Society of Stampaholics

VIDEO: How to Resize Photos in PicMonkey

I've been meaning to make a video using one of those programs that allows you to video your computer screen so the viewer can see exactly what you're doing in real time.

Thanks to Screencast-o-matic, I finally did just that - and from the comfort of my own bed, I might add! (I was forced to do this while everyone was asleep this morning - only way to guarantee some quiet! Luckily, Spouse wasn't snoring.) 😉

So with no further ado....

How to Resize Photos in PicMonkey

You can watch this video full screen here.

T I P

Reducing a picture's size is never a problem in terms of maintaining quality, but trying to enlarge a small photo is another story entirely. You can bump it up a tiny bit, but very quickly the picture becomes pixelated and loses detail faster than you can squeal, "Cheese"! I strongly recommend adjusting your camera setting's file size default to at least the "middle" option (different cameras have different settings). In other words, never choose the smallest size option(s).  

I hope this video showed you how quick and easy it is to resize any photo using the oh-so-fabulously-FREE PicMonkey site!

Thanks for stopping and have a blessed day!

Deborah

*This is an international card exchange - you send a handmade card to the person above you on the list, and you receive one from the person below you on the list. If that's not enough of a win-win, I also randomly draw a prize winner each month. I do a reveal of all the cards with links to the challenge participants' blogs or online photo galleries - which is a great way to increase exposure to your blog or photo gallery!. Please read the Rules and FAQ's if you want to play along. :~D

See a past CCC reveal.

Total cards exchanged as of December 1, 2015: 1,905

Come join a fun and rewarding international card exchange! Send a handmade card to the person above you on the list, and get one from the person below you. In addition, you may be the randomly drawn winner of the sponsor's prize! All cards are showcased in a reveal post with links to their makers' blogs or online photo galleries. It's a win-win, so sign up now!

The New Blog - Theme #2

Okay, I need your opinions!

The first theme I set up for the blog renovation is called The Style; here's a screen shot of it:

Since I was absolutely in the dark, I didn't have a whole lot sussed out (why there's no header, etc.).

I've spent a few hours trying out Theme #2: Sky. Again, I'm not astute enough yet to get everything up and running, but I'm interested in your feedback in terms of the aesthetics. Do you like The Style or the Sky best?

Go here for the home page. If you click on "Family" or "Technology", you can see what it looks like when it changes.

I'm very grateful for any and all feedback!

Thanks for stopping and have a blessed day!

Deborah

 

Wanna Watch Me Torture Myself?

Ha! I thought that title might get your attention!

Revamping of my blog is on my to-do list this summer. And by revamping, I mean a whole new ballgame. Before September 1, 2015, rolls around, Typepad will no longer be my home.

I say this with confidence because I bought a year's subscription to both HostGator, my new domain, and to Elegant Themes by Wordpress (and have actually selected one, by cracky)!

I have even... uploaded said theme to my new blog host AND made a child theme so I can tailor it to my specifications without hopelessly destroying the original code.

Do I know what I'm doing?

Nope.

But I'm an autodidact and have managed to successfully teach myself just about everything I've ever wanted to know, so with the help of YouTube, the WordPress site, and some other fine sites out there, I will overcome my ignorance!

And I will share my hard-won knowledge with those who are interested so you can learn from my mistakes. (And, let's face it, this situation is rife with comic possibilities so it should have some entertainment value.)

If you'd like to see what I've accomplished thus far, check out my first post at my dream blog.

Thanks for stopping and have a blessed day!

Deborah

Tutorial: Fill Your Text with Pictures

Hello, World!

I wanted to make a teaser for the upcoming Card Chain Challenge reveal post, and I ended up teaching myself a fun and EASY way to fill letters with pictures. No Way, you say!

WAY!

I used Photoshop Elements but I'm sure other graphic programs will allow you to do this trick as well.

So here's my final product (of which I am ridiculously proud!):

The pictures you see in the letters are little selections from some of the cards exchanged this month (I made a collage). You can use just one photo, though.

How to Perform This Magical Trick

I thought it would be best to create instructions with screenshots, so please feel free to Download Tutorial - Text Pictures.

I hope you give this a try and send me your results!

Thanks for stopping and have a blessed day,

Deborah

How to Find Your Permalink

If you've ever followed a blog hop, you may have noticed that each stop is often linked to the blog's general address rather than to the specific hop post. (My general address is www.dominodebi.typad.com, for example.) This can be troublesome if you want to follow the hop at a later date, because now you have to scroll through each blogger's subsequently published content.

Another example of not being able to find something is when you follow a link to a post that was published two years ago... only to find yourself arriving at the blog's home page and not the specific post. 

Oh, the humanity!

If the blogger had linked to the specific post's permalink, you would have landed right on target - even if that post was published a year ago.

Which brings me to the reason for today's post. I'm going to school y'all in permalinks!

A permalink is a post's specific web address, and it's created as soon as you give your post a title. Where to find your post's permalink depends on your blog provider. Since most people use either Typepad or Blogger, that's what I'm going to cover. If you have another blog provider, leave a comment, and I'll update this post once I've researched it.

We'll start with Typepad since I'm here.

I N   T Y P E P A D

Typepad's permalink is almost impossible to miss because you will always find it immediately beneath your title field, and it's clearly labeled Permalink:

All you have to do is highlight the permalink, copy it, and paste it wherever you like. (Start highlighting at the http://.)

Here's what it looks like when I copy and paste this post's permalink:

http://dominodebi.typepad.com/sos/2013/02/how-to-find-your-permalink.html 

When I recently participated in the Hero Arts Hostess Blog Hop, I provided my post's permalink to Tami at Hero Arts so she could write (in advance) the opening day's post with a link to my specific hop post:

http://dominodebi.typepad.com/sos/2013/01/your-2nd-stop-on-the-hero-hop.html

rather than to my general address: www.dominodebi.typad.com. 

I N   B L O G G E R

Finding your post's permalink in Blogger is also easy!

The permalink can be found in the column directly to the right of your writing field - third choice from the top. Check it out:

All you have to do is click on the permalink icon, and you'll see this:

Just copy-and-paste, chicas! I've copied it, and now I'm going to paste it right here:

http://auditioningblogspot.blogspot.com/2013/02/how-to-find-your-permalink.html

Just click Done when you're finished.

(Ignore the Custom Permalink option. We don't need to mess with that for our purposes.)

And that's it!

Your assignment (if you choose to accept it) is to go back to your blog and write a post that tells the world that you have conquered the Mystery of the Permalink! Before you publish your post, come back here and paste its permalink in a comment. If you do this at least once - now, while the information is fresh - you'll own that knowledge forever! (You don't have to publish the post unless you want to, of course.)

I hope everyone will use their posts' permalinks when providing links in the future, so we can all find what we want on the Web!

Thanks for stopping, and have a blessed day!

Deborah

PicMonkey, You Rock!

Oh. My. WORD.

I have discovered a site, thanks to my lovely friend and cardmaker extraordinaire, Nancy Krueger, that will be the joy of a lot of people if they don't already know about it yet.

If you don't own any photo editing software, or if you own some and it makes you pull out your hair... MAN, do you need to know about PicMonkey! 

PicMonkey is an online photo editing site that is easy and free. (And when I say easy, I mean as easy as that girl whose number was always on the bathroom wall in high school.)

You can join up as a member, but you don't have to. Of course, you can buy a subscription to get access to more tricks and options, but most people who just want to do some basic editing (like resizing a photo to a specific pixel width, for example), will find everything they need without having to spend a brass farthing. 

One thing that might throw someone is their clever allusion to James Bond actors in the Save feature, where the aptly named buttons reflect the quality and size of your saved photo:

SEAN: Gorgeous, but large file size

PIERCE: Great quality, good file size

ROGER: Not great quality, tiny file size

*GRIN*

I couldn't agree more.

I took a few screen shots to give y'all an idea of how wonderful this site is.  

Here's my uploaded photo (click on OPEN - above left of photo), and you see your computer screen window all ready to let you search your computer for the photo you want. 

As you can see, my photo is a little dark (taken after sunset).

Here's what my photo looked like after I gave it a basic edit that took, like, a whole minute:

See the little icons on the left of the menu options? When you click on one, it gives you a whole new set of options. I labeled them for you below:

And here are a very few examples of what you can do:

If you look at the icons on the left above, I've switched to the Effects menu. You can darken (or lighten) your edges and also pick your color, intensity, and size! I chose pink to go with the flower.

How about an old-fashioned Matthew Brady look?

The little orange crown in the menu above means that this particular feature is available to subscribers only, but it's great that you can see what it does on your own picture - helps you decide if you want to take it to another level.

Here we have a cool B&W twist: you can select inside (or outside) the circle (which you size) to have the picture show color and B&W.

Infra-Red - zowie!

And here's a photo that I did all sorts of things to after the basic edit - including using the texture feature so it looks like it's printed on canvas.

You have an unlimited number of features at PicMonkey that are all free and easy to use. When you're done, you can save it, download it, Tweet or FB it, Pin it, and email it straight from PicMonkey.

Now hoe cool is that?

I hope you give PicMonkey a try!

Thanks for stopping and have a blessed day!

Deborah