know when to fold ‘em

(Originally posted to Flickr forums in June 2008.)

I sell accordion albums but it had always been difficult trying to help clients visualize what photo would go where. My ordering software allows them to pick the position of each photo, but without being able to “see” the layout it was difficult to translate from thought to order.

So instead I made the FREE template above to help them understand what the numbers mean (click here to download it in full-size). Much less Advil required.

I also include the following text:

The top row is a flip-image of the bottom row.

I’ve also put in the fold lines for you on the images that will “face” one another in the accordion folds — so #2 and #3 face each other when wide open — #4 and #5 face each other when wide open — #7 and #8 face each other when wide open — #9 and #10 face each other when wide open — and #11 and #12 face each other when wide open.

your daily infoMOOcial

I made these “mommy / playdate cards” during the holidays last year as a nice little surprise to tuck in my clients orders. They are MiniCards by Moo.

The price is $19.99 / pack of 100 and you can upload up to 100 different images per pack. I had mine printed for 5 clients per mini-card order, so it cost me roughly $4 per client gift. Each received 20 cards. You can see a close-up of the way I presented them here.

The new MoosLetter came out today and featured a blog post about the same Minis being used as referral cards. The presentation is fantastic!

I instantly recognized that referral mini card design as the same (FREE!) template by dawn(m) that I used. You can still find the (FREE!) template up for grabs here.

(Don’t forget that through July 31st, readers of Photojojo get 25% off Moo orders of $20 or more!)

Also spied in the MoosLetter…right now Moo is offering a (FREE!) pack of 50 business cards. You just pay S&H. Find out more at their website.

haul out the holly

Quick note that designerdigitals.com is doing a Christmas in July special right now. All regular items are 20% off through 6 a.m. Saturday. And if you sign up for their newsletter this week you’ll receive one special item to download (FREE!) each day before it goes on the site for purchase.

Here are the first three freebies during the promotion:

1. Crystallized Flourishes No. 03 Brushes and Stamps
2. December Memories Layered Template No. 1
3. Capped: Winter

Sign up for the newsletter so you don’t miss any more! (You can also follow Designer Digitals on Twitter now.)

a cow says

I just released a new set of “Fit to Print” templates on Monday. This time it’s six Moo Greeting Card (thank you) designs to compliment the Moo stickers I released last week.

There’s even a bonus 7th template that can be purchased separately.

The cardstock is the same substantial Moo paper-weight you’ve come to know and love – thick and satin-smooth. It’s never too late to give thanks!

(If you have additional questions about Moo Greeting Cards, please visit their Greeting Card FAQ.)

show ‘n’ tell

Today kicks off the first in what I hope will be a series of “guest spots” here at Paperie Boutique — “May We See Your Packaging, Please?” The photos in this entry are courtesy of Christina McCall of Christina McCall Photography (formerly Reflections of Life Photography).

I asked if she’d mind sharing some of her gorgeous packaging photos and tips here and she graciously said “Yes!” I’ll let her say the rest!

• No need to buy the vendor’s belly bands — dress up wallet and announcement boxes, as well as cd cases, with ribbon and buttons (or even pewter charms!) instead. When I find ribbon I love, I stockpile enough to last a while (usually whatever amount they have on hand). The ribbon on the announcement boxes and cd cases is my ‘signature ribbon’, so I periodically raid the stores that carry it to buy up all they have on hand.

To finish them off, I add a button or two over the seam to hide it from view.

• What’s even better about the boxes I use for wallets and announcements? I don’t stamp my logo on them and encourage clients to reuse the boxes and belly bands for gift wrap rather than tossing them after distributing the prints/announcements enclosed.

• My clients love the fact that I package orders to look like a gift — whether delivered in person or shipped! After I package everything, I use paper ribbon bows on sacks and wrapphia on mailed orders and to bundle items within sacks. To complete the look, I tie on a tag I designed with my logo or one of my business cards.

• My absolute favorite packaging item are Moo stickers! I use them as envelope seals, to seal print bags, on proof disc cases, and when tissue wrapping odd shaped items (usually on the lower right corner).

I have a variety of phrase stickers — from ‘Thanks’ to ‘Memories Enclosed’ along with designs including dingbat images and my logo.

• Paper Source‘s baby envelopes are my newest love: they’re great for mini wallets — my client thank you gift — as well as for holding referral or business cards. I seal them with a Moo sticker and stamp my logo on the front.

Thank you so much, Christina! Please visit christinamccall.com for more!

If you would like to feature your packaging / marketing / product lines here, please drop me a line. My e-mail address is over in the sidebar (robyn @ this site’s URL) or you can just leave a comment. I’d really like this to be a full sampling of all the different options available out there, and not merely a showcase of my own items.

And if there’s anything of mine you’ve seen in the past and would like to know more about, post it in the comments. I’ll do a free-for-all Q&A entry when I have enough requests.

pleased to announce…

If you don’t have time to design your own custom announcements and cards, ScrapArtist.com has several templates available for commercial use. The above announcements were created with a design by Amanda Rockwell.

You can view the items in their “Commercial Use” section here. Just read the license agreements very carefully. Some include an additional fee for photographers and businesses. The prices are amazingly reasonable and they are always having sales.

A few favorites:

1. Cute Animals – Baby Birth Cards
2. Photo – Baby Birth Cards
3. Giraffe Baby Announcement Set
4. Not Your Average Templates
5. Fun Girly Templates

merci beaucoup

Today marks a week over here at paperieboutique.com — so to celebrate I’m putting this thank you card template up for (FREE) download. I use these photo cards to send a personalized note of thanks to clients for booking with me inside of my welcome packets, or tuck them inside client orders.

This template is designed to print as a 5×8 photo with lustre finish. Make sure your lab prints this non-standard size! The template is sized at 8¼ “×5¼” to allow for standard cropping in-lab.

You will need to insert your logo, an image, and customize with the background and border colors of your choice.

I have the background set to white, the inner border set to grey, and the bottom solid-stripe set to pink right now — but you can change these by clicking the color fill layers for each section — just double-click each box and you can change to any color you’d like. (Some of the content to alter is located inside folders. Make sure to open them.) The pink arrow in this image shows where you click to change the colors.

Don’t forget to hide the logo and main image placeholder layers before printing! The font I used for the contact information section is News Gothic MT.

→ download link ← (please note this file was designed in CS2 and you must have Photoshop or Elements and know how to edit a .psd layered file — I do not provide technical support for this download)

You can write on the photos easily with a super-fine Sharpie. To finish the look, I use Paper-Source A9 envelopes sealed with Moo stickers.

Thanks again for all of the well-wishes, comments, ReTweets and link-backs during this first week. I look forward to watching this place grow up!

This template is ©Robyn Pollman, 2009. All rights reserved. It may not be copied, resold, made available for download or given away elsewhere, or redistributed without my written permission.

bragging rights

(Originally posted to Flickr forums in September 2008.)

These books can make very nice “under $25″ thank you gifts for your best clients. (Ordering a soft-cover drops the price even more.) The photos shown here are of the ACI’s photo memory book — 20-pages, size 4×6. I upgraded to the black art cloth cover and linen pages. Each page is the thickness of a linen art paper postcard. There is a solid black divider page at the very beginning and end of the book. You can have the pages scored for an additional cost, and I highly recommend doing so due to the page thickness. Dust jackets are also offered for an additional fee.

I actually created my own guide-template (FREE in the download link below) based on ACI’s specs in ROES. The “HIDE crop layer before saving” layer should be deleted before print. It is just a guide. All the light area in that layer is the crop-area. Only what’s inside that light area is guaranteed to print. The two darker strips on either side alternate being relevant one at a time if the page is on the left or on the right of the book — the area in the dark strip is what will be lost to page mount / fold. Basically you’ll start with a 6½x4½” crop and then make sure your page content fits in the grey guides, and then delete the crop guide layer before saving. I numbered my finished pages “page1.jpg”, “page2.jpg”, etc., so there would be no confusion in ROES when it was time to build the book.

Here is an example of the three (FREE!) templates you can download now:

These templates are ©Robyn Pollman, 2008 and 2009. All rights reserved. They may not be copied, resold, made available for download or given away elsewhere, or redistributed without my written permission.

All three pages shown include the crop guide layer. → download link ← (please note these files were designed in CS2 and you must have Photoshop or Elements and know how to edit a .psd layered file — I do not provide technical support for this download)

(Just make sure to upgrade to the linen paper if you want your finished product to look the same as mine.)

sticky sweet

It’s no secret I’m addicted to sticker books from Moo.com. My latest batch, shown above, just arrived today.

People have asked me to design Moo templates for Fit to Print for quite awhile, but since I don’t resell the stickers, I include art on mine that I’m not licensed to resell. (A lot of the cute images are actually dingbat fonts.)

But I finally put together a collection of three templates that are totally my design. You can customize these by color, change the wording, and add your own logos. See Fit to Print for more…

And check out these past Flickr entries that will give you more of an idea how you can Moo, too!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/shutterblog/2093600451/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/shutterblog/2131193638/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/shutterblog/2450414547/

http://www.flickr.com/photos/shutterblog/2538113140/

Happy sticking!

UPDATED to add: My stickers were featured by Moo.com at Photoshop World.

(Have questions about Moo stickers – like, “are they acid-free“? The answer is “yes”. And you can read more at their StickerBook FAQ…)

stick ‘em up

(Originally posted to Flickr forums in February 2008.)

Tired of printing my own circle stickers and having that blasted white ring around the edge, trying other online printers and having that blasted ring around the edge……….I decided to give Zazzle one more try because they do a computer-generated preview of what your printed label will look like. I wasn’t all that happy with them the last time I ordered because the white ring wasn’t even. But this time, I’d say about 80% of the labels are perfect. It makes a big difference having the border solid to the edge. Someone with OCD like me doesn’t notice the 1mm border shift as much that way.

Now they obviously feed these things into a machine automatically without any quality control, because the other 20% are slightly off.

But hey, I don’t have to deal with printing them myself now — the printing is decent — they’re gloss instead of matte, and you can order as few as one sheet at a time for under $5/sheet.

Here’s your chance to make your own FREE 1.5″ bordered-circle sticker with Zazzle until a better alternative is found.

→ download link ← (please note this file was designed in CS2 and you must have Photoshop or Elements and know how to edit a .psd layered file — I do not provide technical support for this download)

There are two layers — border color and label color:

I have the border set to black and the label center set to white right now, but you can change both of those by clicking where the pink arrow is pointing in each section — just double-click each box and you can change to any color you’d like.

The maximum height to fit your logo or image in the center is 360-pixels high or 360-pixels wide.

Save your image as a .png, .tiff, .jpg, or .gif file.

Make sure to select the 1.5″ labels from Zazzle: zazzle.com/custom/stickers

Check to make sure everything looks centered and how you want it to appear in their design-generator. (I suggest not adding text in their editor — do all of your editing in Photoshop before upload.)

Voilà! (I accept thank you’s via Sephora.)

This template is ©Robyn Pollman, 2008. All rights reserved. It may not be copied, resold, made available for download or given away elsewhere, or redistributed without my written permission.