The Digital Scrapbooking Revolution

[Earl Kelly]

Most of us have been as accustomed to the idea of scrapbooking as a
blending of paper cutting, photo gluing and assembling bits of nice
materials together. All these would be placed on a piece of cardboard,
paper or any other foundation the scrapbooker would like to use as a
medium.
But the world is changing all around us; computers are a big part of
that change and the crafting industry is certainly not immune; not by
a long-shot. Computers are ubiquitous and have penetrated almost every
discipline, both personal and business - this includes the art
disciplines, such as scrapbooking.
Computer scrapbooking, (also known as digital scrapbooking) is done by
way of laying out pages with the assistance of computer software.
Basically, this involves the manipulation of graphics, photos, text,
borders and other add-ons using digital devices. Like with
conventional scrapbooking, the pages may be printed on high-resolution
color printers that the scrapbooker can then paste onto traditional
scrapbook pages. And because the scrapbook lives in a digital format,
copies of the scrapbook can be made at the touch of a button - with
each copy just as beautiful and crisp as the next. Also keeping a
scrapbook in electronic form allows you to more easily archive your
scrapbooks as compared to bulky albums.
Printing your scrapbook requires the use of a high-quality color
printer. There are two basic types of printers: Color Laser and Ink
Jet. In my experience, Ink Jet, as far as quality for printing
photographs goes far exceeds color laser. However, Ink Jet tends to be
more costly when you factor in the expense of the ink. You always have
the option to take your layout on CD to a specialty print shop like
Kinkos, which costs a little more per page, but saves you from having
to bear the cost of own the printer.
There are a number of computer programs that you can make use of when
doing digital scrapbooking. The three most popular are Adobe PhotoShop
Elements 2.0 and CS, Microsoft Picture It!, Lumapix, and JASC's Paint
Shop Pro. All these programs are very effective in helping their users
manipulate their designs. The basic features include photo cutting,
background replacements, change of colors, text adding, border
placement and over-all graphic designing.
The more comprehensive the program (more features), the larger the
scrapbooker's learning curve and the higher the price tag. Therefore,
it may be in the scrapbooker's best interest to start with a simpler
program like Hallmark, CK, Scrapbook Studio, or Scrapbook Assistants
and 'upgrade' to a more full-featured package as his or her skill
level or need for features increases. Regardless, each package is
going to require the scrapbooker to spend some time to master it to
realize the full benefit of the package.
The Internet is teaming with websites that offer pre-designed digital
templates at rock-bottom prices (some are even free) and more and more
popping up all the time. The scrapbooking world is moving at light
speed in the digital direction. There are so many benefits, you may
want to consider making the jump yourself sooner than later.

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