Tutorial: Design your own cards from vintage images!

It's easy to create your own collage-style cards from vintage images ... and the results can be quite enchanting, as I'm about to show you. One recent creation of my own is this free 'French Bird Christmas Card' which you can download HERE (pictured in the final image below).

Here are the ingredients I used to create this card in Photoshop, but you could also figure out how to create a paper version without too much difficulty.

Easy Directions for Photoshop:
1. Take an old illustration of a bird or other animal/object. You can find vintage images to download on Etsy. Try searching 'digital collage sheet' + 'bird'.
Choose an image that would create a nice silhouette. Select the background area behind the bird with the magic wand tool. Inverse the selection.
2. Open another image of vintage flowers, or foliage or other design. Choose an image that would bring out the character of the bird shape, or create a crazy abstract effect. You might find the perfect vintage image in my 'Vintage Scrap Box' store at Etsy HERE.
3. Copy and paste this image into the selected area of the bird image (edit > paste into).
4. Select the background area again, fill with a color, then stamp with vintage text and antique printer's ornaments.
5. You may like to add a background pattern (I've used damask here), and a calligraphic style box with text. These books by Dover have some gorgeous calligraphic boxes!


6. You can then print, paste onto cardstock and embellish further if you like.

That's it! How fun is that? So, please try it out, and email a picture of your creations with a link to your blog to gypsychickdesigns@yahoo.com, and I will post them here.

Freebie: French Bird Christmas Card!

I worked up a little Christmas card design to send to some friends today, and I thought I'd share it with you as well. There should still be enough time to print, paste and post before Christmas! You get two different colored versions of the card in this freebie (see below).

I can't get enough of the 'French' and 'bird' motifs so popular in design these days, (that, plus this Aussie girl is not used to these freezing North American winters, so I'm dreaming about warm Spring weather, lovely  twittering birds, pretty blue sky, ... etc, etc :).

How To: The image is 4 x 5.5 inches in size. Print onto either watercolor paper for a softer effect or glossy photo paper for a brighter effect. Attach to a 4.5x6 red or yellow card, add ribbon, embellish.

You can click on the images below to see the bigger previews, but you must come back and click HERE to download the French Bird Christmas Card, and please leave a comment below.  I always love to see photos of your creations, please send to gypsychickdesigns@yahoo.com. This card is personal use only.

Want to see a tutorial on how I created this card? Go HERE to see how you can create your own cards from vintage images!

© Gypsy Chick

© Gypsy Chick

Freebie: "Santa Calling" Digital Scrapbook Paper!

Got a little freebie for you today ... a 12x12 inch digital scrapbook paper by Gypsy Chick.  Click the preview to see a detailed image of what you'll be getting, then simply download HERE, and enjoy!

Feel free to leave a comment if you like it! :)

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

Win the 'Father Christmas' 6x6 inch paper pack!

All you need to do is leave a comment here on what you think of the new 'Father Christmas' collection by Pink Paislee/Gypsy Chick and you will go in the running to receive this 6x6 inch paper pack! It's a lot of fun for scrapping your favorite Christmas memories or even making Christmas cards! 

The winner will be announced December 16 here on the blog! 

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

Freebies From the New 'Father Christmas' Collection!

Make sure you stop by the Pink Paislee Blog where they have featured all kind of fun project ideas and downloadable freebies from my new 'Father Christmas' paper scrapbook collection at their '12 Days of Christmas' promotion.

Here is just one of the many freebies you'll find there (pictured below) ... a cute Christmas quick-page I created for you. Go HERE to download it from the Pink Paislee blog.

You can also read about me in their 'meet the artist' feature as well (blush:) ... thank you for the kind words Pink Paislee!

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

New Paper Collection: Father Christmas

Oops ... Thanksgiving has come and gone, and time is just flying by! For all my friends in the USA, I hope you had a fantastic Thanksgiving like I did! After eight hours in the kitchen that day, our family had one of the most amazing meals I've ever cooked (if I don't say so myself! :) ... it was awesome!

and now... Christmas will soon be upon us ... bringing many wonderful memories I'm sure you'll want to scrapbook. SO, if you haven't had a chance to check out my new paper collection (by Gypsy Chick), then here it is!

This collection was released with the very wonderful 'Pink Paislee' brand, and they tell me it sold out a few weeks ago :( ... however you may still be able to grab a few bits and pieces from various online scrapbooking stores, or your local scrapbook store if they stock Pink Paislee (if they don't, tell them you want it! :)

The 'Father Christmas' collection is a fun vintage collection featuring those nostalgic Victorian Santa images that we've all grown to love ... take a look!  Leave a comment and you will go in the draw to win a mini paper pack (6x6 inches) of the whole collection! Happy Christmas everyone.

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

© 2010 Gypsy Chick

Designing With Vintage Scraps!

Vintage scraps are a great way to add instant nostalgia to all your digital designs! Most of the older designs are now in the public domain, so there are no worries about copyright.

Dover has some great clipart books with CD that feature lots of royalty-free die-cut scraps, but you can also find these lovely little bits of ephemera on places like Ebay.com and Etsy.com.

A lot of the scraps can be quite small, (1-3 inches) but if you scan them at a high resolution, you can usually bring them up to a size that will work perfectly for your designs.

Here's one I restored to perfection for you ... feel free to use it any of your personal or commercial designs, just give me a credit if you can either on your blog or in your terms of use file.

How to download: Click the image to get to the larger image, then click the image again to get the largest size. Right click, then save to your computer. This is a JPG file with a white background. To make a transparent PNG file, simply choose your magic wand tool in Photoshop with a tolerance of 1, Select white area, select inverse, then select modify and feather it by 1. Copy and paste into a transparent document, and there you have it.