The Ohanaware Weblog
Make A Beautiful Christmas Card
In this tutorial I’m going to show you how you can create a beautiful memorable Christmas card. I can pretty much guarantee that your card will be different from everyone else’s. So I’m going to walk you through enhancing the photo, framing it, adding a caption and then finally printing it. I would recommend getting some heavier paper with either a photo gloss or photo matte finish, it’s up to which you choose. Also you should check out your local stationary store, many carry blank greeting card and envelope packs, just right for you to print your cards onto. You can also get a sample pack from our favorite paper suppliers, Red River Paper for only $12.49 shipped [Click Here to See or purchase Red River Paper's Greeting Card Sample Pack].
This tutorial has been designed for Funtastic Photos [Click here to download a free unlimited trial version], however you may be able to use a different program to apply these effects. If you’d rather, you can download the 1-Click Style, however I think you should still read step 6 onwards.
Step 1 :: Let’s get started
Open up Funtastic Photos and choose the image you wish to use. For this tutorial I’ve chosen a beautiful image of a family wearing santa hats. I think that this photo is a good one to use a Christmas Card. If you’re sending cards to Grandma or relatives a nice family photo will work. If it’s a close friend, perhaps a silly photo. If you’re really out of ideas, there are a bunch of FREE clipart web sites out there that you can download christmas scenes from and use them.
I confess that this isn't one of my images, I got this one from istockphoto.com
Step 2 :: Slight Enhancing
This picture is great, but I want to make some minor tweaks to it, I’m going to brighten up the dark areas then get the software to fix the contrast. Seems pointless as it makes only a minor difference, but I like it. In Funtastic Photos, make sure that the “Advanced Options” are visible, click on the “View” menu in the menubar of Funtastic Photos. If the “Advanced Options” item doesn’t have a check to the left of it, select “Advanced Options” and they’ll slide into the right hand side of the window. First check the “Auto Contrast” option, now Funtastic Photos will calculate the contrast of the image for you. The next option to check is the “Digital Flash”, this’ll bring out the detail in the dark areas.
Step 3 :: Magic Moments
The above step was like a warming up, we’ve got our advanced options and not afraid to use ‘em, so let’s use ‘em! We’ll start with the Confetti effect, Scroll down the list till you see the “Confetti” effect, click on it to activate it and show the options. Change the Type from “Confetti” to “Fat Stars” by clicking on the menu next to Type. Next change the “Max Size:” slider to about one 10th of the slider bar. Next, scroll down the Advanced list to find “Vignette”, click on it to show the options and to enable the “Vignette” effect. Drag the little “Radius” slider to about 3 quarters of the way, this’ll reduce the effect. The next effect is the Borders effect, again click on it to activate it and show the options. Click on the little button next to the “Border” caption. This’ll bring up the border selector. For this tutorial I’m using the border called “Scratch Thin”, but you can choose any border. Lastly click on “Gloss” and drag the “Strength” slider to about a 3rd of the way.
Step 4 :: Neat Trick
So that looks great and now we want to add a caption to our Christmas Card, however I don’t want the caption to be within the image. This is where the multiple layers of Funtastic Photos really becomes handy! The layer selector is at the top of the Advanced Options, and it reads “Top Layer” & “Bottom Layer”. You’ll notice that “Top Layer” is currently highlighted, if you click on “Bottom Layer” the picture will change to show you the layer underneath, which is the image as it was when we loaded it! Switch back to the “Top Layer” by clicking on it. Now scroll through the effect list until you find the “Scale” effect. Click on it to activate it and to reveal the options. Drag the “Scale” slider a little to the left so that it doesn’t cover the divider in the slider bar. Now use the mouse to click and drag the picture around, as you do you’ll notice that we can see through to the “Bottom Layer”. If you position the Top Layer so that it is centered width wise and the top of the image touches the top of the bottom layer.
Step 5 :: Back to the Bottom
Alright, back to the bottom layer. Click on the “Bottom Layer” caption in the layer selector to go to the bottom layer. Your screen should look exactly like it did when you first opened the image. Scroll through the Advanced Options list to find the overlay effect. Click on it to activate it and reveal its options. Nice, it’s all bright orange! Not what we want, click on the orange square next to “Color” and choose pure white. This’ll cover the bottom layer in pure white, which is what we want right now. Fantastic, now we’ll add a caption. This one’s a little trickier. Scroll through the list and click on “Captions & Text”, the effect will activate and reveal the options. Enter a very nice Christmas message, I’m using “Wishing you a Merry Christmas & Happy New Year”. I’d recommend you change the font to something a bit more festive, click on the menu next to “Font” in the “Captions & Text” options. I chose “Brush Script”, but you can choose whatever you like. If you click on the black square next to “Color” you can also change the color of the text, I choose a festive dark red, but again the color’s up to you. Now the tricky bit. We want to move the box to the bottom of the layer. Position the mouse so that it’s over the frame of the text area, the cursor will change to look like a hand. Click and drag the edge of the box, so the box moves to the bottom of the layer. You can resize the box using the corners of the text box. Try to position your box like I have done in the screen shot below.
Step 6 :: Let’s Print
So if you click back to the “Top Layer” you should see something that looks like below.
Beautiful huh? If your caption doesn’t quite line up you may need to go back to the bottom layer and move the text. When you’re happy with it, let’s print it! Click on the “Print & Layouts” button on the toolbar. The interface will change, then you’ll be in the Print & Layouts interface. There’s a row of icons at the bottom of the window. Scroll through the icons untill you see “Greeting Card”. Click on it and the preview will update. If yours is anything like mine, it’s cut off and doesn’t look too great! The first thing to do is to make sure that the Page Setup is the right orientation and correct paper size. Click on the “Page Setup…” button in the toolbar and make sure that the paper size is correct and the layout is Portrait. Click “OK”. Chances are everything looks better already!, however we’ll make one more adjustment in Funtastic Photos. Click the “Options” button on the toolbar and select “Scale Images To Fit Area”.
Step 7 :: Print Already!
Okay, now click on the “Print” toolbar button and it’ll produce the standard Apple print dialog, but don’t click on “Print” just yet. One of the secrets to getting great looking print is to tweak the print settings. In the dialog there is a button with a triangle. If it’s pointing downwards click on it to reveal the settings. There is a popup menu which says “Layout”, click on it and select “Quality & Media”. This step can severally improve the quality of your print out. I suggest you to select the correct kind of paper from the “Media Type” popup menu. Then set “Print Quality” to the highest setting possible. Now you can click Print.
When your card is printed, fold it over in half and voila. A beautiful memorable and personal greeting card.
A neat tip to save paper, is to change the Layout option from “Single Fold” to “Double Fold”, you may need to enable the “Auto Rotate For Best Fit” option in the “Options” menu on the toolbar. Print out the Christmas Card, turn the paper around 180 degrees and stick it back in the printer (your printer might be different and it may take several attempts to get it right), then print again. Cut the paper in half, and you’ll end up with two smaller cards from the same sheet of paper! Plus smaller cards are easier are easier to find envelopes for!