I did a daily prompt at Cocoa Daisy this week, all about using a mat to highlight your photo(s). Yes you heard me right a mat - remember when we used them on all our layouts!! Here is my example:
The third Monday of each month I am doing a design challenge at Cocoa Daisy. Here is my challenge/tip and layout from May:
For this months design challenge I wanted to share with you a little trick on how to draw a person's eye to the primary subject or photo on your layout. The first thing we are usually drawn to in a photograph is a person's face/eyes. Sometimes we have a great photograph were the subject's eyes just pop off the page at us, but other times we need to lead the viewer in the right direction. I have found the best way to do this is by using paper strips and embellishments that will point the viewer in the right direction. I have used a few different techniques on the example below. Most people view a layout from left to right, so I started with a bold black photo turn on the left side of my layout pointing into the page. Next your eye goes to the bright red strip of lace paper. The way the lace paper is positioned it does two things: first the width of it highlights Nate in the picture, bringing your eye down to his face and gloves, second the edge of the paper is centered right in the middle of his eye, so that edge of the paper leads you right down again to his face and eyes. The last thing I did was position the title and bee embellishment cluster to push your eye back into the photo, framing his face. I even positioned the bee's wings so that they line up with Nate's eyes.
The challenge and layout for June:
For this months Design challenge I wanted use one of my favorite layout designs: the grid!! No matter how you lay it out a grid always looks great! You can use big squares, little squares, or even circles in a grid pattern. A grid always looks clean and balanced and my favorite part about using a grid - being able to use up your scraps and have a bunch of different patterned papers on one page.
July's challenge is coming up - I hope you can join us this month!
A fun tip that I posted on the MMM blog this week:
An "a-ha" moment.
You know, one of those moments when something hits you square in the forehead and you think "why didn't I think of this sooner!". Well I had one of those moments the other day when I was trying to decide what size circle punch I wanted to use. It seems every time I go to use a circle punch I have to punch a scrap circle to see what the size will be. Not to mention how I am always measuring the circle punches to figure out what size they are.
So my solution (which is really simple) was to punch a set of circles and label them. Now when I need to find the right size circle punch I just pull out my templates and I am good to go.
Well, now I feel all caught up on my scrappy posting :) Have a great Friday everyone!
2 comments:
Wow. That was a lot of design info to take in. I wish I were so knowledgable on design. I think it would help when I made layouts. Where in the world did you learn all that?
Thanks for sharing it!
Love your layouts! The "where in the world" one really catches my eye with the paper squares. And that's a great tip on the punches too!
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