7/7 - 7 Tips for New Mobile Scrappers POSTED

Longer days and lots of sunshine tends to mean more time spent outdoors. It often also means more photos to scrap. But where to find the time? Maybe you’re like me and are trying out the option of mobile scrapping to take advantage of every free moment. If you’re new to this aspect of the hobby I thought I’d share a few tips that might save you a little learning curve.

new album by Stacia, on Flickr
new album by Stacia, on Flickr

First - One of the benefits of mobile scrapping is the fact that all of your cell phone photos are already there, no need to transfer them from different devices to get scrapping. However, we tend to take a lot of photos now in the digital age and could potentially have hundreds or thousands in our photo stream. How do you narrow that down? I know my own feed is often clogged up with screenshots of invoices and other work stuff that I cull out occasionally.

Because much of the scrapping I’m doing currently is PL/everyday moment stuff, having the ability to sort by week is helpful. So I create new albums in Photos for each week and select all the photos I might use. Of course, I could just as easily name new albums by event like birthday or graduation and gather photos in the same manner. Creating the new albums was pretty intuitive, just click the + button and give it a name. Deleting the album afterward wasn’t nearly as intuitive to me. You have to go to See All albums, then Edit and select the red – sign for the album(s) you wish to delete (leaving the photos in your stream).

Like by Stacia, on Flickr

In a week where I’ve taken tons of photos, narrowing that down to only 12 – 14 can be difficult. So I’ll scroll through them full screen and pick the ones I KNOW I want to use by clicking the heart symbol making them a favorite. Sorting first decreases decision time later.

single tag by Stacia, on Flickr
multiple tags by Stacia, on Flickr

Second - My process when scrapping on my desktop has always been to drag over (from ACDSee on my second monitor) pretty much everything I think I might want to use on my page for evaluation. Then I hide them and delete them at the end if I don’t use them. That really has not been an option scrapping on my iPad.

So I started thinking about that. I considered tagging as a method of approximating it. Then I could pull up almost a miniature collection of the items I might want to use on a page without having to scroll through everything.

So I created a new tag, naming it generically so I could reuse it. At first, I was only able to add and delete tags one at a time. Well, that’s going to get OLD! That would probably limit my using it.

Turns out I can use the Select option at the top right to select multiple items then click Share at the bottom left in the Files App. That brings up a menu where I can add tags or remove them from multiple papers and elements at once. This will definitely be a timesaver for me.

remove tag by Stacia, on Flickr

To remove the tags so you can reuse the generic project tag again, select and highlight the specific tag in the Files App. This will bring up everything with that tag. You’ll click select, select all the items you want to remove the tag, then share and select add tags. There you can UNcheck the tag and it will be removed.

Evernote by Stacia, on Flickr

Third - We’ve talked about our photos and supplies, but what about the stories and journaling? I absolutely LOVE Evernote for keeping these things corralled. In past years, I've made notes of things that happened in a paper planner during the week. But then you have to bring the planner with you and my schlepping it back and forth to work isn't really happening. Evernote seemed like the perfect answer! I already use it web-based on my home computer, both work computers and my phone. Most importantly because I'm scrapping my scrapbook pages on my iPad, I also have access to Evernote there.

I can jot down thoughts from anywhere, any time of the day and have it at my fingertips when I'm ready to scrap. And because it's typed all I have to do is cut and paste the journaling. EASY!  I also use Evernote to keep track of my layout credits. Then I just cut and paste that information when I post my layouts to online galleries, Facebook, Pinterest and when I make my Instagram posts.

All iCloud by Stacia, on Flickr

Fourth - But sometimes I do my best thinking when I’m NOT at my computer. Because I’m spending so much time walking for exercise these days it occurred to me to try to use my phone and the microphone.

So I use the native Notes app on my phone and save the notes to “All iCloud”. I know it sounds obvious but I find that speaking my journaling lends to a more conversational tone and I really like that vibe on my pages. The talk-to-type spelling and grammar are horrendous so it definitely requires editing but it is a start. Then I just cut and paste into Evernote to edit before I put onto my page. I use All iCloud so that I can cut and paste to Evernote both on my iPad and on my desktop computer.

Now I’ll cover a couple of tips that are specific to the Affinity Photo program.

snap1 by Stacia, on Flickr
snap2 by Stacia, on Flickr

Fifth - Sometimes it’s difficult to drag a paper in Affinity Photo on iPad and have it hit the corner. And because the nudge function really isn’t an option without a Smart Keyboard that can be a little frustrating. As I often do in AP, I clicked “options” to see what they do. I found this option and it is helpful in getting papers and journal cards to almost snap to a corner if you get it close.

Sixth - It kind of bugs me that I have to change the font every time I click on the text tool. I figured there had to be another way. Google to the rescue! You can set a default for both Artistic Text and Frame Text.

default1 by Stacia, on Flickr
default2 by Stacia, on Flickr

I'll click the Frame Text tool to bring up the selections. I’ll set the default text font, size and justification. Then pull down the Document menu, and select default. This part isn't really obvious but you click Synchronize from Selection, then click Save. And it worked! I repeated the same steps for the Artistic Text accent font. This is really helpful for Project Life where I use the same fonts each week.

blur by Stacia, on Flickr

Seventh – Sometimes you feel the need to blur out certain portions of your photos or journaling for privacy. It’s much easier to create and save the page as you plan to print it and then just blur out on the web version.

I found a super quick way to do it. I switched to the Selection Persona, drew a rectangle over the section I wanted to blur with the rectangular marquee. Then I added a new fill layer just above the layer to be blurred. Because I had the default colors already selected, it automatically filled the rectangle I created with white. Then you pull down to deselect to get rid of the marching ants. Now you can just export a web size version then delete the fill layer in your final file.

I hope you picked up a little tidbit of mobile scrapping information to start you on your way!