Calendar Workshop 2025

[Cristina]

On 10/25/2024 at 4:42 PM, Susan Ewart said:

Cristina, these are so sweet.  I love how you did the Months like the date blocks and your colors are perfect for all the months.  I couldnt see the first two months though 😥, it's just a little box that I clicked and got nothing. 

Thank you, Susan!

I see now what you mean.   I guess it happened because I had edited the comment, and suddenly, there were two equal comments.  So, I deleted one, which probably had caused the glitch.

I edited it again.

[Cristina]

On 10/26/2024 at 4:58 AM, Cassel said:

@Cristina Two of your images are not showing. I am not sure why (January and February). Out of curiosity, are all those images from the same author or the same theme?

Carole, I could not be here this weekend, so I noticed this only today after seeing Susan's comment.

I guess it happened because I had edited the comment, and suddenly, there were two equal comments.  So, I deleted one, which probably had caused the glitch.

The images are not from the same author or theme (pasja1000 & Couleur); I downloaded them a long ago.

[Ann Seeber]

9 hours ago, Julian Adams said:

I don't understand what promoting a layer does?  Could someone please explain?  I used the Background layer to color what I want the mask to let through around the photo.  Then I created a new raster layer and pasted the image that is to show through the dates there.  How would it work by promoting a layer?

Julian, I use promoted layers a lot as I can select an area, promote it to a new layer and whatever I do to it doesn't impact the original. Usually with these calendars, I'm able to isolate the frame for the photo and work on that, independent of the mask, though in certain cases, I had to slide the promoted layer up out of the group totally.

Edited 3 hours ago by Ann Seeber

[Julian Adams]

3 hours ago, Susan Ewart said:

Here is the materials properties box.  You can see I've chosen the gradient tab on the top and to the right you can see the gradient at zero angle and and 98 angle on the second image.  you can see the name in the drop down list bottom left.  Cassel made this gradient...look below to see how complex it is.  Blows my mind!  And yes, there are master classes about Gradients in the Campus (for Diamond members).  And those (The Master Classes) are downloadable.  You can also see in the drop down gradient menu/list (?) all the other gradients are showing the same 98 degree angle.  I first manipulated it by grabbing that stick--thing in the middle of the gradient box above the words angle and repeats (oh man, you can do crazy cool stuff with repeats using huge numbers!).  I used the top of the 4 vertical boxes on the right top side.  Does any of this help?  I'm not a great explainer.

I also probably used the pick tool to pull out from the left side, horizontally.  I stretch the corner of the canvas out so I can stretch beyond the canvas to get the effect I want.  Sometimes I need to reduce the canvas on the screen to be able the pull out the corners or edges as far as I need to.  Probably this is all stuff you know already.

I feel flattered you took the time to write that response. I need to study it. Thank you very much!

I've used PSP for a couple of decades now to tweak photographs, and my computer generated fractal artwork, but it's all been on a single layer. I'm just venturing out in using layers gradients, masks, and all these other things in the past year. So nearly all the stuff that were learning in these workshops is brand-new to me. I think the reason why my projects look as good as they do is because I have a good sense of color, I'm very creative in a lot of ways, as well as being really good with computers. The ideas just come to me and I figure out ways of getting done what I pictured in my mind.  I'm sure that I'm doing many things the hard way!

Edited 3 hours ago by Julian Adams

[Julian Adams]

5 minutes ago, Ann Seeber said:

Julian, I use promoted layers a lot as I can select an area, promote it to a new layer and whatever I do to it doesn't impact the original. Usually with these calendars, I'm able to isolate the frame for the photo and work on that, independent of the mask, though in certain cases, I had to slide the promoted layer up out of the group totally.

That's exactly what I mean about doing things the hard way. I've been working on the frames too, but I haven't isolated them by promoting to a new layer. That's a great idea will probably make things much easier for me. Thank you

[Cristina]

On 10/25/2024 at 6:44 PM, Ann Seeber said:

sadly, I had the same problem

Ann, there was probably a glitch after I edited the post; it showed twice, and I deleted one.  I posted on Friday and wasn't back here until today. 😞 

[Cristina]

On 10/25/2024 at 6:45 PM, Mary Solaas said:

I'm keeping with the white background for the dates since they may be used for writing in after it's printed. Also keeping with the Arial Black for the font. But love what everyone is doing with their calendars as far as font, background, etc. which are in the tutorials. So, I decided to  play around with background, fonts and whatever else the tutorials tell us to do. This is one of the background papers I made (looking forward to the upcoming workshop). This is some of the fonts I played with (but not the glyphs since I seem to have chosen ones without extra glyphs. On the paper, I played with blend modes on both papers and on the smaller one I used the layer style of outer glow.

Wow, Mary, great ideas for doing things differently!

This is one workshop I like to play around with, although I keep in mind that the recipient is my mother-in-law and what she likes.

[Cristina]

9 hours ago, Susan Ewart said:

here is an almost finished October.  I made the calendar smaller to fit the days of the week across the top and so I could enlarge the Month.  Still playing with placements, month in the centre, month to the far left or centered on the date boxes.  So, I'll live with this for a bit.  The extra space I had planned on using quotes so i will stick with that.  I used a gradient on the background (made of one of Cassel's gradients - sunset), two of them, one with an angle and probably a blend mode to blend them together and the fading white as well.  kept a copy of all of them then merged the other layers into one layer.  Added a texture to the background and to the boxes to make them look like they are part of the background.  Havent changed the numbers yet and decided if I'll keep black text or try something else.  I did try to blend the rasterized quote and it looked cool, but not sure the calendar would remain cohesive if I did that with all the months.  So, this one isnt all the way done but thought I'd show some progress.  Now to go back (and forward to Nov/Dec) to complete them all.  I'll post as I get each one done.   

I might have forgotten to take the blend mode of the first part of the quote (it's a separate layer than the word Flowers), it's looks lighter and not black. 

Quoting Corrie: "I just take one of your posts to tell you that your photos are great and very creative. "

Susan, I love not only your calendar but your photos; they are really great!

[Cristina]

On 10/25/2024 at 7:50 PM, Julian Adams said:

It's starting to come back to me.  I went for a much simpler, cleaner look this time.

 

I love the layout, Julian.

[Cristina]

On 10/25/2024 at 8:40 PM, Ann Seeber said:

And here's October - the Tapirs are designated Endangered. This zoo has a breeding program for them. The background paper is ID_AllThatsFall and the pumpkin sticker is from Sheila Reid.

Ann, I love the layout, the background paper, and the pumpkin clipart on the 31st!

[Ann Seeber]

42 minutes ago, Julian Adams said:

That's exactly what I mean about doing things the hard way. I've been working on the frames too, but I haven't isolated them by promoting to a new layer. That's a great idea will probably make things much easier for me. Thank you

You're welcome

[Cristina]

On 10/26/2024 at 10:10 PM, Sharla said:

It’s been great doing this workshop with you all because we do have different styles and approaches and they are great to see and learn from. I love the differences.

I never use masks in layouts so this calendar workshop has been a challenge for me. More than half of the photos I thought I’d use simply didn’t work with the masks and some of the ones I have used looked awful at their original size hence I’ve enlarged many of them so that some detail emerges. It’s been interesting having to do this because it’s not what I’d usually do. I'll persevere to the end but I am still a reluctant mask user!
 

I cannot agree more, Sharla.  The great thing about doing workshops together is seeing the different styles, uses of colors, and approaches to the same instructions.

There are ideas I could apply to my work now or in the future.

We could do this workshop anytime as Diamond members, but it wouldn't be as fun.

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I have the same issue with photos not working with all types of masks.  Most Pixabay photos were 1920x1280, so I first had to enlarge them until they fit the mask height. 

 I duplicated the photos, blurred the bottom 100%, and scaled down the top photos to fit inside the frame.  Not all were done this way, but most of them... It depended on the time I had or wanted to dedicate to the layout.

 

 

Edited 2 hours ago by Cristina

[Julian Adams]

Somehow I missed April.

[Cristina]

Here are my September & October layouts.

I thought the August photo I used was way too colorful for September (it would fit more the months of July/August), so I played with Effects>Photo Effects>Film and Filters.

Again, I added Corel clipart freebies, which I have had for a long time.

 

[Cristina]

November & December.

More Corel clipart Autumn /NewYear freebies.

For December, I used Cassel's Alpha Beads script again. I chose the square format, translucent instead of opaque beads, and slightly uneven beads. There are four versions of the Alpha Bead script.

 

Edited 47 minutes ago by Cristina

[Cristina]

And the Cover.

As always, it was fun to participate in this Workshop. 🙂