Fancy Digital Scrapbooks

Looking for a Little More?

Last month, we looked at Easy Digital Scrapbooks. In my experience, these are a dream come true for people who don’t want to spend a lot of time on photo-memory books, don’t want to learn an in-depth software program, and just want to get something done fast.

I know someone who wanted to make a book of her daughter’s wedding photos. She put it off for 4 years. When I told her about these Easy Digital Scrapbooks, she decided to give it a try and completed the entire book in 4 days. See what I mean? A dream come true.

But what if you’re looking for a little more than easy templates where you simply drop in your photos and add some text?

What if you LIKE spending creative time on photo-memory books? What if you prefer to create and design? What if you really just like not having any limits on where you put photos and text on a page? What if you like playing with fonts? What if learning an in-depth software program isn’t really a big deal to you?

Unlimited Creativity, Design, and Flexibility

That describes me to a T. I look forward to spending creative time digital scrapbooking. I love having no limits, designing pages myself (while still having template and blueprint options to make it quick), and having complete flexibility and control on my pages. I’m a font girl, too.

So while I do recommend to many people the Easy Digital Scrapbook approach that I shared with you last month, I know some people are more like me and want something more.

I “met” Artisan digital scrapbooking software in October 2021. And I fell in love. Hard. 🙂 Having previously been a paper scrapbooker some 10 years before, and having my previous digital scrapbooking company change management and end up out of commission, I found so much to love about Artisan.

“Ripping” digital papers?! Yes, please! Creating your own alphabet “stickers”?! Let me at it! Being able to add drop shadows behind photos/elements and copy entire pages or projects like I’d gotten so accustomed to in 10 years of digital scrapbooking?! Gotta have it!

Artisan by Forever: digital scrapbooking software

Artisan is powerful, creative digital scrapbooking software. It’s a program you purchase and then install on your computer, like Microsoft Word or Photoshop or any other computer program. You can see all the system requirements that your computer needs to run Artisan here, along with a 30-day free trial link. Artisan is designed for a PC, so Mac users use a partitioning program such as Apple Boot Camp in order to use Artisan. (Forever has tried to make a Mac version of Artisan for a while, but let’s just say that Apple likes to be special and they don’t make it easy for anyone to make programs to run on their operating system.)

You’ll find a few extras in Artisan that you don’t get with Create & Print, the free software you’d use for the Easy Digital Scrapbooks we talked about last month.

1. There’s an Auto Fix tool called Perfectly Clear for enhancing photos in Artisan, including photos taken at night.
2. You get additional book sizes in Artisan. Instead of just the 8×8, 10×10, and 12×12 book sizes you get with Create & Print, you can also choose an 8.5×11 as well as an 11×8.5 size.
3. Your books can have 199 pages, whereas in Create & Print books are limited to 99 pages.

I’ve got a 14-minute video telling you the things to know about Artisan here, too.

And if you want to ask Santa for Artisan, tell him about the gift certificates here. 🙂

Digital Art

There are several free art collections you can use in Artisan, and you can check them out at that link. Otherwise, you purchase art collections, download them to your computer, then upload them to Artisan. You can tag your art to make it easier to search across art collections (tagging video tutorial here), too. Here is an eensy, weensy sampling of the available digital art.

Isn’t it fun?! FYI, digital art is on sale almost all the time, and there are 50% off Deals of the Day as well. You can always see current sales at the Deals link.

How to Get Started Digital Scrapbooking with Artisan

First, see what creating with Artisan looks like at this tutorial I made called “A Basic Artisan Page.”

Second, open a (free) Forever account here. Using that link gets you a $20 coupon (if you’re new to Forever) and connects us so that I’m the person you’ll work with for resources, questions, etc. Just verify your email and you’ll get the coupon, which is good for 60 days so you can use it on Artisan or on digital art!

Third, once you’re logged in, select the “Products” tab and then “Artisan software” from the drop-down menu. I suggest the 30-day free trial, but you can certainly just purchase Artisan on the spot if you prefer.

Fourth, following the steps outlined in the “A Basic Artisan Page” tutorial above, start making a page! 🙂 The width of the cover will change as you add more than 21 pages, so I always suggest saving the cover for last.

As you create your pages in this Fancy Digital Scrapbooking method, I highly recommend you bookmark the Artisan Quick Tips with Jennifer playlist on YouTube! As I started learning the Artisan program, I made notes to myself to remember how to do things. I didn’t have anyone to teach me, so I did a lot of Googling. I didn’t find anything very expansive, so any time I learned something new, I made a note, and I eventually made tutorial videos to help other people learn a little more easily than I did.

At that playlist, you’ll find video tutorials, each covering one aspect of Artisan, such as adding a drop shadow, how to use a text box and change fonts, using the Wish List to save digital art you want some day, how to view a two-page spread, how to rotate something 90 degrees, etc. There are 55+ videos there now, but I add more whenever I learn something new.

Artisan Online Digital Scrapbooking Group Options

I have designed those Artisan Quick Tips with Jennifer videos to really get you going in Artisan, able to do a lot of amazing, fun things.

There are two online digital scrapbooking group options you can take advantage of, too.

The first one is my own little private group, which is not exclusive to Artisan–it’s dedicated time once a season for people to sit down and work on photos and memories. It can be whatever you want. Organizing photos. Sorting through photos to delete extras. Putting photos and memories in pages using the Easy Digital Scrapbooking method we looked at last time, or the Fancy Digital scrapbooking method using Artisan. It’s whatever your photos and memories need. It’s called Photo Rodeo: Rein in Your Photos, and you can find the next session of it at this link. It’s free. You can ask me your Artisan questions there, too, if you want. Or email photoandstorytreasures@gmail.com

The second option is a group called Pixels2Pages, run by Artisan experts called Pixies. (So cute.) Once you’ve gotten your feet wet with Artisan, if you want to up your game, the pros can help you do that! The Pixels2Pages membership includes monthly blueprints (editable templates to use in Artisan, designed by Pixies), weekly step-by-step guides and videos, the Start2Finish video series, access to a full library of training resources, productivity challenges, online “crops,” and more.

Share!

I mentioned this last month, but it’s definitely worth mentioning again! Once you’ve completed a book or even a page, I’d love to see it! I have a Facebook group which is a great place to ask questions, get information, and be inspired, but one thing I especially love about it is that it’s also a great place to share! Join the group at that link, and then feel free to share your accomplishments so we can all celebrate together.

I can’t help sharing mine! Artisan digital scrapbooking is absolutely amazing, in part because it offers so much creativity and flexibility that I find so fun, but in part because it allows me all the benefits of memory-keeping: an increase in gratitude, connection, relaxation, happiness/mood, and a decrease in stress! It also improves memory and has a centering, grounding effect.

And who doesn’t need that?