Scrapbooking Guidelines

While scrapbooking is a wonderful and creative means to be able to preserve memories and share them with other people, I'd like to suggest some scrapbooking guidelines. To make a scrapbook, one should be able to create a visual and tactile delight by showcasing photographs along with other "scraps" or bits and pieces of something that when put together tells a complete story of that particular slice of life depicted in the particular photo.

For instance, a photograph of a person hardly tells a story especially if the photo has no other particular merits or characteristics other than it containing a face. Creatively making a layout of it in a scrapbook allows you to tell the story behind the photograph. By adding other elements from different mediums, you can explain the photograph and the memory behind it without using something as blatant as actual statements.

The challenge of scrapbooking is in being able to utilize various elements to enhance a photograph while being limited to a finite area. Sometimes, in our zeal to tell a story, we tend to clutter and create a busy layout for our scrapbook. While there is no right or wrong way to layout a scrapbook, it may be important to note when less is more and that is what I'm suggesting in these scrapbooking guideline.

Perhaps it is important to remember that when we do scrapbooking, the inclusion of "scraps" or other creative elements into a layout is done to enhance a photo and tell a story that the photograph simply cannot do on its own. Our layout of the elements we incorporate however should not take away from the photograph. Remember that they are there only to improve its capacity to convey a thought or memory and not steal the show entirely.

This means that although there are no set rules in scrapbooking, it may be a good guideline to maintain a clean and simple layout for scrapbook projects. Although it is easy to get lost in the project and with all the items and "scraps" commercially available for use in scrapbooking endeavors, we must always keep in mind that a clean and simple layout may be more manageable to create and maintain.

By a clean and simple scrapbooking layout, we don't mean that you necessarily use less materials resulting in a Spartan like or anemic look to your scrapbook pages. A clean and simple scrapbooking layout simply means that you incorporate more synergy and symmetry in your layout instead of a haphazard collection of images, textures and colors.

The look and feel of a scrapbook is subjective to the viewer, which makes it even more important to maintain a clean and simple layout in scrapbooking. What looks like creativity to you may look too chaotic to another. This is why, being guided by trying to achieve a clean and simple scrapbooking layout is a good way to ensure that your scrapbook and memories can be easily shared and enjoyed by yourself along with your friends and loved ones. A clean and simple layout for scrapbooking cannot be achieved by curtailing creativity. Instead, more creativity should be exercised so that you can craft a better visual layout.

If however you are new to scrapbooking or you may not be sure about what clean and simple scrapbooking layouts mean, you can use ready made scrapbook layouts or use a software for scrapbooks. You don't necessarily have to convert your scrapbooks into digital forms but you are sure to be able to get wonderful ideas from these computer layouts.

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