Halloween Cardmaking

Saturday turned out to be a beautiful autumn day and I did find a few treasures at the REUSIT Day here in town.  ("Rescue the Environment and Us from being Smothered In Trash" is the translation of the acronym, in case you were wondering...)  We took more to the Drop Off/Swap Off than we brought home - so that made everyone happy.  I'll be posting some of my crafty recycling projects made with the items I found over the next few weeks.

I have been working on some designs with spiderwebs that are very intricate.  I haven't had a chance to test cut them yet, so I thought I'd post a couple of cards from last Halloween that use some spiderweb tricks. 

I always like to figure out ways to make the best use of my paper and it is fun to cut a design and then use the "leftovers" to create a second card. 

You can read about making the Beware card by clicking HERE to go to the post.

Information about making similar designs can be found  at THIS POST (part one) with a more detailed explanation at THIS POST (part two).  The trick for making all of these cards is the use of the "Hide Selected Contour" option in Design Studio or on the Gypsy.

Once you start to realize the possibilities that are opened up by hiding lines of a cartridge image you might understand why I have become so interested in using some of the other machines and programs that allow you to create your designs by drawing and editing the individual lines of a design.  The screen shot above shows a simple card topper that I made in the Silhouette Studio program.

Here is another more complicated design.  This was easy to make with the extra tools in the Silhouette program.  I would not be able to do this with Design Studio, the Gypsy or the Craftroom. 

Remember, you have a chance to win this bundle of Vintage Jewels from Creative Charms by linking up a project you have made with any Creative Charms embellishments - all of the information is at THIS POST and there is also a second prize of a mystery bundle of Creative Charms goodies from my stash up for grabs.

I hope you have a wonderful day!

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How to make the "Stained Glass" card

Several of you thought I had used one of the Creative Memories cartridges to make this design - but I have a surprise for you - it was the new Cricut Lite cartridge "Twinkle Toes" that I just bought from Walmart online over the Thanksgiving weekend.

The main image used for the design is this tiara I have highlighted on the keypad.  The size of 2 1/2 inches worked out perfectly for an A2 card.  If you don't have this cartridge I am sure there are other tiaras or similar shapes that could work nicely - just take a look through your cartridges.   (Remember, you can click on any of these images to enlarge them so you can see the details more clearly).

Here is the tiara exactly as it appears on the cartridge.

I used "hide selected contour" to eliminate the outer line of the cut and create the inset pattern.

I also hide these two lines at the top of the tiara.  By doing this, I eliminated the problem of having the one hidden line reappear when the file is closed and reopened in Design Studio.  I could have used another workaround for this problem, but the latest version of Design Studio makes it more difficult to layer designs precisely and then move them apart.

I wanted to have a full shape cutout at the top of the tiara so I used the layer shown on the keypad above.  I kept the size at 2 1/2 inches to make the layer match the original tiara.

I placed the layered element in position to create a larger cutout in the area where I had hidden the two lines from the original design.

I added a second tiara and made the same changes to it, rotated it 180 degrees and aligned it with the first tiara and added the extra element to create the cutout at the base.  If you copy and paste the element instead of adding a new one to the mat, you will need to close and reopen the file to make it possible to hide the lines in the copied image (the option to hide contour will be grayed out until you do this).

I needed a shape to cut the card base.  I always challenge myself to use a few cartridges as possible to create a design and I found this shape with rounded corners on the Twinkle Toes cartridge.  This worked perfectly for my card - I liked the effect of rounding the corners.  I adjusted the size to 8 1/2 inches wide by 5 1/2 inches tall in the Shape Properties box.

Here is the preview of the card.  I checked weld on the card base just to make it easier to see the detail of the design cutout.  By checking weld I eliminated color from the preview of the card and only the dark cutting line shows.

In order to create a liner, I used the same shape that I used for the card but changed the size to 8.3 wide x 5.3 inches tall in the Shape Properties box.  I needed to create a blackout shape of the tiara image since there is not one on the Lite cartridge.  I did this by hiding all of the interior lines in the design.  I aligned the two images for the liner cutout to match the placement of the filigree image on my card front.  I did make a few minor adjustments using the handles to get a perfect fit.

By previewing both mats at once I could make sure that everything was lined up properly before I cut the file.  I was confident enough in the preview that I cut my "good" cardstock for the first cut (sometimes I use "ugly" paper if I want to tweak the design a little or need to do a few prototypes to get a design to work).

There are lots of photographs of the card assembly in yesterday's post HERE but I thought I'd show you the liner again in this post so you could see how it works a little better.

The tissue paper is sandwiched between the card and the liner and the opening in the liner allows the light to shine through the card front.  The liner is adhered only to the front of the card to make it easier to open and shut the card (and to give a little extra space to add an additional message).

Please leave a comment or send me a note if you have any questions about the way I designed this card.  You can apply the same basic concept to many images and have a lot of fun experimenting with the various effects.

If you want me to post the file for this card, please leave a comment.  I think I have explained it clearly enough for you to try your own, however, I know how busy everyone is this time of year and if you want to try this card my file could save you some time.  I want to convert and test it as a Gypsy file before I share a download link and I hope to do that later today.


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Haunted House Card

I have had a few more questions about the cards I make by using "hide selected contour" to cut the design right into the card front.  I know I said I would do another video but I've had a few issues that have kept me from getting to do all the things I'd like to - in the meanwhile I thought I'd do a quick explanation again for those who asked about this.

This is another card I designed by altering an image to fit a standard card shape and using hide selected contour to "embed" the image in the front of the card.  The post with a longer explanation can be found HERE.

As I explained in the earlier post, you do have to be careful to watch the exact sizes of the shapes you use to make the card.  The "handles" around the shape I used for the base were not even with the cutting lines and this card turned out 1/2 inch too short (I had neglected to check the shape against the grid).  It was close enough to the standard A2 size that I could just trim off 1/4 inch for a 4 x 5.5 inch folded card.

This screen shot shows the original image on the left and an adapted image on the right.  I used the "handles" to stretch the width and height to fit an A2 card comfortably.  If I cut the image as shown I would have a card topper piece that I could adhere to any A2 card base.

By hiding the outer cutting line, I can create a card where the design is actually cut into the card front.

An easy way to align the shapes for a project like this is to use the outer edges of the bubbles or "handles" to make sure that the borders are consistent.  Here I just pulled the shape wider (with the center right handle) and longer (with the bottom center handle) until the edges of the bubbles were next to the rectangle that represents the card front.

I adhered the cut card to the bright yellow orange card base.  The design is cut in a piece of Core'dinations Onyx Gemstone cardstock.  I have to say - this is not my favorite card, but since I had taken it this far, I decided to "dress it up" a bit.

I added some clear gems at the four corners and then filled in all of the window openings with purple gems in two shades and sizes. 

The gems represent people (or ghosts!) inside the haunted mansion.  At first I left the top layer loose but, in the end, I decided to adhere the cut image to the liner along the bottom edge.

I added gunmetal Stickles along the roof lines of the house and used Icicle Stickles to make the clouds sparkle.  It actually does look cuter in person when you can see the glitter and shine of the gems.I think it would benefit from some embossing in the yellow liner - maybe I'll do another version...

I hope you had a chance to see the Harvest Moon last night.  It was a special night because there was a Harvest Moon on the same day as the Fall Equinox.  This won't happen again until 2029.  We have one tree behind our house that has already turned a brilliant red - the others will start showing more color soon.

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Pumpkin Carving Cards (part two)

I have some more details to share about making cards with images cut into the card front.  I use this method quite often and there are a few things to be aware of when you design a card of this type.  (Remember, you can click on any of the photos or screen shots to see a larger image).

I always try to use as few cartridges as possible when I create a card - I generally work in Design Studio and I don't have a Jukebox so I challenge myself to keep the cartridge count low.  If at all possible I find an image that can be adapted to work for my project on the same cartridge that has the image I will be featuring.

In order to create an A2 card, I needed a rectangle.  If you look at the images on the Pumpkin Carving cartridge, you will see that there are no rectangles.  This is not a problem - you can use "hide selected contour" to eliminate the interior design and stretch a square to create a plain rectangle.  I chose one of the pumpkin faces because there would only be a few lines to hide.  I needed an image with more than one line to hide so that the lines would stay hidden when the file is closed and reopened in Design Studio.  (This is not a problem on the Gypsy - when only one line is hidden it will stay hidden on the Gypsy).

I set the slider bar at 5 1/2 inches - this determines the height of the image.  If you look in the Shape Properties Box you can see that the width does not match the height in this particular example but the shape on the mat appears to be square.

Using the handle on the right center you can pull the side of the image to the right to create a rectangle.  You can also enter values in the Shape Properties box to alter an image in Design Studio.  There is a bit of a complication in this case because the handles are not true to the edges of the shape on the right side (this is true with many images so you always need to check the actual dimensions).  On the Gypsy, you can choose the "actual" size icon to get a true sized image when the values are entered in the width and height boxes.

The values that you enter in the Shape Properties box do not always match the boundaries of the shapes.  A rectangle in George will have the "handles" exactly on the lines of the image.  The image I chose for the card is about 1/4 inch "off" from the true measurement.  You can see this in the area with the red box which highlights the difference.

I adjusted the size of the second image to match the dimension of the George rectangle.  The actual width ended up at 8.75 inches.

Once the rectangle is created, you need to hide the lines inside to make a plain card base for an A2 card.  Select each of the interior lines by left clicking on the line - it will turn pink.  Then right click and choose "hide selected contour" from the bottom of the drop down menu.  The screen shot above shows that you now have a plain rectangle to work with.  (Of course, you could always just use the George rectangle or another plain rectangle from another cartridge if you want to).

Next I chose the images to cut into the front of the card.  The pumpkin face is sized at 2 inches and the "Happy Haunting" is set at 4 1/4 inches which makes it easy to center on the card front.

The outer line of each design needs to be hidden to create the cut out effect.  On the Gypsy, hiding just one line is fine - it will stay hidden when the file is closed and re-opened.  For Design Studio, an extra step is needed so you don't have to rehide the lines each time you use the file.

Add another image that is exactly the same size and at the same position on the "Y" axis.  Then hide the outer line and one interior line on the original image and hide everything except the line that you hid on the first image on the duplicate image.  If you have copied and pasted the second image, you will need to slide it to one side before clicking off the image and then close and reopen the file to make the "hide selected contour" option functional on the copied image.

In this screen shot you can see the two images with different parts hidden.  The end result is that the interior lines will cut once and the outer line will not cut at all.  You need to move the second image into exactly the same position as the original image by changing the "x" value to match.  Type the value into the Shape Properties Box and hit enter.  Once you do this and click somewhere else on the mat the two images can not be separated so be sure that you have the proper parts hidden or you will have to start over  (this is a change from the last version of the software).

Here is the card with the images aligned.  to be sure that the items you want to cut will be cut, do a preview on a blank page.  To make the preview work more clearly, check weld on the card base so it will just show the bold cutting line with no color.

Here is the preview of the final card.  The extra steps we took will make the file ready to cut as soon as it is opened and you won't have to remember to re-hide any lines.  If you would like another very simple step by step explanation of how to do this, here is a LINK to the blog post I made when I first figured out the workaround back in February of 2009.

After all the trouble you went to to create the file with the shapes cut out it would be a shame to put a liner in the card that stays attached to the front - you would hardly be able to tell the difference from simply cutting the shapes and adhering them to the card front.  So here is a way to add the liner but keep it separate from the open shapes.  Cut a piece of cardstock just a tiny bit smaller than 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 inches.  I think this piece is 5 3/8 x 4 1/8 inches.

Score the cardstock at 1/4 inch and fold along the line.  It is best to score this line first in order to get a straight fold on such a small width.

Add a strong adhesive to the narrow section.  I use Scor-Tape in the 1/8 inch width.  This tape is very strong and also easy to work with.

Adhere the thin section of the liner to the front of the card.  Be careful to keep it aligned so there is nothing that extends beyond the edge of the card.

The liner will now block the center of the card so you can write on the inside.  When the card is viewed from the front the effect of the cut outs is preserved.

You can add as much or as little decoration to the card front as you like.  I will probably add some pen stitching and possibly a few brads to finish off this card.  A stamped sentiment or handwritten note can be added inside.

I encourage you to try making your own file following these directions.  If you are having trouble let me know and I will "clean up" and post my file to share.  These cards are a lot of fun to make and have many interesting variations - have fun creating!


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