardent Sparrow:

From Paula Kesselring:

This is definitely a shop worth keeping an eye on, and maybe I'll see you in the forum tomorrow?