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1/12/12

My Very First Sketch

I love creating layouts from sketches.  Using a sketch designed by someone else sparks my creativity, challenges me to go beyond my comfort zone, and helps push me to try new things.  They often serve as a jumping-off point for me to make something totally unique.

I've wanted to try making sketches of my own for awhile now.  But I had no idea how to go about translating my pen-on-paper sketches into the 'real' sketches that actual sketch artists make.  So I asked the ladies at Ideas for Scrapbookers what software they use to make their sketches.  I learned that Cathy uses Photoshop CS4.  Dolores uses Photoshop CS5.  Pam and Heather both use Photoshop Elements.  I don't have any of those.  Is it possible, I wondered, to make a sketch using an ordinary program everyone already has?  Fortunately, the answer is yes. 

I started with the OpenOffice version of Word (Writer).  At the bottom left of the screen, there is a nice assortment of shapes.


In a short amount of time, it was fairly easy to translate my pen/paper sketch into something that looked more professional.  I printed out my sketch- it looked good!  But when I went to blog about it, I ran into trouble.  There was no way to export the document into the jpg, gif, or png that Blogger requires.  I tried a variety of things before deciding that the amount of effort I was putting into changing a .doc into a .jpg was exceeding the amount of time I'd spent making the sketch!  Unacceptable.   

So I ditched Writer and tried the OpenOffice version of Paint (Draw).  The control panel looks similar to the one in Writer but with a few extras.

 

I set about recreating the sketch I'd already made in Writer.  It wasn't too difficult.  Best of all, it just took one click to export the file as a .png, which I was then able to upload to Blogger.

And here it is- my very first sketch!

It's nothing fancy, but I like it.  For those of you who don't have Photoshop, you can create a perfectly acceptable sketch using Microsoft Paint or OpenOffice Draw.  I'd encourage you to give it a try!

8 comments:

  1. SteveJanuary 12, 2012 at 9:57 AM

    BTW, OpenOffice is a Open-Source office suite similar to MS Office. You can get more information here: http://www.openoffice.org/

    Another free and useful draw program is Google's Documents office suite. This is a fully online office suite: http://www.google.com/google-d-s/drawings/

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  2. Heather LandryJanuary 12, 2012 at 2:55 PM

    I think it came out adorably! You did a great job!

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  3. yyamJanuary 12, 2012 at 7:26 PM

    Looks fabulous! Cheers to more sketches! :)

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  4. Julie Tucker-WolekJanuary 12, 2012 at 7:40 PM

    Loveeeeeeeeeeee it!!! And loving the blah blah blah blah! lol! :):):):):):):):):):):)

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  5. Izzy AndersonJanuary 13, 2012 at 9:08 AM

    Wow, it's a great sketch and I love how inventive you were with figuring out to to draw the sketch with programs you already had. This is terrific.

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  6. Izzy AndersonMay 8, 2013 at 11:44 AM

    I was just looking at this again today. I think I want to play with this. I do not have Photoshop either. Thanks for this tip.

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  7. Tanya HamJanuary 15, 2014 at 10:19 AM

    I have Photoshop Elements, but I have no idea what I'm doing with it most of the time. This is awesome, and I will definitely be trying this out soon! :)

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  8. Alice GoldenJanuary 18, 2014 at 7:40 AM

    Thanks for the inspiration!

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