Stretch a sketch with Aly Dosdall!

Every year I look forward to making handmade valentines for my hubby and kids.  I always handwrite a note inside--it’s a great chance to record my thoughts about how special they are and what I love about them.   But, making six cards by hand can be time consuming.  So this year I decided to save some time by basing all six of my cards on the same sketch.  Here is the sketch I chose--it’s one of the December 2010 cardmaps by Becky Fleck from her PageMaps blog (www.pagemaps.com):

 
 
I also decided to save myself a trip to my local scrapbook store (not that I don’t love shopping there) and stick with my stash for these cards.  I only had a couple of Valentine’s Day lines, so I tried to find other lines that had colours that were appropriate.  I wanted each card to be unique so I picked six different lines to work with.  I ended up using two Valentine’s Day lines, two everyday lines, one little girl line, and even one Christmas line.  I also picked out some generic love-themed stickers and rubons to use for sentiments.  Here are the six cards I made:

 

Supplies: patterned papers (My Mind’s Eye, Echo Park Paper Co., Bo Bunny Press, Heidi Grace Designs, Imaginisce, Cosmo Cricket), die cut tags (My Mind’s Eye), cardstock alphas (Echo Park Paper Co.), sentiment stickers (SRM Press), velvet sayings (Making Memories), raised heart accents (Heidi Grace Designs), die cut stickers (Sassafrass, Echo Park Paper Co.), rub-ons (Imaginisce), glitter flowers (Imaginisce), ribbon (Cosmo Cricket, Offray), baker’s twine (Jillibean Soup), buttons (Making Memories), gems (Darice, Creative Hands), spray ink (Creative Imaginations), ink pad (Clearsnap), scalloped scissors, border punch, and scalloped heart punch (Fiskars), circle punch (The Paper Studio), corner rounder (Creative Memories), craft knife and edge distressor (Making Memories)

Can you tell each card is based on the same sketch?  It’s easy to tell some are based on the same design, but harder to tell with others.  Let me show you how I used the sketch as inspiration for each card and share some tips with you on how to stretch a sketch to meet the needs of your project.

Tip 1: Take it literally

Sometimes the best way to stretch a sketch is to copy the design pretty carefully, but just use different products.  That is often the best use of time because it doesn’t require much extra thought.  Here is my example:

 


Both of these cards follow Becky’s sketch pretty closely: they are both the same orientation (vertical vs. horizontal), use ribbon in the same place, and have three elements stacked on the side of the card.  The sentiments are in different places, but you can tell they follow the original sketch.

Tip 2: Tip it over

One of the easiest ways to alter a sketch to meet your needs is to tip it on its side, or rotate it.  For this card I simply rotated the sketch to the right, like it’s lying on its side:

 

You can rotate a sketch to the right, left, or completely turn it upside down.  You can also flip it top to bottom, or left to right.  If you feel like getting a little crazy, you can do both! 

Tip 3: Move it

Sometimes you might need to move one or more of the elements of the sketch to another place to fit your project.  In my cards below I rotated the sketch to the left, and moved the ribbon to another place to fit my needs:

 

I also replaced the ribbon with different kinds of borders, and left the card on the right in a vertical orientation even though I rotated the sketch on its side.

Tip 4: Keep it loose

Sketches don’t always have to be followed exactly—or even mostly.  Loose interpretations are just fine!  You can take only part of the sketch as your inspiration.  For example, you could use only the 3 elements stacked on top of each other and change the rest.  Or, you could use a layered artisan label and embellishment.  Or you could mimic the placement of the background patterned papers and change everything else.  On this card, I used three focal elements and a ribbon border, but nothing else from the original sketch:

 

(Tip: to add a little dimension, I cut out the chicks from the patterned paper with a craft knife and adhered them in their original spot with some dimensional foam squares.)

I hope these tips have inspired you to save yourself some time by stretching a sketch over several projects.  If you have lots of valentines (or other cards) to make, consider picking a favourite sketch and sticking to it! 

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Comments

[Barb]

Awesome tips, Aly! Thanks so much!
And the cards are all adorable. :)

[Valerie G.]

Love how you broke down the info for each variation! This is a great way to get a lot out of sketches. Thanks for sharing!

[Maryann]

Great ideas and the cards are all awesome. Thanks so much for all the good ideas here.

[Lesa]

Sweet cards and great tips, thanks so much for sharing!!

[Kathy (krolski)]

Great cards and tips! Thanks!!

[michelle galloway]

such pretty cards!

[mmspiker]

Thanks for offering all these design tips, it was really helpful!

[melanie]

Wow! Love the inspiration, have to get cracking on mine now, thanks.

[Janet Sisk]

Thanks for the inspiration. Just think you are done with them now so you can just sit back and not stress over last minute card-making! :D

[Marilyn Nimmo]

Very sweet Valentines!!! Thanks for showing how to stretch sketches!

[jill]

I love the detailled explaination of how to work from a sketch to create. Thanks for sharing your cards. Guess I better get going on mine now!

[MaryK]

super helpful tips. thanks

[Carol Metully]

This blog entry is awesome! I really love the fact that you've shown how to use a sketch in so many ways and described it as well. I'm not new to sketches or cardmaking but it's always nice to see how someone else approaches the creative factors! Inspiration like this can put a mental block back in the closet where it belongs!!

[Becky Williams]

Such great cards and tips, Aly!

[Nancy]

Your cards are fantastic...I love all the variations! Thanks so much for the tips on sketch interpretations! :o)

[Claire]

That is a cool sketch and I love the way you explained.I'm not very good at following sketches, somehow as soon as I see one my own ideas get in the way which is not always a good thing lol.
Claire

[Anne Marie B]

So many different ideas with one sketch love it!!!!! Fabulous cards!

[Monika Wright]

Awesome ideas and tips, Aly!

[Sandy]

Great cards. I really enjoyed the tips cause I always have trouble with sketch challenges. No wait, I have trouble with colour challenges too:) But really, the tips have inspired me to TRY AGAIN:)

[Lisa P]

That is awesome. The best case for using sketches yet!

[doreen Moore]

love your cards. I'm certainly going to use this sketch.

[Cathy P]

Such adorable cards! Thanks for the sketch tips - it helps me to think outside of the box! :)

[sharon hack]

Love your cards ! Thanks for showing us the different ways to follow a sketch. Great tips !

[Sandy L]

Thank you so much for writing this! I've definitely learned from it. You rock!

[Darla]

Really interesting to see the variations on the sketch. Always good to experiment and colour outside the lines.