Exercise: Think of an event where lots of people were present. For 15 minutes or more, write down reactions you think others would give of the event.
Example: Annual family Christmas party – Me: The basement where we have our Christmas party gets pretty crowded, but that just means there are lots of people to greet and laugh with. Grandpa: My favorite part about the Christmas party is seeing the little ones’ faces as they receive one of my Christmas gifts. Mom: I’m just lucky to find a place to sit and eat my food. Aunt Kathy: I wish I could get more people to turn around and smile as I take these pictures.
Goal: Thinking of the story from multiple perspectives puts a new spin on the experience. Once you have ‘pretend’ quotes from each family member, you can create a fun story. Example: Each annual Christmas party is crowded, with aunts trying to take pictures of every incident, cousins playing games in the small corners of the room, and Grandpa telling crazy stories to little ones as they receive their Christmas gifts.
Exercise: Grab a photo, any photo. This can be a picture of you at the beach. It can be of a hike you took at Yellowstone. It can be a picture of your birthday party. Or it can be a simple picture of you and a friend.
Now, for 15 minutes, write everything you can about his photo: who’s in it, where does the picture take place, what smells do you remember from when this photo was taken, why did you take the photo, etc.
Goal: Get yourself thinking about the storybooking process. Storybooking is not only about preserving photos, it’s about preserving the whole memory. And without the words, the pictures don’t mean anything to the reader.
Choosing fonts for your project can be a bit daunting. You want to make sure you pick fonts that go together, and you don’t want to over burden your page by having too many fonts. So, to help you out, we’re providing Fonts 101: a quick tutorial to help you pick the right fonts for your project.
To get started, you’ll need to know the difference between serif and sans serif fonts.
Serif fonts have finishing strokes on the end of the letter, such as in this font. Examples include Garamond and Times New Roman.
Sans serif fonts do not have finishing strokes on the end of the letter, such as the title of this article. Examples include Arial and Calibri.
Now that you know the difference between serif and sans serif fonts, you’ll understand what we mean when we talk about combining the two.
There are two basic types of text you will apply fonts to. One is the title. The other is the body or copy of your story. To begin, let’s talk about the title.
First off, you may have many different titles to deal with depending on your project. If you are doing a poster or a canvas, you will most likely have one title. If you are doing a storybook, you will have the main title of the book and, possibly, sub titles within the book. Make your title consistent to help keep the flow from page to page.
When designing your title, you will want to pick no more than two fonts. As a bit of advice, we would recommend that you do not choose two serif fonts or two sans serif fonts. Mix it up a little. You can choose a fancy font such as Broadway, then add a serif or sans serif font to the mix. Or you can replace that fancy front with a script font such as Shishoni. Or you can go elegant simple and combine a serif and a sans serif font.
For the copy or main text, you will want to choose a readable font. Choose a simple serif or sans serif font, no fancy fonts or script fonts. Good fonts are Garmond, Times New Roman, Avenir, and Trajan. The goal is to help ease the work of your readers. They don’t want to stare at a long piece of writing, trying to figure out what it says, which is what they will do with a script font. (Save script fonts for titles or small pieces of text).
Now you have it. Go ahead and try new title designs. You’ll be surprised at what great designs you can come up with.
Now you can do so much more with your Heritage Makers photo storage system. Not only can you upload photos and store them into albums, but now you can organize those albums into folders.
When you enter My Photos you will see a screen that looks like this.
To the left of the screen is where you can organize all your photos. Make multiple folders and multiple albums. Plus, you can do so much more.
To view an existing album, simply click on a folder. The albums in that folder will drop down. Just click the one you want to view.
To create a new folder, click the button “new folder” located above the photo organizer. Then name the folder (ex. Summer 2009) and click “create folder.”
To create an album, click on the folder you want the album to appear under. Click “new album,” name the album (ex. Lake Michigan), and click “create album.”
Share albums with friends and family by clicking on an album and on the “share” button located below the photo organizer.
Double click on the photo to add a title or caption. Ex. Title: Saving the Easter Bunny. Caption: Brian thought dad really ate the Easter Bunny and was ready to use the plunger to save him.
Also download a high resolution image by double clicking on a photo.
Plus, you can do all this all from within Studio Editor.
Want to share your Heritage Makers projects on your email, blog, Facebook, or another site? Heritage Makers is working to update the embed option but, in the meantime, you can easily post your projects by following these simple steps:
1.In your My Studio, go to the My Projects folder.
2.Right click on the project thumbnail of the project you want to post.
3.Select copy from the dropdown.
4.Paste the image into your email, blog, Facebook, or other site.
5.Add a link.
a.If the post is in an email, you can add the hyperlink to the image.
b.If the post is in a blog, simply add the words “Check out my book” to
the post and hyperlink them.
c.If the post is on Facebook, such as in a note, do the same as you
would a blog, except you will need to use html. Follow the
instructions on the link “format your note” found under the not text
box.
Looking for some Heritage Makers Studio tips and tricks? Keep these ideas in mind when working on your storybooks.
Photo Rubberband
First of all, what is a photo rubber band and what does it have to do with Studio? Actually, a photo rubber band is very important to Studio. It is the colored border around a photo that has been applied to a project. You’ll notice that when you place a photo on a page of your project, the photo has a green border. And the rubber band appears each time you select the photo.
Basically, the rubber band is a reference for increasing the size of your photos. Knowing how the rubber band works will help you print good quality projects.
There are four important colors you will want to keep in mind as you size and resize your pictures: green, yellow, orange and red. The green color indicates the best size for your picture to print in. As the picture’s size increases and the rubber band changes from yellow to orange to red the more likely the picture will not print well. You’ll want to stay away from red as that is the worst quality.
Photo Dimensions
Another important tool to help you create the best quality photos for printing is the box that pops up when you click on a photo in the My Albums tab. The box gives you information about the photo and how it will best print. It may say something like, “In an 11×8.5 calendar, this image prints best at 14.08 inches x 10.56 inches or smaller.” Pay close attention to these dimensions when you place and resize a photo.
2. Choose one template from the hundreds available. (I chose a 5×7 greeting card for my experiment).
3. Your template automatically goes into your Studio account.
4. Add pictures.
5. Add text.
And you’re finished! In just 5 minutes, I was able to create a holiday greeting card, complete with my pictures and personalized text. It’s really that easy. You can send greeting cards for birthdays, anniversaries, the holidays, or simply just because. In 5 minutes, you can make someone’s day with a stunning greeting card.
Don’t have a Heritage Makers Studio account? No worries! Get one for FREE here.
Check out these cool tips for using Heritage Makers Studio!
- Locking each item on your page is a smart way to avoid moving or deleting that object. But locking every item on each page of your book can take a lot of clicks. Now you can do it in one! On your “Edit” menu, you’ll find a “Lock” option. Click on that to see a drop-down menu with the following options: lock all on the page, unlock all on the page, lock all in the project, and unlock all in the project. Fast, easy, secure.
- Do you ever want to stretch an object, but you don’t want to have to go to the Layout tab to unlock proportions, make your change, and then lock proportions again? You can stretch an object quickly and easily just by holding down the Shift key on your keyboard as you drag the sides of the object. When you release the Shift key, the proportions of your object will automatically default to “locked” again.
- After you’ve swapped a photo, if you want to make adjustments to the current photo on the page, lock it first and then go to the “Tools” tab on your toolbox. When your image is locked, you will see “scale” and “rotation” that aren’t available when the photo is unlocked.
We’ve done it again! More new and exciting products from Heritage Makers. Check out our latest…you’re going to love what’s in store.
12×12 individual scrapbook pages
Affordably print your digital scrapbook pages to create a cherished keepsake the entire family can enjoy. Easily print digital pages and place them in the scrapbook of your choice.
Our scrapbook pages are made from velvet paper and are acid- and lignin-free. All pages are single-sided.
Create your own creative pages today!
$3.95/page
Plus, we’ve expanded our quotation library in Studio. We’ve added to your favorites to give you more than 2,000 quotes! Take a look at some of our favorites:
“29 again? Talk about recycling.”
“To us, family means putting your arms around each other and being there.” Barbara Bush
“Forget love–I’d rather fall in chocolate.”
“Good friends, good books, and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life.” Mark Twain
Take some time to search through the quotes library…you’re sure to find the perfect quote for any occasion.
