The physical labor paid off: our engagement announcements came out great! The above picture is a scan, so it's not going to be color accurate, but the ink is an antique gold and the paper is a blush pink. I'm going to slowly be adding photos of it as part of my documentation of the planning process, so keep checking my Flickr account for new uploads. I'm going to try to get some done tonight.
If you're a design-it-yourselfer like I am, and you like this look, here was my supply list:
Since you need all hands in the studio that are available, I couldn't take step-by-step pictures of the process, but I will be going back soon to press the holiday ornaments for the swap, so if anyone would like to see them, comment here to request them. I will, however, give you a brief overview of what to do to press your own. I can't get too specific, because the process greatly depends on what kind of press and images you're using, but here we go:
Design your invitation or announcement, then get it ready for prepress. Convert all images to black and white, and outline our text so it becomes a vector image rather than a font. If you don't use SmartSet, the Linotronic film vendor I have linked above, contact your negative producer to see what formats they'll accept. My file was submitted as an Illustrator file. Send off your file, and you'll usually receive it back fairly quickly.
When you have your negative, prepare and make your plates. This step, and the negative making process, can be consolidated by simply by having your plates made by Boxcar Press. You can choose metal or vinyl backed plates - vinyl are more flexible and transparent, so you can easily register and square off your plates with a Boxcar base (available through them). I recommend vinyl, but it's a personal preference - if you end up washing your plates out by hand, you may prefer metal backs.
To make your plates, they need to be exposed to UV light. Place the negative so that it is wrong-reading (emulsion side down) on the surface of the plate and expose it - 3 minutes is generally enough if you have strong bulbs. The plate will noticeably be different - exposed areas will have slightly changed color. Wash out your plates gently in a lukewarm bath with a soft brush (Boxcar supplies these brushes as well, I believe) until the gummy surface of the unexposed plate has washed away and water rolls off of the surface like it would on glass. Let the plate dry thoroughly; it's best to do a flash dry with a hair dryer so that water spots are avoided as much as possible. If you have a plate dryer, let it sit in there for 10-15 minutes. Re-expose the plate without the negative for equal to or slightly more time than it took to initially expose it to completely harden the plate. If you're using vinyl plates (instead of metal backed with a magnetic base), you'll need to add plate adhesive to the back of it, which is also available at Boxcar.
After nearly a year of ignoring my studio space at home, I've decided it is high time to make it look more like a graphic designer works there. Don't get me wrong - it's really pretty: lavender accent walls with a light cream carpet, a large window that floods the space with light, and these awesome industrial-style glass and silver metal desks and shelving units from CB2. Other than the basics, though, it's not very inspired - or maybe it's that I'm just not very inspired by it? Whatever the case, it's clearly upgrade time, as I'm planning on doing some freelance graphic design work for the indie community in the near future (more on that soon), and will be spending my weekends almost exclusively in there! I figured I'd share since (in my opinion) the more you like your work environment and the more professional you think it looks, the more you'll take yourself seriously - and in turn, your clients!
My first step: wall lettering. I want to spell out "THE STUDIO" - nothing too creative, because I don't want to be locked into a name I can't or won't want to use later. I was originally considering buying these cardstock letters from Target, installing them quickly and calling it a day, but I thought it would be great to have some dimension to them, since the light is really beautiful in that room. I had been looking through Joann a few weeks back and found some really awesome dimensional letters that appeared to be made of chipboard - there are also these wood letters available online, though I think I'd prefer a flat edge to a beveled one. Since I want them white, I'm planning on painting the letters with Gesso, but you could use a variety of paint media to cover it if you'd prefer a different color. (If you're interested in coloring it but still maintaining some of the wood grain, why not try painting it with gouache? Gouache seems expensive, but if you use it right, it can go a long way, and the price could be well worth the final results!) Although I'm keeping it as a flat, graphic color, you could also consider rubbing the paint down with sand paper for a more grunge look, or focus on just the edges with your sand paper for an antiqued look.
I haven't decided on how I'll mount them yet, but I may end up purchasing a white Ikea Lack shelf (it's thick, basic, and modern looking), or I may just make something similar and set the type on that. The other option would be to mount them directly to the wall, which would probably look better given how clean the rest of the aesthetics in the room are. I'm going to run to Home Depot - I'll let you know what they recommend for that!
I received this email from Caroline today, and thought it would be a useful question to post:
Hi!... I am currently in the throes of wedding planning and even though I'm an abysmal DIY person, I thought I would take on the monumental challenge of designing my own wedding invitations. I have no background whatsoever in graphic design but I want to challenge and make something myself. I by no means plan on starting a letterpress company, I'm just trying to push my creative envelope. I'm in the process of learning how to use Adobe Illustrator and playing around with live trace and I was wondering if you could advise me on the following. I am into the pretty engraved letterpress illustration you discussed and I'm wondering how it's created- in particular botanical illustrations. Do designers take old engraved prints or photos and live trace and play around with the design? Or do they freehand them and scan them in? I have attached the following sites: to me they look almost identical- is there a botanical illustration resource book that these designers use?...
I'm just a novice but I would love any insight as to how this engraved botanical illustration look is created. I would like to use that engraved style and add my own designs that have been floating in my head.
Letterpress illustrations come in one of two ways: the company either hires an illustrator (or retains one in-house) to have them drawn specifically to their needs, or out of copyright engravings are used. Since you're not a business or planning to be, as you mentioned, you'll probably want to go the out of copyright route - so I'll focus my time on that...
Most of the Dover Publications-esque resource books are out there aren't really of the caliber that letterpress wedding invitations generally use. For that reason, to find out of copyright engravings I'd head to the library, antique store with a book section, or a vintage books store. If you have samples of the kind of illustration you're looking for, the staff will most likely be able to direct you to what you need. Browse through some books and find a few samples you like, then buy the books or check them out. I'd make sure you have a few possibilities - in design, I find that you never truly know what works until you try it, and sometimes the prettiest artwork can disappoint you! If that's a dead end for you, I found this thread - some of the suggestions aren't very helpful, but it's still worth taking a look at. Also try your shot at Gutenberg.org - it's a site with a bunch of online out-of-copyright texts, and they upload the book's artwork as well. I was able to find a few things when searching for "flower", "botanical", and "engraving".
Because of the nature of polymer plate letterpress, it's not necessary for designers to use Live Trace in Illustrator [blog note: Live Trace is an automatic function in Illustrator which allows the designer to automatically convert Bitmap ("pixelated") images into vector ("non-pixelated", graphics are drawn by mathematical equations by your computer) based on a variety of preferential settings] - all you need is a nice, rich black. The same applies if you're planning to use Gocco - it's the quality of the black that matters. It will actually give you better aesthetic results if you don't Live Trace it - by turning the engraving into a vector image, you lose the handmade quality of the illustration, and thus, the beauty and personality this type of letterpress design capitalizes on. I recommend just scanning in the art, adjusting the scan in Photoshop (or a similar program) to suit your needs (the contrast and levels will probably have to be adjusted slightly), then printing it out on a laser or carbon-based ink printer to get those blacks you'll need for exposure on the plates or the Gocco. If you are going the letterpress route, I'd recommend having your plates sent out - small detail, which is essential to this kind of artwork, can be difficult to achieve if you haven't done the process before. I'd point you to Boxcar Press for that - they have a great reputation, and they're pretty cheap - plus, that means less supplies to buy and fewer chemicals lying around, huzzah!
A big congratulations to Caroline on her upcoming nuptials! I hope that was informative for her as well as everyone else - and please, if you have a question, don't be afraid to ask! If I can't answer it, I'll try my hardest to point you in the right direction!
Among many things I dabble in, I love jewelry. Other than paper crafting, there's really nothing more relaxing that wrapping wire while watching a movie - I can't really explain it, and maybe it's just me. If you're one of those who, like me, love to keep their hands busy, it's certainly a worthwhile thing to pick up. Here's some suppliers and tutorials to keep you busy (in no particular order).
Suppliers
Fire Mountain Gems and Beads: really great supplies to get you started. There's a lot of diverse stuff, and their customer service is very helpful.
Rings and Things: Probably my favorite supplier. They've got a lot of unique items, and it's my go-to place for charms at the moment. Shipping is very quick, and their customer service is amazing.
JewelrySupply.com: I have yet to order from them, but they seem to have a pretty good assortment. I like to do a lot of simple charm work in my jewerly, and I'd definitely consider them when buying in the future.
Frost Creek Charms: Exclusively silver-toned metal charms, but they have a great selection.
Laramie Studios at EBay: Far and away my favorite source for vintage beads. Since they're located near Providence, Rhode Island (which used to be the jewelry capital of the world), they have great resources at their fingertips and have great finds! They're consistently very helpful and friendly, as well.
Beadin' Path: A somewhat recent find for me, Beadin' Path has a lot of great Vintage jewelry supplies, including Lucite beads, cabs, and pendants. I like that I can shop by color, which is really helpful when I have a project already in mind and know the color and material I want to work in.
Tutorials
Fire Mountain Tutorials: Fire Mountain has a lot of really great beginner to advanced tutorials to learn from. They're well-written and extremely helpful, regardless of what level of crafting you're on.
Norma Jean Polymer Clay Food Tutorials: Mini polymer clay food jewelry is pretty big, and nobody does better tutorials for getting into makng them than this website. The bakery section? Far and away my favorite - I'm a carbs kind of girl.
This project evolved from being generally dissatisfied with the selection of Father's Day cards at retail stores this year. I love letterpress, but the beauty of that technology is lost on my dad, so it didn't make sense to go that route, either. It came down to trying to figure out what was uniquely him, but I had already gotten him an eight pack of tickets to the Yankees for him and a friend for the holidays, and I absolutely refuse to buy a Jimmy Buffet CD, regardless of whether or not I end up keeping it. Yyou see, my father (the wonderful man he is) would like to imagine he spends every day in paradise. He's at the beach every moment he can be, and spends most of the summer in Hawaiian shirts with various strange prints on them, from beer mugs and bottles to Hawaiian luau girl bobble bodies (you know, those little luau girls you stick on your car and they dance when you drive).
That was my "ah-ha!" moment. How cute would it be if I could recreate his Hawaiian shirts with a card, but not so, well, kitschy? I was determined. Here's the process of how I made the card. It's super simple, and if you have all the supplies together from the get-go, it only takes 10 to 15 minutes. This obviously doesn't have to be a Father's Day card; the sample I made for the photos on this tutorial are a more preppy-looking patterned shirt or polo, and the design can be altered to make more specific shirts that apply to the person you're handing this to at the end of the day.
You'll Need:
Patterned or Solid Paper for Shirt "Material", larger desired size of card
Folded Blank Card (or Flat Card that can be folded)
Glue Stick (I don't recommend PVA or white glue for this - it makes the paper too wet and flimsy)
Scissors
Envelope for Mailing or Giftability
You May Want:
Solid Paper for "Button Strip"
Small Buttons (adhere with a glue gun) OR Printed Stock Photography of a Button, Cut Out (used in this example, and shown cut in the lower left corner for scale)
Bone Folder for simpler, cleaner folding
Ruler
Heavy Book to press card flat when finished
Step One: Turn folded card to front, ensuring the fold is crisp and even. Apply glue with glue stick liberally and evenly, leaving no chunks on the surface while still covering it completely.
Step Two: With the patterned paper face down, flip the glued side of the card over and carefully align the folded side to the edge of the paper. If you don't align the folded side and use the booklet side instead, you'll have a bit of trouble cutting in the next step. When the fold is perfectly aligned to the edge of the paper, press down to adhere the card to the paper. Give it about thirty seconds to set before continuing; you may place a heavy book on top of the card to make the paper really stick to the card.
Step Three: When the paper has been allowed to set, trim the excess paper away from the card. I set it aside to use it for another project, but you can use it to decorate your card or line your envelope later.
Step Four: Measure or eyeball the center and cut two inches straight down the center of the card.
Step Five: Fold over one part of the cut so the non-patterned side is exposed. If you have a bone folder handy, use it to make a clean fold; if not, use your thumb. The collar should ideally be square with, but not reaching, the edge of the card. Repeat on the other side.
Step Six: To make the base of the color, cut a strip of paper (I used the white back of the patterned paper) and cut a slight notch at the top of it.
Step Seven: Fit the notch into the area where the cut stops at the lower part of the folds as shown. Use the glue stick to adhere it.
Step Eight (Optional): Using cut out printed images of a button or small real buttons, arrange on white strip and space evenly. Glue paper cut outs with glue stick; use glue gun for real buttons (paper cutouts are recommended if you are mailing the card to avoid any broken or ripped off buttons when going through the post office machines). Glue down both sides of the collar for a more graphic look, as illustrated above, with a glue stick, and press the face of the card down with a heavy book.
There's a grand tradition in my house of me making things for people as gifts that must have started from when I was as young as five. This past holiday, I scrapbooked for the first time because it was my first year living in another part of the country from my family and wanted to give her something that was distinctly about the two of us and how much I appreciated her.
My next gift (which may or may not get out to her in time) is going to be a mini spa kit. My mom works a part time job but also runs an EBay business, so she's constantly busy and, with my brother only just 18 and still living at home, stressed out as well.
I thought I'd share my recipe for bath salts (which I've used and perfected in the past - I developed and branded product in the bath and body industry for an assignment in college) for anyone else looking for a personal touch. Some of the ingredients also have links to suppliers I've used in the past to help you out if you don't have anything handy. I apologize that this tutorial won't have photos as my digital SLR camera USB cord seems to have run away, but I'll try to update with a photo of the finished product later.
TRIO OF BATH SALTS Bath salts are a quick and easy way to make any bath more soothing. Including them in multiples allows the receiver to choose a fragrance that best suits their mood, or the mood they'd like to be in!
With a kitchen scale or by eye, measure out the number of ounces of salts that your container will hold; add on an additional two to four ounces to compensate for any salt shrinkage that may occur as you add wet materials to them. Move measured salts into a mixing bowl or other large container that you will NOT use for food in the future - obviously, not a good idea to eat essential or fragrance oils, even if it smells like chocolate, or blueberry muffins, or whathaveyou.
Begin with your food coloring - if you choose not to color your salts, you can skip this step. Color choice is based on personal preference; if you have a color theme that your scent doesn't fit into, it's not a big deal. Because food coloring is a wet ingredient, it is important to add this in slowly and in small quantities at a time. Add it in drop by drop, mixing the salts as you go with a spoon or other tool that you can dispose of after the batch is complete. When you have achieved your desired color intensity, put the food coloring aside and continue to mix for five minutes or so as the salt dries and absorbs the last bits of dye. If after this the salt still appears wet, spread it out on wax paper over a large, flat surface to allow it to dry further before proceeding - it will not absorb the fragrance well it is still too wet, in my experience.
Once your bath salts are dry, you can begin to add fragrance. There is no exact formula to tell when you have exactly the right amount of fragrance added, but you can certainly under- or over-fragrance these salts. When you've added too much, the salts become incredibly wet and begin to shrink. There's no "in-the-process" way to really tell when you've added too little - you just have to wait until they're dry to test their aroma. If it's too weak, you can just add more fragrance and let them dry again. in my experience, it's better to add more fragrance than to be wimpy with it, as long as you're still falling short of the salts shrinking. Since you need to air dry them, some of the fragrance will be lost in the process, so personally stronger is better for me.
After placing your salts back in the mixing bowl, begin adding your fragrance, blending it in as you add (as you did for the coloring). Eye droppers are extremely helpful during this process so you can have a greater "drop by drop" control of the fragrance - you don't want to add a lot at a time. It's good to take short breaks between adding batches of fragrance to ensure your salts are absorbing them by mixing without adding additional fragrance.
After adding the fragrance, the salts should look a little slick, but not sopping wet. There should not be excess fragrance in the bottom of the bowl after blending; if there is, drain it out of the bowl. Distribute salts evenly over a sheet of wax paper on a large, flat surface and let them dry for a couple of hours (or until dry to touch). The salts must be allowed to dry thoroughly before being placed in containers.
All that's left then is to pack them up and design the packaging (perhaps use the Spring Gift Tag Kit?)! You salts will be able to be used immediately, although I've personally noticed the fragrance pops a lot better when used after a week or two.
Using the Spring Gift Tag Kit is simple. Here are some instructions and suggestions on how to get started. They are broken down by program - Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop (free trial programs available at Adobe's website). Photoshop instructions can be mirrored in most other similar photo editing programs, such as Paint Shop Pro.
Please note these instructions were based on CS2 program organizations and capabilities - older versions may have different functions listed in different places.
Getting Started
There are three pages within the PDF provided. The first is a title page, the second is for dielines (paths that are drawn out to mark where to cut) and TO/FROM copy, and the third features different decorative edges and graphic elements. Open the second PDF page in either Photoshop or Illustrator and choose your gift tag shape(s). To make things simpler, you may want to create a new letter-sized document at 300 DPI as a workspace. You can use this document later to copy and paste the finished composition to make multiples if you'd like to make them in quantity.
Choose your color scheme. Not really sure what colors to pick? If you have Adobe Illustrator, you can open up a number of swatch libraries and browse color options for inspiration. This can be found under Window » Swatch Libraries. I highly suggest using the Brights, Garden, and Pantone Pastel Libraries for this project.
Determine your tone. Is the occasion fun or formal? Different combinations of the typefaces available in this kit (or ones you have yourself!), colors, and design elements can send different messages.
Changing Colors
Adobe Illustrator: Probably the simplest way to change the elements from black and white to match your color scheme, simply select the item you want to change and you'll notice that on your toolbar, the colors will show up (visual). These swatches represent the fill color (solid square swatch, shown in visual as the white swatch) and the stroke color (square swatch with square hole in middle, shown in visual as the black swatch). You can either double-click the swatch you want to change to bring up the Color Picker or you can simply click once on the swatch to bring it to the foreground then click any square in the Swatch Library window if you have brought one up (directions to opening the libraries can be found in Getting Started).
Adobe Photoshop: There are two ways to change colors in Photoshop, and which way you use depends on which element you're using. If you are coloring a dieline which already has a black stroke, select the Magic Wand Tool and make sure Anti-Aliasing is turned on (visual) and select the white area inside the dieline. Use the Paint Bucket to fill the white interior with the color of your choice. If you are changing the color of one of the silhouette graphics or type, select the element and make your color choice and open up a separate document. Ensure that the imported page has already been rasterized (Layer » Rasterize » Layer) before you continue, or this will not work. Paste the graphic into this document and create a new layer (Layer » New...). Flood the entire new layer with the color you want to change it to with the Paint Bucket. Navigate to Layer » Layer Style » Blending Options and under "General Blending", choose "Lighten" as your blend mode. The graphic should now be knocked out in the solid color. If you're up for experimentation, try different blend modes or instead of a solid color, try a pattern.
Size/Orientation Changes
Adobe Illustrator: Size can be changed with the Free Transform Tool on your tool bar or by navigating to Object » Transform » Scale. When using the Free Transform Tool rather than the Scale pop-up function, you can hit the Shift button on your keyboard to scale proportionately (without distortion). Orientation can be changed by navigating to Object » Transform » Reflect and choosing "Vertical" under the Axis options. Similarly, items can be rotated by choosing Rotate rather than Reflect on the same menu and entering the angle of your choice.
Adobe Photoshop: All transformations can be done through the Edit » Transform menu in a similar fashion to Adobe Illustrator. Changing orientation is easier in Photoshop because they have the "Flip Horizontal" and "Flip Vertical" functions. To change from left to right (and vice versa), choose Flip Horizontal; to swap from top to bottom (and vice versa), choose Flip Vertical.
Finishing Up
Use a hole punch on whichever part of the tag you want to use to affix it to the gift. Consider a fabric ribbon for more formal tags or shredding curling ribbon (by cutting it in half to make thinner, more attractive curled ribbon) for more fun, playful tags.
Consider fun materials to us e along with the ta. Rhinestones? Grommets? Embossing powder? Think of all the possibilities!
Hope this helps! Comment with any other questions you may have.
I don't know about you, but I am in a super happy mood today, and it's because today marks the last day of Winter! (And, well, I'm listening to Voxtrot, but they just make it super happy). In celebration of the upcoming season, I dug up a bunch of crafts to inspire you! Hopefully they'll get you so excited that you ignore Spring Cleaning until summer and you get creative instead!
CHOCOLATE EGGS BY MARTHA STEWART | Say you want about Martha, but her staff... now they are awesome. When they developed this Chocolate Egg how-to with simulated Robin's Eggs, they tugged at my heart strings and appealed to my ever-present love of brown and blue together. We can't forget the chocolate aspect, either, or course! This crafty recipe makes a great springtime present for friends or co-workers and can also be a great surprise for your guests after an Easter meal.
PRESSED FLOWER SOAP BY TEACHSOAP.COM | A very cute idea for gifts or for a little spring time relaxation (and indulgence!) for yourself. To prevent browning if you are planning to use them later (rather than sooner), I might even consider drying them properly and using petals rather than pressing them.
FABRIC FLOWERS AT WISE CRAFT | These are too cute! Using simple techniques and a snazzy template that is provided, you can make your own fabric flowers. Sew them onto a bag, or glue it to a pin backing (as shown) - this project has a number of uses when a creative mind is working on it!
TERRARIUM MAKING AT MIGHTY GIRL | Terrariums are the essential gardener's tool for those, like me, who are resigned to life in an apartment - at least for the time being. I used to make some with my father in fish bowls, but these are so much cooler! Maggie uses awesome antique apothecary jars (I love those - any excuse to use them is GREAT in my book!) and cacti to make an amazing mini garden. She's got a lot of pointers and (mistakes to avoid) to make yours fabulous.
After a couple of years of hearing more and more about it and me, well, being a broke college student for most of those years, I finally bit the bullet. I bought myself a Gocco printer on Ebay last night, and I'm totally convinced it's worth every penny I spent for the brand new starter set (with machine) that I just bought.
What is a Gocco? It's this amazing machine from Japan that came about in the 1970s. It's essentially a silkscreen studio in this one little tool that looks like a toy. You can expose your screen (called a "master") and then print directly onto fabric or paper. The size you can print to depends on the model you're working with - mine does 4" x 6" - perfect for post cards and invites (after all, paper is my "thing").
In celebration of this exciting splurge, and in anticipation of some fun activities I'll be able to post, I'm giving you a Gocco (pronounced Go-Co, not Gokko) themed post for the craftsty types and the crafting fans!
