WOW!  It has been a LONG time since I posted.  I plan to use this blog to document my scrapbooking and photography journey.  I am currently taking the "Oh,Shoot" class with Candice Stringham, the new "Up & Running" class with Jessica Sprague, and the Digital Journaling class at JS, too.  I happen to have the Beautiful Evidence, Brushabilities, Digi in Deep classes open and in progress, also.
     I've been scrapping a bunch of layouts about Vivi and Ewan and a few just about my feelings.  So I thought I would upload a few and make some comments about what I was trying to achieve.  So here goes...

     This is a photo Lexie sent me from their trip to Oregon.  I've been dying to try a technique I saw in a tutorial at Oscraps.com.  When I saw this picture with the long stairs it made me instantly think of the Part Photo, Part Sketch technique.  I thought it turned out great.  I wasn't completely happy with the watercolor brush strokes at the edge of the photo, but I'm still collecting good brushes.

   I saw another layout that used this kind of perspective with a frame, so I decided to do another layout with this same photo.  See what you think...

 

   I loved the colors of this kit, but it fought a bit with Vivi's bright pink sweatshirt, so I decided to make that part of the photo have sepia tones.  That turned out to be WAY harder than I thought it would be.  I'm limited by my ease with the photoshop tools and I don't always remember how the selection tool works.  But I fiddled around for a while and I got it.

   I scraplifted a layout of Vivi on the Beach (same trip as in the layouts above).  I didn't do any real blending, but the mask makes it look like I did.  I had real difficulty finding just the right place for the script and flower.  Brian thinks it looks totally out of place, but I like the artsy feel of it.  Check it out...

 

 

    In my photography class I've been working on aperture and shutter speed.  I took Ewan to my school's skating party and thought it would be a good place to practice my lessons.  There is one major problem--poor lighting.  But I shouldered on and got one particularly great shot that I put into a layout. 

 

 

 

   The composition was strictly an accident.  I was lucky to get a shot at all; he did not like holding still for the camera.  The aperture was about as wide open as I could get it and the boken effect is just spectacular.  I kept the layout super simple so the focus is totally on the photo.  I scraplifted the doodle border idea.

 

     These layouts have gotten some nice comments in the JS gallery.  Till next time....