What advice would you give a newbie?

farrijc

farrijc

Active member
Other than directing her to some of the awesome tutorials here, what advice can I give my friend that wants to start digital scrapbooking? I suggested she download the free trial of photoshop elements, then start searching the web for tutorials. She also asked if there are any books out there that I would recommend. I said I didn't know of any, but that you guys might :thumbup:
 
I'd tell her to browse the online galleries first, and get a feel for what style of scrapping she is attracted to (clean/simple, art journally, clustered etc) before she goes buying books.
 
My biggest help was a video tutorial series that I bought when I was just getting started. It was custom to whatever version of PS or PSE that you owned. It made me not loose my brains while trying to figure it all out. I don't know of any books really. I did get the scott kelby book for my version of PSE when I had it to learn how to edit my pictures better and do some cool detail photo work. That was helpful and led into some scrapbook knowledge also.
 
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The biggest thing that helped me - look at other pages and try duplicating what I liked most. Look at what I liked about the pages, figure out what it was I liked, then googled how to do it myself.
 
I don't know of any books for digital scrap booking. Scott Kelby's books for photoshop are well done, but are focused on photo editing.

Jessica Sprague classes on her site are good. The beginner one is just starting again and the lessons are all redone with PSE11. Renee Pearson also has a class, but I haven't taken it. Digital scrapbook teacher is another option. I'm sure there is lots of free help out there too, but half the battle is knowing what to search for when you are just starting out.

Did you warn her as to how addicting this hobby is?
 
I wish someone had told me in the beginning: Take your time and don't let it overwhelm you.

If she already has a traditional scrapbook, she may want to try creating some of her same ideas into digital. Once she gets the hang of that and her editing program, things will get easier and easier. Looking at digital galleries is also a good idea and just checking out tutorials from the scrap site(s) that she favors.
 
Tell her to keep her eyes open here on May 1st for an AMAZING new product from Janet Phillips that will teach her to digital scrapbook like a pro!
 
I would tell her 2 things:

1. Get yourself a set of shadow layer styles
2. Take one of the wonderful PS or PSE classed geared towards digital scrapbooking. I can recommend the ones I took years ago if you want to send me a pm.
 
I was going to mention shadows like Jaimie said ^^. There are some good shadow styles around, and it'll keep her from going crazy trying to figure them out at first! It's easier to have a set and learn to tweak them in the beginning, I think :)

Oh, and to check out the awesome freebies here <3 lol!
 
I would definitely recommend Jessica sprague's beginner class but also ditto the shadow styles. Jessica tends to be a bit less dramatic with her shadow styles than I like. I started with her classes and they really go through things step by step.
 
The Daily Digi also has a manual of some kind that breaks down digital scrapbooking into more manageable chunks :)

(and now I'm intrigued by Robin's teaser)
 
there are loads of books. I have bought a few when I first started. They helped me a lot.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=sr_nr_n...ooking&ie=UTF8&qid=1365400660&rnid=2941120011

I also buy scrapbooking magazines and books periodically. I enjoy just browsing to see what is out there even though I mostly scrap digitally I do paper projects just not layouts.

Browse the galleries and different sites. See if she is attracted to a certain type of layout. I personally love simple layouts with a lot of white space, photoless layouts and clustery layouts. Combing one or more of those is the best :)

Learn your program as best you can. THat I think is the most important thing above everything else. Learn the shortcuts to the program too. Before I memorized the most used shortcuts I took so much time clicking on the menu to get to what I needed. So much easier to press the keys that do the same thing.

And the last thing is to remember to have fun. I love scrapbooking so much. It is one of the few hobbies I have kept up with consistently for many years now. I do have other hobbies but I take frequent breaks from them.
 
If she's not familiar with PS, I'd maybe suggest getting a Lynda.com subscription for a month and go through the PS tutes there for the version she gets. I know I would have been totally lost when I started scrapping if I hadn't already known PS well.

Its always fun when new people get excited to scrap!!
 
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