Template Workshop 2025

[Ann Seeber]

5 hours ago, Cassel said:

In the last page, it LOOKS like the middle strip of paper has an unexpected blurred edge.

You are right, I was not happy with the effect there. I used a striped fill and added the blur, but it is too much. I have fixed it and also the swirls here...

Edited Saturday at 08:58 AM by Ann Seeber

[Sharla]

Day 5: The photos are from freepik. The papers are from a kit by Rachel Martin called Aidan. The quote is from The Book of Tea by Kakuzo Okakura

The text reads: “Tea is a work of art and needs a master hand to bring out its noblest qualities. We have good and bad tea, as we have good and bad paintings—generally the latter. There is no single recipe for making the perfect tea, as there are no rules for producing a Titian or a Sesson. Each preparation of the leaves has its individuality, its special affinity with water and heat, its own method of telling a story.” 
 

[Cristina]

I fell behind and haven’t started choosing the photos for Days 4 and 5. 
I had time, however, to review the “Temptation Tentations Masterclass” and “Writing on Different Surfaces" blog posts. It is an easy and very effective technique, and I will definitely use it more often. 
But I need to figure out how to do this in Affinity, as it is the app I’m using for this workshop. Considering that the Photo Layer has Layer Effects FX - Outline - Shadow - Color Correction, and I have to learn how to remove part of the selection.
It's probably not difficult to find the Affinity way, but I don’t have the time now. Still, it’s something on my to-do list.

-------------------------

I'll go over the previous posts now.
 

Edited Saturday at 11:23 AM by Cristina

[Cristina]

On 4/25/2025 at 10:47 AM, Sue Thomas said:

You would  have seen them all before, as they are a sample of what I  have posted over the years.  Your comment is still  very much appreciated.

Sue, I have seen them before, but it's always great to see them again. Some techniques, such as the candle, are clever and beautiful.

[Cristina]

@Cristina In the layout At the beach, did you treat both greenery as painted on the background? If so, it looks great except for the fact that a painted element would not overlap the photo or extend past the paper. If you were to offset your leaves a tiny bit, they would blend very well with the watercolor feel of the blue paper.

Yes, I did. Do you remember that I wrote you because the Diamond file didn't have the shadow layers, and that I would consider them as stamps?

I am saving your comments with all the pages' folders, so I don't forget to address your comment later.

Keep them coming!  🙂

[fiona cook]

4 hours ago, Jean Naumann said:

And I'm caught up now, here is Template 5.  I think I'll redo this one, I like to have more space taken up with photos so I'll probably have a play with it, but it's always good to follow along with the lesson.

Jean, Can I ask what method you used to place the stars around the stitching? It looks good to me.

[Cristina]

13 hours ago, Susan Ewart said:

Lesson 3  -  Template 3-Diamond

I should have titled this "Blend Modes" because every paper or photo mat, and the two pieces of foliage have blend modes and some with 3 or 4 papers in the blending group.  I did group all the blended stuff and duplicated the group, hid it, then merged the end result for the shadow part.  I used elements/papers from Digital Scrapbook (Marisa Lerin, Brooke Gazarek, Gina Jones, Jessica Dunn, Kerri Dempsey and Janet Scott). 

The foliage I used the tutorial with the filled duplicate layer above, took me awhile to get the right color fill.  I still found it was too bright on the layout so I merged the blend group and blended them into the blue paper (already merged blended group).  I even attempted to make a cluster from 6 separate elements.  

The fonts are Creative Fabrica; Madelican and Matona ('S')

Photos are mine and they aren't really looking at the real sun (like fake news, there is also indoor fake sun 😲).  These were my surprise sunflowers I discovered at the back of my very small garden that I only noticed because I needed to go into the little shed.  I thought they were mutants, cute fluffy mutants.

I love everything about it, Susan.  The photos, the colors, the title, the elements.... Outstanding!

[Cristina]

11 hours ago, AprilDawn said:

still using Affinity 2.6.2 and finding it  a joy to use. This is lesson 2,  i am a bit behind though due to some more life issues but i will get to finish. The photos are from pixabay and  created a colour swatch from  it in affinity photo and used those colours on my project. Beige coloured paper created from a pattern, teal blue paper  free from Chantahlia Design, foliage  design is an abr brush imported into  affinity. again  i give thanks to Carole for the templates and the video as they are well explained.   i have been looking at everyone's projects for this workshop and you all have created  lovely work.

best wishes to everyone,

Dawn

 

Lovely layout, Dawn! I recall the first time I got to know Kookaburra through Marlene's page years ago. She used to showcase them often.

Probably through you and Annie as well. I even saw a YouTube video to hear how they sang. I learned to like this bird. 🙂 

 

 

[Euka]

Day 5 - Monkey Mia, Western Australia,  is a conservation park in the Shark Bay region 850 kms north of Perth known for the dolphins that come in daily to be fed.  When I was there I was told visitors used to be able to swim with the dolphins and feed them but these days only the park rangers are in the water with them and a couple of people selected to be in the water to help feed them.  I wasn't selected 🙁. The rest of us lined up on the waters edge to watch.

The background is a photo of the sea with another photo overlayed at the bottom.   All the papers are from photos apart from the rick rack and the paper underneath it.  The 'flower' is also from a photo of shells and blend modes added.   The centre I made years ago. 

[Bee Kelly]

Lesson 3  - papers from THD_IntheSpringtime_Mar25DSBT - using PSP

[Leslie Pugs]

A bit behind. Here's day 3. Font is Black Spiral.

Taken in S Africa.

 

[Cassel]

For those of you who had issues with the template for day 5, I have fixed it.

Thanks for catching it.

[Sue Thomas]

Carole, I  have every intention of continuing to use PSP. Also I, very much appreciated your kind commet that you made about my wordart.

Here is my day 6.  The title and flair buttons were done in PSP, the rest in Affinity.

British Wild flowers. From left to right, coastal sea pinks (Thrift family), wild garlic and cowslips. Top flair button: periwinkles, bottom one are violets.

I do take a little  time scrolling through all the  wonderful pages, far to many to comment on  individually. All I can say is congratulations to one and all, each and every one are uniquely awesome and inspiring. 

Edited Saturday at 01:58 PM by Sue Thomas

[MoniqueN.]

2 hours ago, Bee Kelly said:

Lesson 3  - papers from THD_IntheSpringtime_Mar25DSBT - using PSP

Is it me or are the shadows a bit "big"? 😎

[Sue Thomas]

18 minutes ago, MoniqueN. said:

Is it me or are the shadows a bit "big"? 😎

I'm going to suggest to  Bee that  she deletes the shadows she has, assuming that they were created on their own layer that is, and start again.  Making sure that the  horizontal and vertal offset settings are the same, lower the opacity and  add some blur. Also, make sure the shadow on it's own layer box is checked. 

Edited Saturday at 02:08 PM by Sue Thomas

[Julian Adams]

5 hours ago, Sharla said:

Day 5: The photos are from freepik. The papers are from a kit by Rachel Martin called Aidan. The quote is from The Book of Tea by Kakuzo Okakura

The text reads: “Tea is a work of art and needs a master hand to bring out its noblest qualities. We have good and bad tea, as we have good and bad paintings—generally the latter. There is no single recipe for making the perfect tea, as there are no rules for producing a Titian or a Sesson. Each preparation of the leaves has its individuality, its special affinity with water and heat, its own method of telling a story.” 
 

Nice Tea theme! I've been very much in very good quality Chinese High Mountain oolongs for years. I just started drinking Matcha, so I can relate to your images.

[Julian Adams]

@Cassel What are some of the things Affinity an do that PSP can't. As you know I've been having trouble with PSP 2023 crashing on my Windows 11 machine and it'd be nice to try something that will be more stable. I've been watching the Affinity videos and it does look easier in a lot of ways.

[Susan Ewart]

7 hours ago, Ann Seeber said:

I think we call them "volunteers" when they spontaneously seed themselves away from the garden.

I love that word Ann (volunteers).  I had volunteers volunteering to help spread seed too.  the birds made sure that sunflowers were popping up all over the lawn too!  those ones only got 8" high but still had a pretty flower.  So bizarre.

[Susan Ewart]

7 hours ago, Carolyn Rye said:

Day 3 using Affinity Photo 2.  I decided to theme the Anzacs.  The Mural is from one of the many murals that my friend had photographed during her outback of Australia.  

Beautiful memorial.  I had to look up Anzac and learned it is the same as what we call Remembrance Day in Canada.

[Susan Ewart]

3 hours ago, Cristina said:

I love everything about it, Susan.  The photos, the colors, the title, the elements.... Outstanding!

Oh Cristina, that means a lot to me.  I still consider myself the newbie, the little sister trying to keep up with all the big sisters and brothers in the campus.

[Susan Ewart]

17 minutes ago, Julian Adams said:

@Cassel What are some of the things Affinity an do that PSP can't. As you know I've been having trouble with PSP 2023 crashing on my Windows 11 machine and it'd be nice to try something that will be more stable. I've been watching the Affinity videos and it does look easier in a lot of ways.

I would love a comparison as well.  Perhaps in the Q & A or a blog post.

[Susan Ewart]

3 hours ago, Leslie Pugs said:

A bit behind. Here's day 3. Font is Black Spiral.

Taken in S Africa.

 

Wow Leslie, how awesome to see a rhino in the wild, it must've been a humbling experience.  I hope we see more from this adventure.

[Susan Ewart]

3 hours ago, Euka said:

Day 5 - Monkey Mia, Western Australia,  is a conservation park in the Shark Bay region 850 kms north of Perth known for the dolphins that come in daily to be fed.  When I was there I was told visitors used to be able to swim with the dolphins and feed them but these days only the park rangers are in the water with them and a couple of people selected to be in the water to help feed them.  I wasn't selected 🙁. The rest of us lined up on the waters edge to watch.

The background is a photo of the sea with another photo overlayed at the bottom.   All the papers are from photos apart from the rick rack and the paper underneath it.  The 'flower' is also from a photo of shells and blend modes added.   The centre I made years ago. 

WOW!  I love this layout.  So thoughtful to use the photo as a background and overlaying another photo adds good texture.  Perfect choice using the circle for the sun.  This template was made for these photos.  I have friends that moved to Scotland last year and one thing they noticed was that the locals don't realize how stunningly beautiful it is right in their own back yard (so to speak). I think you know how incredibly beautiful Australia is by your layouts.  I love to see a land that is so vastly different than where I am from in Canada.

[Cassel]

24 minutes ago, Julian Adams said:

@Cassel What are some of the things Affinity an do that PSP can't. As you know I've been having trouble with PSP 2023 crashing on my Windows 11 machine and it'd be nice to try something that will be more stable. I've been watching the Affinity videos and it does look easier in a lot of ways.

At this point, I can't give a reasonable comparison as I am still learning about Affinity, trying to replicate effects/functions from PSP, and discovering new ones. As I dig further, I do find many things are similar, some things are easier, and other things are almost impossible, or even missing in Affinity (like the simple Repeat command in PSP is missing in Affinity). I surely will have a blog post on this at some point, but right now, I would not have enough information and experience to have a fair comparison.

[Sue Thomas]

12 minutes ago, Susan Ewart said:

I love that word Ann (volunteers).  I had volunteers volunteering to help spread seed too.  the birds made sure that sunflowers were popping up all over the lawn too!  those ones only got 8" high but still had a pretty flower.  So bizarre.

I refer to them as self-seeding plants, or volunteer plants.  Withinn the farming community  we   refer to them as self-sown plants