Sketchy Ideas: Quick Card Making for Beginners and Experts
19 December 2011
Author: Kara Ward
Cardstock, patterned paper and embellishments are the perfect ingredients for card making. Knowing the proper amounts and combinations to use on a card can leave anyone, from an expert card designer to a beginner card maker, feeling overwhelmed. This overwhelmed feeling seems to sneak up at the beginning of the creative process when you have your supplies gathered. Having too many possibilities or no direction can cause a creative roadblock. If only there was a recipe for adding the “right” ingredients to “bake” the perfect card, a road map of quick card making for beginners through experts, allowing basic designs to get you to your final card destination.
Wish no more -- there are tons of recipes and road maps available to show you the way.
Using a card sketch is like having a recipe or road map.
- It helps narrow down the possibilities and helps narrow down supply choices.
- It gives you direction but doesn’t stifle creativity.
- Creative interpretation can take the sketch from simple to complex, depending on your needs.
- There are no rules to card sketches. Create your own or use the sketch as a guide.
A card sketch is a starting point.
- It is a template that one can use just as it is shown.
- It is a natural outline of how the finished card will look.
- Print the sketch and cut the scrap paper to fit the different areas of the template.
- Remember to take into account areas of overlap.
- Create the card using any papers, colors or embellishments.
- Simply follow the template!
A card making sketch can be used as a visual guide.
- Use the sketch to guide your creative process by using the key elements of the sketch.
- Interpret the sketch’s elements however you desire.
- The circle on the sketch can be a circle on your card design - it may also represent a large flower embellishment. You make the creative decisions.
- The sketch has basic shapes drawn on it but no written directions are given. It is left for your creative interpretation.
- This simple visual guide can be adapted for many different uses by varying the colors of the paper or changing the embellishments.
Create custom designs by mixing and matching sketches or finding inspiration in everyday life.
- Take the basic sketch and adapt it to meet your design needs.
- Alter it by changing the size of the embellishment or even the shape of the design.
- Keep the sketch as a blueprint for your card design but change it to meet your creative needs.
- Just by adapting the size of the design, you can create an entirely different look.
Inspiration to create your own card sketches:
- You might be inspired by an ad in a magazine or a decorative pillow in a store. Quickly sketch the idea and then recreate the sketch into a card.
- Keep a notebook (like this one) dedicated for your sketches as reference.
- Karen, our Spotted Canary Expert Studio author, shared how she was inspired by everyday objects to create amazing cards. She created her sketches from plates to zebra bags. Her cards are so similar to the pieces that brought her inspiration.
- Find something you love and let it stir your creative card making!
Find card making sketches created by others:
- Free card sketches are available in crafting magazines, idea books and all over the internet.
- Some internet sites are dedicated specifically to card sketches. They have weekly sketch challenges where they share their own interpretation of the sketch. This is a great way to find ideas and designs. It is also a nice way to share your work with others.
Try it out, use it up!
- Working with a card sketch is a quick and easy way to use up leftover scraps and supplies.
- It also lends itself for trying new techniques.
- It gives one a safe layout on which to experiment with new stamping techniques or paper folding ideas.
- It is a great map for creating invitations, holiday cards or birthday cards.
- It offers a formula for easy production when creating mass mailing card sets or gift sets.
Card sketches are perfect for the beginner crafter.
- They allow the crafter to learn about layout and design.
- They give one the opportunity to explore color and embellishments in a safe environment.
- No more struggling for ideas and inspiration or getting caught up in tiny decisions that might leave one feeling frustrated
- They are a crafting road map to eliminate creative block.
Even the most experienced crafter will enjoy card sketches.
•It challenges the card maker to stay within certain design constraints, enabling one to think outside-the-box and allowing creativity to soar.
•It gives the crafter a community to share their work in and a place to grow their creativity.
•It saves time and supplies by having a game plan for their card.
Card sketches really take the pressure off the crafter and make it easier and faster to create fabulous, treasured cards. Everyone can benefit from having a sketch to follow; card sketches make for quick card making for beginners and easy card layouts for expert designers. Sketches open up creative doors in one’s mind, allowing each card to be as unique as the designer.