Scraps Of Mind

3 Different Techniques for making Artist Trading Cards

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Corina from Patchscrap sent me a lovely gift of some gorgeous pieces of brocade lace for Christmas. And since she and I have been playing with ATCs in recent times (see my article on Artist Trading Cards here to get the lowdown on what they are), I thought I might use some of it for a little project I had in my mind about ATCs.

From a scrapbooking point of view, an ATC can be created as:

• Traditional, with real life elements and embellishments;
• Digital, created as a digital file using all digital elements;
• and Hybrid, creating a major element(s) digitally and incorporating it into a design with real life embellishments.

So I thought it might be fun to make three different ATCs, one in each genre, using some of the brocade lace on each of them to link the three together. And you can see each of the different styles and tell me which you prefer.

Traditional Scrapbooking ATC

My Brocade Dream ATC is made with no use of the computer whatsoever. I’ve used the brocade lace as a backdrop for the focal element (the Edwardian lady) and added snippets of the gold brocade to the edges of the flower petals.

The title is partially hand written (I don’t think that it’s come out particularly well, especially after scanning) and partially from a fabric sticker I had. And some bling accents to add some sparkle.

I do enjoy this romantic style. I rarely use it on my Scrapbook layouts but I’m very fond of it for my ATCs.

Digital Scrapbooking ATC

Brocade Birds is a totally digital ATC.

I’ve used Thao Cosgrove’s Art Journal Collection for this piece. It’s one of my favourite kits.

I’ve scanned the brocade lace and turned it into a digital element. And then reduced the opacity to blend it a little more into the background. This is one of the big advantages with digital of course, you can play around with your elements until you get them looking just how you want them.

I’ve deliberately made the birds look like they’re flying off the paper for this one as I think it works in this instance. I would not normally use such a large shadow on my digital scrapbooking elements.

I also used the ScrapSimple Fancy Folds Photo Curl to roll the edge of the brocade lace and reveal the background paper beneath.

Hybrid Scrapbooking ATC

Finally I made Book of Brocade as a Hybrid Scrapbooking ATC.

I made the book from elements out of Erica Hite’s Bookworm Collection (another timeless digital scrapbooking kit). The little flower is part of the digital element I created, and then I added a real brad after I had printed and cut out the element.

Most of my ATCs are Hybrid ones as I frequently print out digital elements, resized to fit on the ATC format. I don’t always make specific elements though, such as this book.

So as you can see, all three techniques create very different styles of ATC and it’s great great fun to play around with them.

Thank you very much Corinna for giving me the brocade lace that has inspired this project. I had a great time working with it.

I’m not sure which one I like the best. I’m pleased with how the digital ATC has evolved, and I do like the romantic look of the traditional one. And although I don’t feel that this Hybrid one is one of my best, I enjoy the look of combining traditional techniques with digital scrapbooking ones.

What do you think? I’d love to hear your views on them and on the different approaches to creating them.

Other related Articles:

Trading ATCs

Scrapbook Layout Color Schemes

How to Digital Scrapbook

Hybrid Scrapbooking - the best of Both Worlds

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