Once I got into scrapbooking, I also got into photography. Quite simply, I wanted better pictures for my scrapbook pages. Now I follow as many photography blogs as I do scrapbooking blogs, and I learn a lot online that helps me to improve my photos. One of my favourite photography sites is the Pioneer Woman. She gives great photography tips and tutorials, as well as shows some of her beautiful photographs. But one of the best parts of her blog is that she has created some amazing actions that she gives away for free.

What are actions? (I didn't know either, up until recently.) They are a series of steps in photo editing software (typically Photoshop or Photoshop Elements, which I use) that can change your photo to give it a certain effect. So if you want to make your photo sepia toned, black and white, brighter, or sun-kissed (among many others), with just one or two clicks using actions you can do so. Many photographers use actions, and there are many for sale, but PW gives hers away, and I have all of them and use them all the time. From simple actions that boost colors, to fancier actions that give some really stunning effects, I'm hooked.

Here's an example: 

OK, so as much as I love this photo I'm not about to make a scrapbook page with it. (You think?) But I do use actions for a lot of the photos I use on my scrapbook pages. I love the effect of mixing color and black & white photos of the same subject/person on a layout, and I do that a lot with pages of my kids. I use PW's black and white action BW Beauty as I love the clean black & white photos it renders.  Like on this two layout I used just two photos of my older daughter, one in color, one in black & white:



Here I had a pile of good shots of my younger daughter and I couldn't choose just one. I ran BW Beauty on some of the photos, to differentiate the photos one from the other, as they were all so similar, and also to add a little visual oomph to the grid for a simple page.



Lately I've been doing some art journaling type pages for my personal scrapbook album, and I've been having fun using some of the more unusual actions for the photos. (By the way, SOOC = straight out of the camera, that is, without any effects on the photo.)


Cool, eh? I actually used two actions on this last photo, first Colorized, then Edge Burn, which ended up being my choice to make this scrapbook layout:



For this last photo I first used Boost to make the colors and contrast bolder, then I ran the Seventies action. I tend to use one of the boost or fresh colour actions before I run the other funkier actions as when the original colours are strong (too strong for my taste for a "normal" colour photograph) they heighten the effect of the action. (I do use the Lovely and Ethereal action on many of my photos, it adds a little oomph but not too much.)

I loooove how it came it out, it really made the photo perfect for this LO that I did with it:



A couple of things to note:
Installing actions can be challenging. The PW actions come with detailed installation instructions, and if you follow them closely, you should get it right without too much frustration. But just beware that it's a lot of steps and if you don't get one step right it messes up the whole thing. Just seeing the installation instructions can put you off, but it really is worth the trouble.

Don't forget to flatten your layers after each action. You can do this by (in Photoshop Elements) selecting "merge layers" or "flatten image" under the layers tab.

Actions have added another dimension to my photography and to my scrapbooking. If you haven't discovered them yet, give them a try!

Day 7

Today the giveaway is a for a spot in an upcoming Big Picture Class called Decorate Your Life. Ella friend Diana Chen will be in the class, and she is working on the pre-class project. Enter the giveaway by leaving a comment.

Comments close December 18 @ 9:00 am MST

From Diana
"This project and class are firsts for me. It's my first scrapbooking class online. I'm really excited about it. It's also a first for me as I have never done a mini album before (I've started a couple but never completed them), and certainly never something so crafty. I actually printed the circle template directly onto the patterned paper and cut that out and then stuck it to my white cardstock.

I searched high and low but couldn't find Christmas balls in a clear plastic tray. I will keep looking though, hopefully I'll find it so I can play along with this aspect of the class too. (If anyone wants to mail a clear plastic ornament tray to me in Jamaica let me know!)"

Teacher Darci Dowdle

Decorate your Life class description

After the holidays, it is customary to take down the decorations. Darci however, thinks the New Year is a perfect time to acknowledge the decorations that adorn our lives all year long: personalities, relationships and ordinary routines that add sparkle and shine to our everyday. Spend this January with Darci, packing away holiday decorations and getting out a different kind, as you gather products, paper and pictures to "decorate" 14 layouts documenting daily life. Darci has created a proven process, full of surprises, for gathering materials ahead of time and compiling simple, fun and meaningful layouts in just a few minutes each day. read more

**Update**

Winner is Sara Lara