August 2022 Monthly Challenge Game

[H Keith]

Here is my stroke page

[englishrose]

Here is my LO #2.

Thank you for a great week Mikelle. I've learnt a lot.

[mimes1]

On 8/3/2022 at 12:48 PM, ladyscrapalot said:

Well for the life of me I can't upload my finished layout in the gallery. I have every which way to reduce the size. I did the same way I always do it. I even compared it to a layout I posted yesterday. I also redid that layout using my same method and I get upload that one again. I've closed out of everything and rebooted my computer. I've cleared caches. Before I reduce my layout I compared sizes. They are both the same size. However, after I reduce the image and save as a jpg the file sizes are not the same. The one I can post is 370.3k. The one I can't post is 9.8m. I just can't figure out how to make it smaller. I've tried different ways to no avail. UGH!!!!! Going to try one more thing.

Edit: I was going to try save for web but I don't think that's an option with PS CC phooey.

This happened to me a couple times too. I wound up taking a screen shot of it and uploading that. 

[Mikelle]

Monday, Aug 7th (Week 2, Recoloring):

I decided to try tackling recoloring for the next few days - but I think this will be a little challenging since there are about a thousand different ways to recolor elements.  Over the past week, we did have some discussion about adjustment layers; using a hue/saturation adjustment layer is one great way of recoloring (but make sure you clip the adjustment layer only to the layer you are trying to change!)  Below I've posted several tutorials addressing recoloring: adjustment layers are discussed in a few, and at least two of the tutorials also specifically address selective recoloring, meaning how to change just one color in a multicolored element.  

Since the ability to recolor elements is a major advantage of digital scrapbooking over traditional paper scrapbooking, most of us probably already know at least one way of recoloring.  If you don't know how to recolor yet, pick an appropriate tutorial below and learn how - you'll never look back!  For everyone else, I challenge you to learn and practice a new way of recoloring, different from how you usually do it.  Here are some of the recoloring tutorials available, and your tasks for today are below.   

Recoloring Digital Scrapbooking Elements (PS)

Recoloring Colored ScrapSimple Templates: Hue/Saturation (PSE)

Recoloring Colored ScrapSimple Templates: Color Replacement Tool (PSE)

Technique Tuesday - Recoloring Papers & Elements Nondestructively (PS)

Technique Tuesday - Recoloring Multi-Colored Elements (PS CC)

Today's Tasks:

1.  Choose the photo(s) that you would like to work with.  For this layout, ideally you'll want photos that have a few different colors to work with, so that you can recolor elements to match your photo.  Or, you can pick a more monochrome photo and choose a background paper that you like well enough to use twice - in two different colors.

2.  Choose your background papers, making sure to choose at least one that you don't mind using twice (say what?)   Although several of the tutorials above mention Scrap Simple products, you don't have to use a Scrap Simple paper for this challenge.

3.  Choose one of your papers to recolor.  Do this by duplicating the paper in the layers palette, then recolor just the paper copy.  Find a way to use both the original and recolored paper on your layout.  There are lots of ways you could do this:  Use one color for a background, and the other color as a frame for your photo, or clipped to a mask, etc.  Don't forget you can resize one of the papers, too.

HAPPY MONDAY!

Here is my layout so far...  I used papers from ACA Opposites Attract collection (retired); the original background paper has red flowers, and I changed segments of that paper to yellow flowers (I was trying to match the little tennis ball that Pumpkin, our dog, was playing with).  I used a second paper for a border around the page (original is red), and then changed the red to yellow and used the same paper for a frame around the larger photo; I also made the paper smaller so that the pattern looks smaller on the photo frame than it does on the page border.  So far, I'm happy with my layout!

 

[Belle]

Here is my Week 1 Stroke layout. 

[ladyscrapalot]

@Mikelle Oh yay! I need practice with recoloring!! Can’t wait to check out the tuts. ?

[Mikelle]

Congrats @ladyscrapalot Kelly!  You are our first week's winner!  Email Angie at either hello@scrapgirls.com or prizes@scrapgirls.com and tell her which set of Pocket Life Journaling Cards you'd like!  ($3.99 value).

[Mikelle]

Remember, when it comes to the weekly prizes, you'll get one entry into the drawing for every layout you completed that week.  So, even if you only manage to complete one of the layouts that week, you'll still get one entry.  Two entries total possible per week!   

[Mikelle]

Tuesday, Week 2 (Aug 9th, Recoloring):

How did everyone do with recoloring a paper or two yesterday?  If you've got any questions, be sure to ask! 

Tasks for Today:

1.  Pick the embellishments you'd like on your layout.  Don't finalize their placement yet...

2. Choose at least two of your embellishments to duplicate, and recolor the copies.  Use both color versions on your layout.  If you can (or dare), include at least one multicolored embellishment and change just one or two of the colors.  Another idea, find an embellishment that you like but that doesn't match your layout, and recolor it to match.  If you do this, let us know which embellishment it was so we can all admire it!

Today's post is short, but I wanted to give you links to a few more tutorials that we might not otherwise get to this month.  Unfortunately, two of the tutorials below are missing the images, but if you read through I think you can still pick up some great ideas!

Using Clusters to Create Quick Layouts

The Basics of Clustering Digital Embellishments

Shape Repetition for More Engaging Layouts

[ladyscrapalot]

8 hours ago, Mikelle said:

Congrats @ladyscrapalot Kelly!  You are our first week's winner!  Email Angie at either hello@scrapgirls.com or prizes@scrapgirls.com and tell her which set of Pocket Life Journaling Cards you'd like!  ($3.99 value).

Oh my goodness, I forgot there were prizes! I was just excited about learning/practicing the techniques you're are sharing. Thank you so much! 

[Florida granny]

@ladyscrapalot Congratulations, Kelly and happy shopping! Let us know what you picked.

[Florida granny]

So... I recolored part of a multi-colored embellishment (a rose from Brandy's Cottage Rose collection) and learned that the technique in the tutorial works for PSE as well as for PS CC. Good to know!  I also discovered that when I turned the blue rose into a red one some of the green leaf was affected as well. So I masked it out. These techniques are a lot of fun to play with! Here are my two roses --- they'll find their way onto my layout somewhere.

 

[englishrose]

Here are my recoloured embellishments (EBA_BloomGrow). the change of colour in the ribbon was using the colourise function on hue/Saturation and selecting the ribbon with the Magic Wand tool. It took a while becasue of the diferent tones in the ribbon.

[Mikelle]

Wednesday, Week 2 (Aug 10th, Recoloring):

For this last day of practicing our recoloring techniques, I anticipate I'll hear a few groans once you read your tasks.  The good news is, we'll have another layout done after today!  Bad news (for some of us)...  I want to practice recoloring an alpha.  

Woo hoo, ALPHAS!  I love them, but I know not everyone does.  This probably won't be the last time this month that we'll use an alpha to practice on - in fact, I know it won't be the last time, because there are just too many good tutorials out there that center around alphas.  Yay!  ?

Tasks for Today:

1.  Figure out a title for your page, and find an alpha that you'd like to work with.  The alpha can be multicolored or solid, it doesn't matter.  You can also mix and match alphas.  If you're newer to digital scrapping and you don't yet own any alpha sets, you may use a font instead.  Or, go to this link and sign up to receive the SG Newsletter, and you can download an entire starter kit for FREE, which includes a cool alpha:  Newsletter Sign-Up

2.  Choose at least one letter of your title, and change the color(s) of that letter.  Changing up the color, texture, and/or size of your alpha letters in a title is a great way of adding interest to your layout, by the way... here is a tutorial that will give you other great title ideas to help inspire you to use all those awesome alpha sets you've got!  

Terrific Title Tips

3.  Set your title, place your embellishments (if you haven't already), and put the finishing touches on your layout.  You're done!  Upload it to the Hodge Podge Gallery, then come back to this thread and leave a link to your layout!

***********

Here is my alpha in transformation - I'm using ACA Opposites Attract Alpha 1 (retired).  The first image below is the original alpha, and the second is the recolored version.  When I place it on my page, I will probably change sizes and tilt the letters to add even more interest. 

                       

I used hue/saturation adjustment layers on the P, E, and T.  I changed my foreground color to yellow from my photo using the eyedropper tool, then clicked the "colorize" box in the color adjustment panel for the adjustment layer.  Because I wanted the P and the T to be the exact same color, I wrote down the numbers for R-G-B (red-green-blue) for the P, then made sure the numbers were adjusted to the same for the T.  It was interesting, too, for the red E, I changed my foreground color to red by using the eyedropper to pull red from my background paper, and I clicked the "colorize" box in the adjustment panel again.  Then, instead of messing with the saturation and lightness sliders to get the right color, I just plugged in the same numbers I had written down for the yellow, and voila!  The red matched my layout perfectly!

[Mikelle]

Here is my layout #3 (recoloring layout):  Play Fetch With Me!

[Boatlady]

Here is my recolored page

I recolored a paper, a shovel and the DIG signs.

[Florida granny]

Here's my finished re-color layout: Jatropha.

I have so many interesting alphas but am usually too lazy to use them, so this was a good task!   I recolored an alpha from Syndee's Stories We Tell from gold to red and used a different alpha (from Brandy's Cottage Rose) for the first l letter.

My favorite way to recolor gingham, like the ribbon on my layout and the one on part of @englishrose 's embellishment is to use a gradient map (not a gradient, which is a different thing altogether). I just pick the two colors I want on the ribbon (green and white for mine) and add a gradient map to it. This time I did it twice and used a soft light blend mode to get the right green. I don't think it would work on Hilary's example, unfortunately, because her embellishment also contained leaves, but it's a simple fast way to change one that's on its own.

[ladyscrapalot]

Didn't do as much experimenting with the recoloring techniques as I would have liked. I did discover that I could  take each letter alpha of a word and turn them into a smart object. Meaning I selected the letters R, U, N and then convert those into 1 smart object.  I applied a solid color adjustment layer mask, clipping to the alpha layer.  I changed the blend mode to hard light. I then selected the letters F, R, E, E converting those into a smart object. Next I copied the adjustment layer masked and clipped it to the top of the letters in free. 

Mustangs

[ladyscrapalot]

On 8/9/2022 at 11:33 AM, Florida granny said:

@ladyscrapalot Congratulations, Kelly and happy shopping! Let us know what you picked.

Thanks, Diane! It so hard to chose but I ended up picking My Garden Embellishment Mini Journal Cards by Aftermidnight Designs. I thought they were so pretty!

[Florida granny]

12 minutes ago, ladyscrapalot said:

Thanks, Diane! It so hard to chose but I ended up picking My Garden Embellishment Mini Journal Cards by Aftermidnight Designs. I thought they were so pretty!

So... I just took a look at them. Super choice! I can just picture them on greeting cards as well as in a layout. Congratulations, again.  

[H Keith]

Here is mine

Recolored half background paper with an adjustment layer and clipped to paper.

Recolored arrow, ribbon, leaves and bow with top menu options for recoloring and clipped to element.

Recolored alphas with clipped papers and stroke outline.

[englishrose]

Here is my recolouring LO.

[MariJ]

16 hours ago, Florida granny said:

So... I just took a look at them. Super choice! I can just picture them on greeting cards as well as in a layout. Congratulations, again.  

Oh my goodness, I often wonder what I'd do with journal cards but using them for greeting cards is a great idea.

[Mikelle]

On 8/10/2022 at 7:28 AM, Florida granny said:

Here's my finished re-color layout: Jatropha.

I have so many interesting alphas but am usually too lazy to use them, so this was a good task!   I recolored an alpha from Syndee's Stories We Tell from gold to red and used a different alpha (from Brandy's Cottage Rose) for the first l letter.

My favorite way to recolor gingham, like the ribbon on my layout and the one on part of @englishrose 's embellishment is to use a gradient map (not a gradient, which is a different thing altogether). I just pick the two colors I want on the ribbon (green and white for mine) and add a gradient map to it. This time I did it twice and used a soft light blend mode to get the right green. I don't think it would work on Hilary's example, unfortunately, because her embellishment also contained leaves, but it's a simple fast way to change one that's on its own.

This is a recoloring technique I've never tried! I don't recall ever having used gradient maps for anything before. Hopefully I have some time this weekend to give this a try.  Thank you for explaining it - and I may end up with some questions!

[Mikelle]

22 hours ago, ladyscrapalot said:

Didn't do as much experimenting with the recoloring techniques as I would have liked. I did discover that I could  take each letter alpha of a word and turn them into a smart object. Meaning I selected the letters R, U, N and then convert those into 1 smart object.  I applied a solid color adjustment layer mask, clipping to the alpha layer.  I changed the blend mode to hard light. I then selected the letters F, R, E, E converting those into a smart object. Next I copied the adjustment layer masked and clipped it to the top of the letters in free. 

Mustangs

I also need to play with smart objects.  The way you handled recoloring the alpha sounds pretty straight-forward, I'll definitely have to try this!

[ladyscrapalot]

1 minute ago, Mikelle said:

I also need to play with smart objects.  The way you handled recoloring the alpha sounds pretty straight-forward, I'll definitely have to try this!

I had hoped I explained it well enough. I'm still learning. I took a couple of classes but there is so much to remember. The great thing about smart objects is it's non-destructive. You can easily go back and back changes. Just know it will open in a new window and after you make changes be sure to save it and then close the new window and it will make the changes in you original document.

[Mikelle]

Thursday, Week 2 (Aug 11th, Brushes: )   

Ah yes, brushes!  Like recoloring, learning to use brushes on your layout really opens up a new world of possibilities.    This leads me to realize that I have not announced the prize for the drawing this week (week 2):  A brush set of your choice ($4.99 maximum value)!  Check out the BRUSHES here in the SG Shop.  I spy a bunch of newer ones that I'd love to have!

I will say, I definitely do not know everything there is to know about how to use brushes.  Chances are very good that I will learn something new myself over the next week.  We will have Brushes Part 1 (starting today), and then the first half of week 3 will be Brushes Part 2.  There are so many ways in which we can use brushes that I'd like us to practice on two different layouts.  

With that, let's start with the basics.  Here is a tutorial written by Amy that addresses the basics, guiding us through how to use a brush as a stamp on our layouts - unfortunately the pics in the tutorial once again aren't showing up (boo); this was an issue I had not anticipated before starting the game this month, but hopefully the tutorials are still useful for you.    

Basic Tips For Using Digital Brushes

Below are a few screen shots I took that may help fill in the missing pics in the tutorial:

     The brush tool icon

    The brush tool menu, with size and hardness sliders above.  

  

In the above screen shot, I opened up my brush menu to see some of the default brushes that are loaded into PS CC.  I have not yet loaded any of my own brushes into PS CC, as I just recently switched from PS CS6.  By the way, who is Kyle?  ?‍♀️

I just chose a simple circle brush, at 100% hardness and 100% opacity, and stamped it on my page.  Not too exciting, but even a simple circle stamp has a ton of possibilities - you could clip a photo to it for a round mask, or clip a paper to it for a round paper layer.   

Tasks for Today:

1.  Choose your photos for this layout.

2.  Choose one background paper that is not very busy (ie is solid, or only has a subtle pattern/color variations)

3.  Make a new layer for your brush.  This layer will be empty until you start stamping with your brush.  You could just stamp directly onto your paper layer, but then you're very limited on what you can do with your stamps (like clip photos or papers to it, use styles on it, change the color or texture, use blending modes and adjustment layers, etc)

4.  Find a brush that you'd like to work with as a stamp on your background paper, and practice stamping with it (I think it helps to turn off all layers except the paper layer and brush layer).  Even if you have never bought brushes before, the photo editing program you use likely has a few default brushes, like my circle above - practice with those.  Mess around with all of the settings - color, opacity, size, hardness especially, but then there are many other settings like mix, flow, etc.  Some of the icons I see in PS CC are new to me - yikes!

Happy stamping!

[Florida granny]

Yay, brushes! I've started a page with a cream colored plain paper from Brandy's Botanical and stamped brushes from AFT Essential Light Grunge http://store.scrapgirls.com/Value-Pack-Essential-Grungy-Brushes.html  to give the background a texture. I'm not sure about white on cream, so this whole thing might look different tomorrow.  

 

[ladyscrapalot]

1 hour ago, Florida granny said:

Yay, brushes! I've started a page with a cream colored plain paper from Brandy's Botanical and stamped brushes from AFT Essential Light Grunge http://store.scrapgirls.com/Value-Pack-Essential-Grungy-Brushes.html  to give the background a texture. I'm not sure about white on cream, so this whole thing might look different tomorrow.  

 

I can see the white paint. It adds a nice soft texture. 

[Boatlady]

Ah...I love brushes. I'll get busy. Mikelle you are doing an AMAZING job on the monthly game!!!