Scrapbooking is a way to preserve personal and family history in the form of photographs, printed media, and memorabilia contained in decorated albums, or scrapbooks. In addition to photographs, postcards, and other memorabilia, journaling is often a principle element in scrapbooks. Journaling is the writing that describes, explains, accents or even tells the story behind the photographs on a scrapbook page. Journaling includes song lyrics, quotes and poems. Some even believe that a scrapbook without any journaling is just another fancy photo album. A few of the basic materials that are used for scrapbooking include background papers, photo corner mounts, scissors, rubber stamps, stickers, art pens, archival pens for journaling, paper scraps and a few adhesives like, glue, dots, tape or mediums. More elaborate designs require more specialized tools such as die cut templates, craft punches, stencils, inking tools, embossing tools, paint, paint brushes, and die cut machines. Accessories, also known as "embellishments," are used to decorate the scrapbook pages. These include rub-ons, stamps, eyelets, brads, alphabet letters, buttons, ribbons, lace, any cloth materials and thread.
While some people prefer the physicality of the actual artifacts they paste onto the pages of books, the digital scrapbooking hobby has grown in popularity in recent years. The advent of scanners, desktop publishing, page layout programs, and advanced printing options make it relatively easy to create professional-looking layouts in digital form. Through the internet, scrapbookers may publish their work. Some of the advantages include a greater diversity of materials, less environmental impact, cost savings, the ability to share finished page elements in multiple ways without making permanent adjustments. When you create a digital layout, you do it in much the same way that you would a traditional layout, in that you layer papers and elements on top of one another. Each paper, photo or embellishment exists on its own layer in your document, and you can reposition them any way you'd like. Digital scrapbooking is not limited to digital storage and display. Many digital scrappers print their finished layouts to be stored in scrapbook albums. Others have books professionally printed in hard bound books to be saved as keepsakes. Professional printing- and binding-services offer free software to create scrapbooks with professional layouts and individual layout capabilities. The most commonly used programs are Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Photoshop Elements, Jasc Paint Shop Pro, Microsoft Digital Image Pro or Ulead Photo Impact. It is also possible to use other programs such as FotoFusion, but does not have the same capabilities as the other programs.
You can personalize your paper scrapping with any of the many digital kits. For instance typing you date, name, special moments on labels and then printing them out on card-stock, photo paper, or even transparencies and adding to your paper based layouts or projects. You can personalize your paper scrapping with any of the many digital kits. For instance typing you date, name, special moments on labels and then printing them out on card-stock, photo paper, or even transparencies and adding to your paper based layouts or projects. Mixing the 2 is becoming more and more popular as people are realizing that if they don't want to give up their paper products, they don't have to. They can still use the digital kits and their paper supplies to create unique, gorgeous keepsakes.
I have found some wonderful sites throughout my research on scrapbooking that may help you get started. The first site that I came across was JenStrange. This site offers tutorials, FAQ's, tips, and other useful information that helps out if you're a beginner in scrapbooking. Another great site is Two Peas In A Bucket, which allows you to post your work and view other great layouts from wonderful talented scrapbookers. It is also a great place to network. These sites' goals are to provide help and resources to anyone, any age, interested in the digital or paper scrapbooking world. They try to provide different and new ways to design layouts and ways to use elements and the tools for this hobby. One of the sites, Big Pictures Scrapbooking, offers workshops and classes around the state which give you the opportunity to register and become part of a live lecture. I really enjoyed these sites because it provided me with tons of helpful ideas and gave me the knowledge to understand and view this new hobby in a different and interesting way. I believe these sites would encourage you and inspire you to start creating wonderful memories. Recently, I joined Scrap in Style TV in which I uploaded a few of my scrap layouts, you can go and check them out!
Most of the information was obtained from: : Wikipedia
