Mix and Match! There’s no catch!

Have you checked out the great paper packs in the MMS Design Shop? Some of our designers feature beautiful paper packs that don’t have any embellishments. Let this be an opportunity for your creativity to shine by mixing and matching embellishments from other kits There are so many great designers of scrapbooking kits that it is often hard to pick your favorite. Don’t feel obligated to feature just one designer for your layouts – Mix and match embellishments and papers from your favorite designers to make the perfect page. Also consider embellishing a template page with embellishments in your stash to make it uniquely yours. Below is a Template page from the Family Defined Template pack by StoryRock. I swapped the background for one from Dana Zarling’s Champagne Wishes Paper Pack. Then I added a few embellishments from Barbara Ryan’s Sweet Girl kit. I think the final product is adorable. Switch up some of your kits, templates and embellishments today. You might be able to make some “suite” pages with them.

Happy Scrappin’!

Sarah ~

… and don’t forget to check out my blog for more great ideas!

ScrapHappySarah

Don’t know where to start???

Maybe you are new to the world of Digital Scrapbooking…  maybe you are wondering,  “What do I do first?”  “What does it take to create a really GREAT photo album?”  “How do I get my albums to look like those in the pictures?” “What if I get stuck”!!!???  First of all, remember that even the best designers and scrapbook artists ALL started at square one.  They all had to learn.  They all made mistakes!  So, don’t give up before you get going!  YOU CAN DO THIS!  There are some great tools in My Memories Suite to make sure that your photos are preserved and your family’s story is told and that you create something very special that YOU can be very proud of!

First, realize that the PERFECT album will look different for everyone.  Even with the same photos, and the same page kits and embellishments, each person will see the story a little differently and build their       pages in a little different way.  The wonderful thing about My Memories Suite (whether you have version 1 or 2) is that this program puts YOU in complete control!  You have the ability to decide what goes where, your page order, your background paper, and your embellishments – EVEN on the Designer Template pages.  It is easy to make sure your story comes together in just the right way!  So, decide what story or event your album will include.  This can be anything from a general collection of photos by theme, or a group of photos that commemorate a particular event or holiday, and some will just be for fun.  A great way to give your album a coherent feel is to select a theme or kit to serve as the backdrop or foundation to build a great showcase for all your photos.  This is SO easy in the My Memories Suite Design Shop because there are TONS of great collections to choose from that will instantly give your album that “put together” feel that we all want.  So, gather your photos, pick your theme and you are READY to get started!

Make sure to stop by and check out the My Memories Suite Design Shop and take a peek at all the wonderful Designer Template pages and paper packs and embellishments sets.  Start with one that really strikes your fancy or suits the “feel” of the album you are trying to create.  Even if you build your own album from scratch, choosing a coordinated set of papers instantly unifies your pages.  Pair the set of background papers with a few of the photo only templates already built into your My Memories Suite software and you are well on your way to your own wonderful work of art.  I have included a few pages here from the “Drama Queen” paper pack from Dana Zarling to show you how the background papers pull the pages together.  See how the coordinated background papers and mat pull the pages together?

Your friends and family will be amazed at the impressive, professional results you will achieve, from your very first project.  How easy it was… well, that can be our little secret!  And remember, if you get stuck, or ever need help, we are only an email away.  Remember, you can also check out the Facebook fan page or Flickr gallery for some great inspiration, too!!  We have some very talented friends and fans who have posted wonderful pages that they have created quickly and easily in their MMS program.

So, what are you waiting for???  Your photos are waiting to tell your story!  Let them OUT of your computer, and off your memory card and into the hands of those you want to share that story with!

Have a happy scrappy day!

… and don’t forget to make a memory today!

Lisa J.

lisaj@mymemoriessuite.com

Capture the Moment… The Rule of Thirds

I am thrilled to be writing a monthly article, Capture the Moment…, for My Memories Suite.  The article will focus on one photography tip each month and will be posted on the My Memories Suite Blog on the 1^st of each month. Without photos, scrapbooking would be nonexistent.  As the core element of our layouts, photographs inspire us and influence our design choices.  Great photos will make even greater scrapbook pages.  So, let’s dig in…

Do you consistently try to center your subject when taking photographs?  This topic has been coming up a lot lately.  It’s also my pet peeve! WHY does everyone think the subject needs to be centered?  I often have to shake my head (and not scream!) when friends/family look at images and say “I would like it better if he/she/it was in the middle” or “why isn’t he/she/it centered”.  C’mon, seriously? NOT centering images is done for a REASON!  Here’s a little “design” lesson.  Let’s see if it will change your mind about always centering your images.

The “Rule of Thirds” is a basic design principle that is the basis for well-balanced and interesting shots. The basic principle behind this rule is to imagine breaking an image down into thirds (both horizontally and vertically) so that you have a 9 part grid as follows:

With this grid in mind, the Rule of Thirds now identifies four important parts of the image that you should consider placing points of interest in as you frame your image. The four points where these lines intersect are strongest focal points. The lines themselves are the second strongest focal points.  In theory, if you place points of interest in the intersections or along the lines, then your photo becomes more balanced and will enable a viewer of the image to interact with it more naturally. Studies have shown that when viewing images, people’s eyes usually go to one of the intersection points more naturally than to the center of the shot. Using the rule of thirds works with this natural way of viewing an image rather than working against it.

In learning how to use the rule of thirds the most important questions to be asking of yourself are:

What are the points of interest in this shot?

Where am I intentionally placing them?

The auto-focus mode on your camera may cause problems when shooting in Rule of Thirds style because it assumes the subject is in the center of the frame.  That’s when auto-focus lock comes in handy.  Simply aim your camera so that the auto-focus frame is positioned over your subject and push the shutter release button halfway.  By keeping your finger in place on the button, you lock in focus.  You can then re-compose your shot and shoot the image.

Don’t forget to keep the Rule of Thirds in mind as you edit your photos – cropping and reframing images so that they fit within the rules.  Experiment with some of your old shots to see what impact it might have.  You may be surprised.

(by using the rule-of-thirds principle, I was able to crop out the distracting girl in the background which brings the focus on the boy trying to hide his smile from me)

Rules, as we all know, are meant to be broken. Ignoring the Rule of Thirds doesn’t mean your images are unbalanced or uninteresting.  In certain situations, breaking the rule can actually result in some striking shots.  A very talented commercial photographer recently told me that if you intend to break a rule you should always learn it first to make sure your breaking of it is all the more effective.

(filling your frame with an image is the ideal time to break the rule)

So go ahead… I DARE you.  Do NOT center your images!  Apply the rule-of-thirds design principle and you may surprise yourself.  In the end, we love our favorite shots not for technical qualities (ok, maybe just a little), but because they’re meaningful and spark within us a certain feeling or memory.  Capture those moments… centered or NOT!

~ Mary M.

Make your Valentine’s Day extra SUITE!

Make sure you take advantage of some of the GREAT new deals and goodies in the Design Shop! They are guaranteed to make your Valentine’s Day pages extra SUITE! Get them before they are gone! Make sure you savor every little bite!

…and remember to make a memory today!

Lisa J.

Great idea for your 2010 Family Books!

We have been talking about year long projects and commitments on the Facebook page lately… they are a FANTASTIC way to chronicle your family’s year in pictures and journaling. Finding the TIME to do that type of project can be daunting though – especially when we have VERY busy families! Check out the blog post below from Sarah – a VERY smart member of our Creative Team here at MMS! Sarah shares a great idea for how to simplify this task and make it work for YOU!

Thanks for sharing Sarah! Check out Sarah’s blog for more great ideas! Scrapping Sarah’s Scribblings!

I love scrap booking, but when I see challenges to do 365 day projects, my blood pressure rises and the anxiety starts to build. I can’t take medication 365 days a year like I am supposed to, so I seriously doubt that doing a 365 day project will work for me. The 52 weeks projects look a little more inviting, but then I saw a blog that recommended a top ten memories project and knew I had found the perfect one for me.

I CAN make a top ten list for every month of memories for that month. Couple that with my goal to write more stories down and do a monthly round-up and I think that’s all I can handle. This should help make scrapping all the important events a little easier to scrap because it gives me a plan and it limits my entries. Here are the first pages of the year…

Have you started something new for the year? Share your great ideas.
Happy Scrapping,
Sarah

Organizing Digital Scrapbooking Supplies!

Here is a GREAT article from Katie the Scrapbook Lady on how to organize your digital scrapbooking supplies! Check out this great thought from her blog:

I created a folder just for my digiscrap supplies. I now keep this folder on my external hard drive because it is pretty big – I am a Scrapbook Lady you know! This is what it looks like inside my digi scrap folder:

Here’s a list of all the subfolders – the numbers in front of them are to keep them in a certain order since windows likes to organize the folders in numerical and alphabetical order automatically. I wanted the first folders to be related to the months of the year (holidays) so I numbered them that way. I decided to put Birthdays at the beginning of the year.

1 Birthday

1 Winter

2 Valentines and Hearts

3 St. Pats

4 Easter (even though sometimes Easter is in the 3rd month)

6 Summer and Beach (June is the first month of summer)

6 Travel and Camping (This just seemed to fit next to the summer and beach file)

7 Independence Day

8 School/Art/Music (August is back to school month around here)

9 Fall

10 Halloween

11 Thanksgiving

12 Xmas

Does that make sense so far? It’s pretty straightforward – these are the folders for holiday or theme specific stuff. If I have a full kit that is a Back to School kit, it goes in the file marked “8 School”. If I have a cute little heart doodle it goes in file “2 Valentines and Hearts”. I like to select “Large Icon” view in my window so I can see the folders. I also select an image to represent the folder by going to the folder properties and changing the image if needed.

Next I have files of individual elements. I put a 13 in front of all of these so they stay in alphabetical order based on subject; alphas, buttons, frames, etc. So continuing on with my list of files:

13 alphabets/numbers/dates

13 animals

13 buttons and brads

13 flowers

13 frames

13 journaling/quotes/tags

13 misc. elements (the ones that just don’t fit anywhere else)

13 overlays and masks

13 ribbons/trims and bows

13 shapes and borders

13 staples and fasteners

13 stitches

Next up are papers and kits. Let me emphasize here that I always keep a kit together when I first buy it and file it under “full kits” unless it is a theme kit that fits in one of my earlier categories. Kits are designed to have the pieces go together. Yes, that file is really big! But because I have “thumbnail view” selected for every folder in it, I can browse through my kits in a flash. I do keep subfolders within that file that I will show you in a minute.

My paper and kit files all have a 14 in front of them to keep them nicely in place behind the element files.

14 full kits

14 paper prints and packs

14 paper solids

and here’s a peek into my rather large full kits file:

There are several ways you could organize this folder. I have folders sorted by designer. Each designer gets a folder if I have more than one of their kits, otherwise the single kit will go into the misc. sub-folder. I was surprised that some of my favorite designers didn’t show up here, then I realized that I only bought embellishment packs or theme kits from them. This is an easy way to evaluate what kind of purchases you make.

I do have an Asian sub-folder because I’m collecting Asian style kits to use on pages for my husband’s Japan layouts. Perhaps you might want to set up some folders for boy kits and/or girl kits? It can be difficult to categorize some kits. Most of the kits I buy have flowers in them – does that mean they should all be filed under flowers? You can definitely overthink this step. I suggest just finding a method that makes sense to you and won’t take you to long to browse through. I used to keep this file full of individual kit folders and I did like that approach as it was easy to browse through them. It just got too unwieldy though so I needed to create a sub-folder system.

I strongly suggest that you keep kits together though. I read an article by a very popular digi scrapper who said she breaks up all her kits and puts the flowers in the flower file, the ribbons in the ribbon file, etc. I tried this and not only did it take me an eternity to do, but then it was nearly impossible to scrap. It took me months to undo this mistake!

The next category for me is templates. This is probably the area that took me the longest to organize but it is the one that has had the biggest payoff for me! If you read my Power Scrapping Secrets article at The Daily Digi you will see how having templates sorted by number of pictures they hold can save you oodles of time. I will give you a peek into my template folder so you can see what I’m talking about.

I have filed all of my templates by the amount of photos they are designed for. I realize that some templates might fit in more than one file depending on how you use them but I just tried to stay basic with my filing system. I can’t tell you how useful this system has been. Even if you think the rest of my digi organization is bunk, I bet you will find this part useful.

When I go to create a page that needs to have 4 photos on it, I just open up that folder and start browsing. Even if I don’t use a template, it at least gets my creativity working!

I don’t use subfolders here and all I keep is the preview of the template and the actual template file right next to. Sometimes I have to rename them to get them to stay next to each other in the file. Every once in a while I have to make a jpeg image so I have a preview of the template so if you are a template designer – PLEASE include a preview of each template! My very favorite templates are in TIFF format because you only need that one file to serve as a preview and the actual template. This really isn’t as complicated as it sounds – basically, I just like to see what each template looks like at one glance through the folder it relates to.

Now we are getting into sort of the misc. area of my organization. I have a 16 in front of the next few folders which are for downloadable magazines and tutorials

16 albums and quick pages

16 magazines/newsletters and tutorials

17 actions (even after you load them, it’s helpful to have a place for the instructions)

18 memorabilia (scanned items)

19 AMM (my amazing month of memories files)

19 CU (commercial use stuff from my designing days)

20 photos * will deal with this in a future post

21 layouts * will deal with this in a future post

Organization will pay off in many ways. If anything, it helps you avoid duplicate purchases. The best part for me is that it makes me a more efficient scrapbooker which means I get more done in the time I have and I enjoy it more! The only downside is that it is truly a boring task. I mean all you are doing is moving files around – so my solution is to take my laptop out to the couch for this one and watch tv with my family while I’m digi organizing. It’s nice to have something else to think about while you are staring at the screen. And you don’t have to feel guilty about watching tv because you are cleaning while you are doing it!

Making a Designer template yours! :-)

Here are some great tips that you can use to help you make the most of the Designer Templates available with your MMS program! There are tons of great templates that can really help speed up the process of creating family keepsakes for you. Let’s face it ~ we creative people have a big struggle when we approach a project. We want to get it done, we want to enjoy the process, we want to enjoy the results, and we want it to look like it’s ours! The flip side of that however is, most of us have INCREDIBLY busy lives! We have children and families, we work inside the home and out, we volunteer, we are there for those around us – and we TRY to squeeze out a little time for ourselves in there somewhere! Well, I have found that using Designer Templates really help me to get through a project quickly. Now, sure, there are still some times and some projects that I start from scratch, because there isn’t a template that quite matches the look I want or I really do want every element added to be of my choosing. That’s one of the things I truly LOVE about MMS. I have the flexibility to choose either option every time I add a page to a project I am creating. But for today’s post, I really wanted to show you some quick tips you can use to start with a Designer Template and truly jazz it up and make it yours! A couple quick steps and you will be DONE before you know it!

So, first I will show you the template page, completely as is. All I did was drag in the photos from one of my folders. In this example, I am using some photos from a project I did for my aunt for Christmas. We live in Florida, so we don’t see much snow – but there is a wonderful exhibit called “Ice!” at the beautiful Gaylord Palms Resort in Orlando every year and I have some cute pictures of her family that I am going to use in these two pages.

As I was saying in the first page, the “before” page – I simply chose the page I was going to work on, and dragged each picture into one of the photo boxes that were placed on the page. This is so quick and easy the page literally creates itself in less than a minute or two. Drag, drag, drag, DONE! Looks great, sure! I could move on, sure! BUT… I want to “snazz up” the page just a bit so it better suits my taste. So, I choose a few simple options from all of those available in my MMS software. Now, most of these additions are available whether you have Version 1 of MMS or the newly released V2. They are SIMPLE to do and whether this is your first page or your 1,000th – YOU can do it!

As you can see, I used the ZOOM tool, to really get the pictures more “close up” so you can tell who’s in them! Click on the picture you wish to zoom, then click the ZOOM IN button until you get close enough in. You can also adjust the visible portion of the picture with the CROP tool, which allows you to move the part of the picture that is shown. This is one of my favorite things to do to really get more of the subject in each picture on the page. Okay, so now that I have done all three photos, I move on to the next little change. I choose to add a MAT to my photos. Again, all under my control, for these photos I choose a thin white mat to frame them up a little, and click the “APPLY TO ALL PHOTOS ON THIS PAGE” so they all match exactly. You can choose the color of the mats to suit your taste – you can also color match them so they are a perfect fit for your page! Then, I move on to my FAVORITE little change – SHADOWS. I can’t say enough how much I just LOVE shadows and what they can do for your page. They literally POP your pages to life. I pretty much use shadows on just about everything on the page! What I love about the shadow option in MMS is that it is COMPLETELY under your control. It’s more than just “do I want a shadow or not?”. It’s how much shadow do I want, where do I want the shadow to be placed, how dark do I want it, how much of a drop do I want? Everything is under my control! So, I first click on one of my photos and click on the SHADOW box in my Control Panel. That brings up the SHADOW PROPERTIES box. This is where you control the appearance of the drop shadow of your selected item (the shadows for embellishments work much the same way). So, you choose how opaque you want your shadow, how much blur (which affects how “soft” or “hard” the shadow appears). Then, my favorite part is to decide the offset. You can use either your mouse, by clicking on the actual shadow in the preview box and dragging it around until you like the way it looks, or by using the arrow keys on your keyboard. Either option gives you the flexibility to show a little or a lot, drag it more to the side or the bottom, etc. I just LOVE that option! You can even choose the COLOR of the shadow! Then, I click the little box that says “APPLY TO ALL PHOTOS ON THIS PAGE” so that all the pictures look the same. You can do each photo individually, but this will save time.

Then I moved on to a little more personalization – but not too much, just to keep this short and sweet! I change out the text that says “Dec 2010” for a little “Ice!” so it fits more with the page. Remember EVERYTHING that is included in a Designer Template is completely under your control. You can move it, resize it, reshape it, duplicate it, eliminate it, whatever you like. I chose to just leave the little shape and embellishment and change out the little words. So, I created a new text box (you can create this in “WORDART” in V2). Used one word to help define what is going on in the pictures on the page. Of course, I add shadows to each of the three parts of this little set. The white circle SHAPE on the bottom, the little blue MAT embellishment, and the text. When I am adding the shadow to the little blue MAT embellishment, I click “APPLY TO ALL EMBELLISHMENTS ON THIS PAGE” so it also adds the shadow to the snowflake embellishment along the left side of the pre-designed page, as well as the shaped strip at the top of the page (that you almost don’t even notice until the shadows makes it pop!)

Then, finally, I add one line of text at the top of the page, and the year at the bottom, to really just define it better and fill in some of the empty space at the top and bottom of my page. I add the “Gaylord Palms Orlando” and the “2008” text. I choose a cute font (this one is called “Tingle Institute” – cute!) and add the text in black, of course add my shadow also. Then another one of my favorite little tricks is to create the text like I just described, then I click the COPY button up top and paste and exact duplicate of my text line, so now I have two. Then I click the WHITE button (or you can choose ANY color) to change the color of the duplicated text to white (or whatever color you selected). Then I just “layer” it over the previous black text and it really POPS your text off the page. Some of this can be done in fewer steps with the word art options in V2, but I still like the double layer look!

To finish up, I enlarged each of the pictures, just a bit, to fully utilize the space on the page and maximize how much of the picture I could show.

NOW, I can say, “I’m done!”. I am happy with the layout of the page, and a few simple, QUICK little changes that really just bring it to life for me. Now, you can spend a ton of time working on each little detail, and many of us love to do that – I love to do that too, but sometimes you just WANT TO GET IT DONE! And this is a great way to combine your own personal flair and the ease of the Designer Template options.
Please let me know if you have any questions, or need a little more help with the instructions for anything I talked about here, just ask away! You can always reach me at lisaj@mymemoriessuite.com or find me on the Facebook page at “Polaroid My Memories Suites”!

Good luck with your New Year’s projects and Happy Scrappin’!!

Lisa J.

New Features Video Tutorial from Lesley @ The Pink Toque

Happy Sunday, and have I got a treat for you… introducing My Memories Suite VERSION 2! That’s right, you heard me correctly. Not only is there a new version to My Memories Suite with all new features, I created a video tutorial to explain it all and show those new features off!

Last month, StoryRock unveiled an all new version 2 of its famous and very popular digital scrapbooking software, My Memories Suite. Version 2 is packed with all new goodies and awesome new features that we were dying for in Version 1. It’s like StoryRock read all of the feedback of features and ideas that its users over the years have been wanting out of the software and put it in one neat little package that will make digital scrapbookers the world over very happy.

If you’ve been to the Pink Toque Craft Blog before, you know I am an avid user of My Memories Suite. I got the software over 3 years ago when it first came out, and I have been in love ever since. I don’t want to babble on forever (because the new Version 2 goodies are exciting!) but if this is your first visit to my blog and you’re wondering what all of the excitement is about and why I love this software so much, be sure to go and read my review. My Memories Suite has been the best digital scrapbooking program to ever come along and with Version 2, it just got better.

Version 2 includes 1500 new background papers, 1300 new embellishments and 20 new layouts that come built into the software for your use right out of the box. On top of that, new features such as the zoom ability, Resource Gallery, and WordArt Designer make creating beautiful digital scrapbooking pages even easier. My favorite new feature is that your text can now be curved and follow shapes. This was not something you could do in Version 1, and I love that I can create text in beautiful circular shapes or to follow the edges of a photograph right on the page. It was probably the most requested feature and question I got from readers of my blog. Before I had to tell people they could only do something like that in Photoshop, but now My Memories Suite allows you to edit curved and rounded text on the fly right in the program instead. Hooray!

Another highly-sought-after feature that a lot of people asked me about was how to view pages side-by-side so they could build double page spread layouts. Unfortunately, this was not something you could do in Version 1, but now in Version 2 it’s easy. You can also now share your digital scrapbook in a wider variety of ways, including trading cards or calendars. They’ve also streamlined the Photobook process to make it easier to create beautiful photobooks of your finished albums.

I received Version 2 last month and have been trying hard to squeeze in some digital scrapping time with it so that I could show off the new features here on my blog. I finally got around to it today, and created a new video tutorial that highlights all of the major new features available to you in Version 2. I walk you through the new things and how to use them, and it makes it easy for Version 1 users to pick right up where they left off in the old version, or for new users to My Memories Suite to see just how awesome the software really is so they can get it for themselves.

Version 1 users will love that all of the photo albums and pages they’ve created in Version 1 will be converted for them into Version 2 compatibility and that the transition will be seamless. You won’t lose anything and all of your old albums will be right there for you in Version 2, ready to go and waiting for you to use the new tools and features to enhance them even further. When you’re adding embellishments or papers, you’ll be able to easily see what items are new to Version 2, and all of the old embellishments and papers from Version 1 are collected together in a folder labeled as Version 1, so you can quickly find all of your old favorites or check out the new stuff.

Speaking of Favorites, another new feature that I just love is that I can “bookmark” the embellishments and papers that I use most often and mark it as a favorite. This means that it’s added to a special “favorites” folder so I can access those favorite items quickly anytime I want to without having to search for them every time I want to use them on my digital scrapbook page designs. I show how this works in the video tutorial.

The WordArt Designer allows you to create fun and professional looking word art for your pages easily, and is built right in to the side tab of My Memories Suite now. Type in the text you want to create into word art, select the font and sizing, line spacing, colors, fill, stroke, etc. You can add shadows or a bevel and design the perfect word art accompaniment to any page you’re working on. I also demonstrate this in the video tutorial!

I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but I’m really excited about the new features in My Memories Suite Version 2! I just recently finished up Family Life 2009 digital scrapbook and am eagerly looking forward to working with all new designs, layouts, and features with Version 2 in 2010. If you want more details about what Version 2 has to offer, check out the info on mymemoriessuite.com. Original users of Version 1 will be able to upgrade for a nominal fee to get all of the new features, papers, embellishments, and layouts that come packaged with Version 2 and brand new My Memories Suite users can get on board and pick up Version 2 for themselves!

I’ve spent most of the afternoon recording the latest tutorial and getting it uploaded for viewing. It ended up being 18 minutes long! Since YouTube only allows videos up to 10 minutes each, I split the tutorial into 2 parts:

Link to YouTube Video Tutorial Part 1

Link to YouTube Video Tutorial Part 2

Enjoy! Be sure to let me know if you have any questions or comments on the new video tutorials or you need help with My Memories Suite Version 2. Hope you’ve had a great weekend Happy scrapping!

Lesley  thepinktoque.com

My Memories Suite Version 2.0 offers an exciting new interface, intuitive features and a variety of unique designs. And for the first time is now being offered via download so users can start scrapbooking immediately!

My Memories Suite Scrapbooking 2.0 is a fun and creative way to keep and share memories. The software’s intuitive design tools and varied sharing output, help users to build entire albums effortlessly by using one of the many installed templates, or design their very own pages from scratch. Users looking to share or search for even more templates are encouraged to visit My Memories Suite’s online Design Shop offering a growing library of templates, papers, and packs to infuse the creativity of its users.
New Core Features

* “Resource Gallery”: Drag & drop embellishments, backgrounds, shapes, layouts
* feature_resources
* Find and replace text
* Identify objects that are off the canvas
* Allow setting (and showing) a mat and/or shadow on photo template objects
* Text that follows a shape (circle or rectangle)

* Add background as photo object (from backgrounds dialog)
* Import different QuickMix shapes into current album (i.e. Import landscape QuickMix pages into a   square album)
* Add different shaped album pages into current album (i.e. Import landscape pages into a square album)
* Set default shadow from shadow dialog
* Set default text options from text panel
* Better user interface design for Mat and Shadow dialog
* New Line shape
* Search for embellishments (search field on bottom of embellishments dialog)

* Edit object from right click menu
* Right click edit
* Hold shift key while dragging an object constrains it to horizontal or vertical axis
* Locate Albums (File–>Locate Albums) will ask for a directory and then search for albums)
* Warn if there are missing fonts when doing a hi-res output
* On canvas text editing

Additional Features

* Searchable Embellishments
* Add own embellishments
* Favorite embellishments
* New photo shapes palette
* Unsaved changes recovery option on next open�if shutdown improperly
* Added blue and red filters to effects palette
* New effects pallet

* Preview effect before committing
* Effects Pallet

* Created solution for the Windows Movie/DVD audio issue
* Print to contact sheet
* Fill text with background or photo
* Effects controls
* Allow for multiple backgrounds on a page (not as photo objects)

Other

* Text Art tool w/ bevel, emboss, gradient, drop shadow, image, warping or shape
* Text art tool

* Spell checking (including check-as-you-go technology)
* Duplicate & mirror pages
* Free rotate objects
* Zoom canvas for more precesion control
* Multiple Preview Views
* Enhanced (more streamlined) photobook, calendar, and card sharing wizards
* User should have ability to search provided images by tags: category, type, keyword
* Tiling for backgrounds
* Texture fills

* New look, updated interface
* Auto Fill at any time
* Gradient fills (add/edit color points, radial and linear)
* Gradient fills
* Better CD/DVD burning capabilities
* Better optical device support
* Space evenly

Code Enhancements

* Updated to install4j 4.1

* Adopted use of java 1.6 (speed, rendering, sharpness, general enhancements) Vista compatibility

Check out the website and order now!!

Christmas Projects ~ Ready, set, create! :-)

I have a confession to make – I like being recognized as the creative and crafty mom who takes time to make gifts, remember all the special people in my kids’ lives and go above and beyond expectations.
One of my goals when I was a little girl was to be a great mommy. You know the type—a great mommy brings homemade snacks in for the classroom, a great mommy makes cool things for all the friends in the classroom to take home, etc. We all know they type of mommy I’m talking about. I wish I were that great!
Here’s the reality – I have three kids, a full time job, a house to run and plenty of extra curricular activities that leave me with next to no time to be creative and crafty. I more often than not forget special occasions, snacks for school are almost always store bought and making gifts for people has always just been a pipe-dream. That was until I discovered My Memories Suite (MMS). In fact, this was the very reason my love affair with My Memories Suite started—It allowed me to do something creative and crafty things in almost no time at all. And now…it’s helping me make personalized gifts for everyone I know…Oh how I love MMS.
So what’s my newest project? I’m making Christmas gifts. I discovered pocket calendar covers, and I am making them for everyone I know. They are a breeze to make and they will get me the kudos that make me feel like a great mommy – a perfect combination;-) You design a snazzy cover for a pocket calendar that you can buy almost anywhere for $1-2, they type that have a plastic covering that you might carry around in your purse, and you place your cover on top of the original cover and sheath it under the plastic.

Here’s a quick tutorial.
First you will need to purchase your pocket calendar. Measure the width and length of the calendar when it is spread open and flat on your work surface. Next you will open MMS and create a photo box the size of the calendar you are working with.

You will need to select a background and add it as a photo to your page. Drag the photo created with your background into your sized photo box.

Add your embellishments and photos. Remember that this will be folded in half once you put it around the calendar, so be careful not to add too much embellishment to the center of your layout.

Print your calendar cover and cut it out. (I recommend printing a practice cover to make sure you have everything the right size before printing it on photo paper.) Remove the calendar from the plastic sleeve and insert photo cover.

Insert calendar into sleeve on top of the calendar cover.

Now you have a finished product. Give it to a dear friend or family member.