Online Scrapbooking Services - Which to Choose?

Confused by Online Scrapbooking Services? In this article you'll discover what online scrapbooking is, what these services can enable you to do, and which ones to consider. It'll depend on whether you're a newbie, or experienced scrapper, and what you want to achieve. For newcomers, this could be an easy introduction to the creative world of digital scrapbooking.

Online scrapbooking websites are generally similar in that they allow you to upload your photos, select templates, add narrative and graphics to create your pages online, and then publish your album in print, on CD/DVD, or for viewing online.

Over the last 2-3 years, this has been the fastest growing area in the scrapbooking world. As you'll see, online scrapbooking services enable you to organize, create, save, and share your photo albums, all online. You can think of it as a merge of simple online photosharing with digital scrapbooking functions, in some cases with the capability of adding audio and video.

There are now many websites offering variations on these services. Here are some of the best known ones, with an indication of whether they are photo album oriented, or also support a higher level of creative art expected by online scrappers.

Online Photo Albums, with some scrapbooking Functionality:

MyPhotoAlbum.com - Allows you to archive photos & videos, access and personalize hundreds of designs, then create and share your photo albums online with your private group of family & friends, or open it to the world. You can also print your album as a book, or cards.

Shutterfly.com - Allows you to create online photo albums and offers a digital scrapbook printing service so you can order scrapbooks, photobooks, mugs and more. For example, Shutterfly will allow you to create online scrapbook pages for sports teams.

SnapFish.com - Upload and share your photos as an online photo album. Snapfish offers high quality online digital photo printing, as well as photo sharing. You can find creative scrapbook ideas and choose from over 100 personalized photo gifts to make from your photos.

Picasaweb.google.com - allows you to create online photo albums, share photos with friends and family...or explore public photos. Google claims..."a faster way to organize, edit, and share your photos".

Flickr.com - Photo-sharing heritage... You can explore, upload and organize your online photo albums, create albums, share and stay in touch.

Online Digital Scrapbooking Sites

ScrapBlog.com - a mature online, flash-based multimedia scrapbook editor. It allows you to quickly combine various media - images, audio, and video - into scrapblogs. Easy to use drag & drop photo upload, and creation of scrapbook pages. Integration with numerous services such as Photobucket, Flickr, Myspace, Facebook for ease of publishing across social networks.

Smilebox.com Offers hundreds of online scrapbook templates that you can use with your photos and videos. Add journalling and audio, and then you can email it to friends & family, print it out and more. They also provide slideshows, ecards, photo albums etc.

CropMom.com - CropMom allows you to make scrapbook pages online based around your photos and then download them in various formats. Low resolution downloads are free and will have the site logo on them and are usable for emails and blogs. High resolution digital scrapbook printing will cost you, but is offered on various items.

FreeDigitalScrapbooking.com - online scrapbooking, provides you with great information and products to help you merge your passion for scrapbooking with the ease and convenience of digital scrapbooking online, by providing tons of downloadable digital freebies, information, and tutorials.

So who should use which type of service?

- experienced scrappers, looking for the highest artistic functionality from online digital scrapbooking should select from the Online Scrapbooking Sites list

- newcomers to scrapbooking, or folks just looking for a quick way to share simpler designs with friends and family should select from the Online Photo Albums list.

The way things are going, the differences in online scrapbooking services will narrow as time moves on.

Genie Balfour A paper crafter and scrapbooker for many years, Genie is well-versed in the ins and outs of paper and online scrapbooking. As the founder of the popular website ScrapbookingGems.com, she writes regularly on paper and computer scrapbooking topics.

Click through to discover more about online digital scrapbooking services [http://www.scrapbookinggems.com/category/digital_scrapbooking/], or check out Genie's free scrapbook sketches and layouts series at http://www.scrapbookinggems.com/.

Why Choose Scrapbooking For a Hobby?

Scrapbooking is one of today's most popular hobbies or crafts. Why? Scrapbooks, whether paper or digital, are one of the best ways to preserve photographs and other memories of a person's life and family. While today's scrappers base their scrapbooks on photographs of special events in their lives or the lives of their family members, scrapbooks were being made long before the advent of photography.

So why choose scrapbooking for a hobby? The main reason to choose scrapbooking for a hobby is to provide a history of one's life and special events. While the popularity of scrapbooking has skyrocketed in the past several years, people have been keeping scrapbooks for many centuries. Scrapbook fans are essentially historians who keep and preserve the special events of their lives. So scrapbooking has been a historically important craft for a very long time.

People have been keeping some sort of scrapbook for hundreds of years. Starting in the 1400s, many recipes, letters, poems and other important pieces of paper were saved in albums. Early scrapbooking crafters collected their precious memorabilia and attached their memories to pieces of paper. These pieces of paper were later made into albums by combining the individual pages together.

Early scrappers saved bits of information on many of the same types of information that modern scrapbooking fans do. Renaissance era scrapbooking fans kept information on their favorite people, poems, pictures and trips. One of the rites of passage for a young person in those days was to take a European tour in their late teens or early twenties. Young, wealthy people who traveled through Europe collected colored plates with pictures of local coats of arms, famous places or famous events to put in their albums as souvenirs of their trips.

During the 1700s and 1800s scrapbooks were kept of school subjects and school friends. Girls kept a record of their writing skills, whether prose or poetry, in scrapbooks. They also kept scrapbook albums of their friends and school activities. While many young people kept journals of their personal history, keeping an album of pictures and other souvenirs was an important activity for many young people. Thus scrapbooking has been an important way for people to express themselves and keep their personal and family histories recorded through the ages.

When newspapers became available, newspaper clippings were added to scrapbooking albums as an important part of recording the important events in a person's life. The next advancement in scrapbook albums came when cameras and photographs became easily accessible to the public in the late 1880s. George Eastman's invention of the Kodak Brownie made photographs available to anyone who could afford to buy a camera. Thus, photographs began to be added to scrapbooks as pictorial records.

Today, scrapbooking is so popular most department stores carry huge assortments of scrapbooking supplies. And as history shows, you don't need to use only photographs for your scrapbooks, you can use any manner of things that mean something to you.

Visit Cheap & Easy Scrapbooking for more tips on scrapbooking on a tight budget.

8 Scrapbooking Materials - Tips To Choose Them Wisely

Years ago, it was hard to find stores that sold scrapbooking materials. But avid scrapbookers created a demand, and today you can find local stores devoted to scrapbooking and other retailers like craft stores that sell a huge variety of books, papers, and decorations. In fact, the hard part today is choosing what to use in your scrapbook. This article covers some basis that will help you make wise purchases and create a beautiful scrapbook.

Beginners are overwhelmed by their choices when they get into the store. There is so much variety that it's hard to pick out items from over-stocked shelves. And if you're making your first scrapbook, the excitement of discovering so much variety of color, design, layout, and concept available to you is overwhelming.

The trick for beginners is realizing that there are a few basic things to buy in the beginning. It's best not to get everything at once. The best start is selecting a few key pieces and building some test pages first to be sure you enjoy the hobby and to see if those materials are what you really want to support your theme.

Planning your project is a great way to limit initial purchases and focus on a few items. That way, you're not overwhelmed by the range of options, and you don't get home with many items you'll never use. Making that first trip for scrapbooking materials can be an expensive lesson in planning!

Even seasoned scrapbookers fall into this trap. Stumbling upon a great sale is a sure way to overstock your own scrapbooking supplies. We see things that look great on the shelf and, even though we don't have a use for it now, we just have to have it for later on. Planning your shopping trip by focusing on a few pieces will help you practice some self-restraint and save your hard-earned pennies.

Your first step for creating a wonderful scrapbook without going broke is planning. Sit down and think about what you want the final product to look like. Your vision doesn't have to be detailed, but you should have a good feeling for your subject, colors, and how much material your scrapbook will contain.

1. Finding the Right Album

The most important material for your scrapbook is the book itself. You'll find hundreds of sizes, designs, and presentation formats at the store. These are a few basic choices that make sense.

Traditional albums are the size of typing or copy paper (8-1/2x11") or one-foot squares (12x12"). Smaller albums are growing in popularity as new scrapbooking approaches increase. You'll find smaller squares that are easy to pack, carry, and decorate (for example, 6x6" to 8x8").

2. Page Protectors that Don't Also Detract

You'll need page protectors to preserve your pages and the photos, memorabilia, and decorations they contain. Scrapbook pages can be vulnerable to tearing and other damages. Page protectors also help keep stock-on items from falling out of the book as it ages.

There are two basic choices for page protectors: clear transparent protectors and non-glare protectors.

3. Using the Right Papers

Papers are basic to your color theme and overall design. The paper you choose for your background is an important part of the overall appeal of your scrapbook. Patterned papers are the most popular today. But it's important to remember that your backgrounds should frame your pages, not overwhelm them. They should be in subtle colors to help focus the eye on the photos and central items rather than the background paper.

4. Selecting Card stock

Card stock is a staple in the world of scrapbooking. Card stock is heavier than normal paper, though not as heavy as cardboard. Many office supply stores sell card stock for report covers and mailers. It's heavy enough not to crease or fold easily but light enough to bend. Used in a scrapbook, card stock is an effective foundation for embellishments, memorabilia, and photographs.

5. Picking an Adhesive

Adhesive holds everything together - literally. There are many types of adhesive available, but experienced scrapbookers know how important it is to use the appropriate type. You should always look for acid-free adhesives that are safe for photos. Adhesives with acids can cause the pictures to oxidize, paper colors to bleed or fade, and cause spots in embellishments like fabric, ribbons, or lace.

6. Take Care with the Paper Cutter

Sizing your inserts is a very important part of scrapbooking. Paper cutters are good for cropping photos, creating interesting shapes, and customizing standard decorations. But be careful! Paper cutters can also make you a bit over-enthusiastic, and you may destroy your item before it gets to the pages of your scrapbook. Avoid using the paper cutter with anything other than paper. While they keep the edges of photos and other paper items straight and clean, you should not try to use them with heavier decorations or fabric.

7. Scissors - a Necessity

The number one tool for scrapbooking is a pair of good scissors. They help you make custom shapes and make clean cuts in fabrics, ribbons, and other decorations. They'll help you make interesting pieces to fit your pages. By using similar shapes, your scissor-cut inserts can even make their own design theme.

8. Rulers

A beautiful scrapbook is precise and clean. Each item on the page must be neatly cut, balanced, and straight. Your ruler will save much time in marking guidelines and making sure the pieces fit properly.

There are hundreds of materials and tools available for scrapbookers today. Among those we haven't discussed are vellum, white plastic erasers, self-healing cutting mats, glue erasers, pens and pencils, photo corners, lettering stencils and fonts, and the trusty X-acto knife. You'll probably want to organize your scrapbooking materials in a toolkit of some kind. That way, you can keep everything together and avoid buying duplicates.

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