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Nuts and Bolts: Artist Interview Julia Bryant.

January 12, 2018
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Nuts & Bolts – Artist Interview Julia Bryant

 

One of the many perks of being a GCU Design Challenge winner is an interview.  These mini-interviews are fun reads and a peek into the makings of the winning card.

 

We love the Fast Five Fun Facts!  Thanks for sharing, Julia!

 

Note: Read about the other rewards, in addition to bragging rights, of being a Design Challenge winner. 

 

The difference is made in the details!

 

Mindy
GCU Community Manager
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Wanted New Cards: Thank You Decorator/Interior Designer.

January 11, 2018
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Wanted Cards – Thank You Decorator / Interior Designer
 
The touch of a professional may well be worth the money and worthy of many thanks!  For home decor, thank the professionals – a Decorator / Interior Designer.  From window coverings, wall colors, flooring choices, architectural changes or maybe just a few key placed pieces of art or perfectly placed accents pillows. Ultimately you’ll likely save time, money and result with that WOW factor. Voila, home sweet home!

 

This category is in need of cards:

 

We’d like you to create at least one card for these categories using the Stock Cards function (Bigstock) or your own graphic designs.

Remember, when you’re submitting your new card, add a little note about the intended category in your Notes to Reviewers. Be inventive,  be clever, be creative. Go for it!

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Freebie Wednesday – Hammock Handmade Font

January 10, 2018
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Freebie Wednesday:

The Hungry JPEG has a cute Freebie Handmade Font for your design arsenal. Hammock, by Kaesebart’s creations embodies the passion for traveling, surfing, nature and everything else made with love. To ensure variety, there are two alternative characters for each letter available (black style), additionally, there are three cuts with different texture levels which makes it possible to use however you want.

 

 

 

As usual this product comes with a complete commercial license.

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from → Fonts, FREEBIES

Rainbow Connection: Apricot Carnation

January 9, 2018
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Some Pattern Curator color forecasts for spring/summer 2018 I found on Pinterest this week:

 

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from → Rainbow Connection (Colors)

Custom Corner: Choose JOY

January 5, 2018
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Nuts & Bolts – Custom Corner:  Choose JOY

 

With the holidays underbelt GCU Co-Founder and Community Manager, Mindy Rosso-Gaemi, shares her family’s 2017 holiday card created by GCU artist Silvina De Vita.

 

I admire all of the lovely and creative Christmas cards on GCU pretty much all year long. You’d think that I would have my own card signed, sealed, and delivered come December 1st. Nope. I feel like the cobbler’s children (or wife) who find themselves with no shoes. But I have only myself to blame. I usually wait until the last minute which is when inspiration under pressure seems to kick in.

 

Still floating on vacation euphoria, having visited Sayulita, Mexico over Thanksgiving break the spirit of the tiny, sleepy but lively surf town became the theme of our card. The pops of color, color, and more color with the papel picado, pom poms, beaded artwork, bright painted buildings, inlaid stone designs and so many more wonderful surprises (don’t get me started on the fish tacos).
While looking for my victim, I mean artist, I contacted both of these GCU artists, Bense Garza and Silvina De Vita, whose designs captured the energy I had in mind.  Ben unfortunately had a family emergency that required him to travel. Thankfully, Silvina was up to the challenge and as of December 1st quickly began working my list of 101 desires into a 5×7 card with little to no time to spare.  Silvina’s GCU store has some darling characters, playful designs as well as Spanish cards which was a plus.
The front of the card took a few small iterations until we both concluded that simple was best (last version):

Our family had an action packed year with landmark birthdays, weddings, filled with special trips, opportunities and people. Feeling pretty darn fortunate and grateful as the year came to a close I felt an overwhelming feeling of joy. Joy for all things that happened in our year – big, little, good, and not so good. This provided fodder for the inside verse on choosing to find Joy. Plus featuring a photo of each family member doing something that brings them joy. I always have a lot to say, much more than what space permits on the inside, so the artist has to be very creative in shoe-horning it in.

For the inside we drew upon personalized papel picado designs like:

See the finished inside below which is a full bleed 10×7 image that I uploaded to the inside of the card just like any shopper can do with an image/photo. I adore the layout, colors and papel picado concept. Looks like I was a busy bee clipping each card with my little scissors!

A big thank you to Silvina for coming to my rescue this year and delighting our friends & family with this colorful design.

 

Silvina shares this about the design process: 
Mindy contacted me at the beginning of December to start designing a Mexican style Greeting card. We didn’t have much time so I thought it would be a great challenge. As Mindy had recently returned from a trip to Mexico she wanted to add some Mexican icons and drawings to the brilliant family photos that she had picked out. I came up with the idea of using Papel Picado, a kind of Mexican style of bunting. She loved that addition and we continued with that theme on the inside. We created a message like it was a big Papel Picado sheet. This was quite challenging as we had a lot of text to fit in, but it worked out in the end. We kept the front quite clean so as not to distract from the photo. It was great to work with Mindy and I’m very glad she was very happy with the final design.

 

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from → Custom Corner

Wanted New Cards: April Fool’s Day

January 4, 2018
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Wanted Cards – April Fools’ Day
 
This occasion in general could use some new cards to freshen up the choices for shoppers.  Additionally we have added many new subcategories in need of cards as well.  No fooling!

Consider relationship specific designs as well as From the Pet and for students Away at College.

NOTE: the proper holiday punctuation is April Fools’ Day. Please create designs accordingly.

 

 

We’d like you to create at least one card for these categories using the Stock Cards function (Bigstock) or your own graphic designs.

Remember, when you’re submitting your new card, add a little note about the intended category in your Notes to Reviewers. Be inventive,  be clever, be creative. Go for it!

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Freebie Wednesday: Yeti – Free Scandinavian Font

January 3, 2018
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Freebie Wednesday:

The Hungry JPEG has a super cute font family and 80+ Scandinavian style decorative elements on offer for the next 6 days.

Yeti by Juliya Kochkanyan comes with 50 elements and 22 patterns and is free for commercial use.

 

 

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Nuts and Bolts: Dedicate yourself to the Details II

December 29, 2017
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Nuts & Bolts – Dedicate yourself to the Details II

 

Dedicate yourself to the details.  Strive for quality.  Create a design and work it a few different ways to see what looks best.  The same goes for a verse.  Let the words flow and take it a few different ways, then boil it down to one that resonates best with the image and occasion.

 

GCU artist PamJarts made some refining edits to an already hot selling card making it even cuter for Valentine’s Day.  Great job, Pam!

 

Before:

 

After:

 

The difference is made in the details!

 

Mindy
GCU Community Manager
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Wanted New Cards: Rough Collie Birthday Cards

December 28, 2017
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Wanted Cards – Rough Collie Birthday Cards

 

Pet lovers are crazy about greeting cards featuring their favorite breeds.  Dogs, cats, birds, you name it.  These fur, feathered and finned babies are part of the family.

 

GCU is in need of more cards featuring Rough Collies (vs Smooth Collies).  Specifically:

 

and

 

Be sure to put important terms like the breed name in the card title, artist notes (which serves a a product description) and keywords.

 

If you are not closely familiar with different breeds of animals it is an excellent idea to do your due diligence to make sure you have the correct breed.

 

Here for example is just one source on the Smooth Collie vs Rough Collie.

 

NOTE: consider designs that feature more than one animal as breed fans or breeders will typically have more than one. 

 

We’d like you to create at least one card for these categories using the Stock Cards function (Bigstock) or your own graphic designs.

Remember, when you’re submitting your new card, add a little note about the intended category in your Notes to Reviewers. Be inventive,  be clever, be creative. Go for it!

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Dash of Inspiration: January 2018 Design Challenge

December 27, 2017
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  • DashInspirationBanner_2015

Another year about to disappear! Here’s hoping each of you had fun, learned something new and were inspired to step outside your designer’s comfort zone this year. Before we kick off January’s Challenge – I want to remind you that behind the scenes, Mindy, Nasser and the GCU team are all little elves working diligent to come up with the very best of the best that we artists brought to GCU in 2017.

Be sure to look for the Best of 2017 Founders’ Choice Awards! This time of year, our founders; Mindy and Nasser, will be choosing from ALL the cards created in 2017 – not just from challenge submissions. Winners of the 2nd Annual Founders’ Choice Awards is expected mid-January, 2018.

As a nostalgic look back, here are 2016 Founders’ Choice Award Winners:
https://www.greetingcarduniverse.com/content/best-of-2016

For those of you who actively read our Community Blog, you now get some extra time to create for our first challenge of the 2018 New Year …

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Theme: Ultra Violet Pantone© Color of the Year for 2018

Requirements:

  • The Ultra Violet Pantone© color of the year for 2018 must be primary in your imagery. Color of the Year for 2018 PANTONE© 18-3838 Ultra Violet
  • Write your own verse/message, be creative and write a message that clearly speaks to your imagery, occasion and recipient.
  • Blank verse will not be considered for entry in this challenge.

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Entry Deadline: Wednesday, January 31st

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How to Enter: Post the PID (card number) and the URL (public storefront link – please WAIT for the card to be available in the public marketplace, please DO NOT post a link to your Manage Cards area) as a post in the challenge blog. We’ll forward your entry to the jury.

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Category:

Any category that is well-suited for your Ultra Violet Color of the Year design.

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Rules:

  • Submission must meet GCU’s Submission Guidelines and be Approved through the usual Review Cycle– Fast Track your submission with this in the Notes to Reviewer: October Design Challenge Submission here is the link to the blog post: (include THIS blog post URL)
  • Only ONE card per artist per challenge.
  • Submissions must be NEW, no existing designs.
  • Your entry must meet the Challenge Requirements and Theme or it will not be included in the challenge.
  • Stock Card Creations entries will not be accepted.
  • Your designs should differ from those already offered in the category of your choice to offer shoppers a variety of choices, not more of the same.

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BLIND Judging: We hope each of you enters every month. Entries are submitted anonymously for judging by the GCU Challenge Jury which means that before and during the challenge, judges do not have any way of knowing what artist is behind each entry. This eliminates any and all concerns with ‘favoritism’. Results will post on the Community Blog. The jury will judge the entries on the following criteria:

  • How well the card meets the Challenge Requirements and Theme.
  • How well the card speaks to the Category the artist chooses for the card submission.
  • Creativity, Execution and Marketability.

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Winners: 1st Place:

  • The winning designer’s card and store will be featured on the GCU Public Blog – the blog which customers view and follow.
  • As well as featured on the GCU Public Facebook Page – nearly 56,000 followers, now THAT’S exposure!
  • The winning card will be Design of the Day following the announcement of the winners (within 48-hours).

    EXCEPTION: Horizontal (landscape) cards may not be featured as DOD due to GCU Home Page space restrictions. In these cases, GCU will choose a different vertically oriented card from your store to feature as DOD. Thank you for your understanding and apologies for this limitation.

  • The winning card will be added to the Greeting Card Universe Design Challenge Winners Pinterest Board – currently GCU’s Pinterest Page followers: 2K!
  • The winning card, should the artist choose, may be referenced in a new series by the winning artist and he/she may Fast Track all cards in the new series (being sure to give the Challenge URL and winning card PID in your Notes to Reviewer for each card in this series).
  • Winning card will be included in a marketing email to over 100,000 customers!
  • NEW starting this month, GCU will create a Meet the Team board for the winning artist under the Pinterest GCU account where the winning artist will be able to pin and promote her own storefront and all that makes them a unique card designer and one of GCU’s artistic community team member.
  • Winning card will be posted on GCU’s Instagram with 2,000 followers and counting!
  • GCU will create a Meet the Team board for the winning artist under the Pinterest GCU account where the winning artist will be able to pin and promote her own storefront and all that makes them a unique card designer and one of GCU’s artistic community team member.

2nd Place:

  • Your submission will be Design of the Day the following week of announcing the Challenge winners (within 7-days).

    EXCEPTION: Horizontal (landscape) cards may not be featured as DOD due to GCU Home Page space restrictions. In these cases, GCU will choose a different vertically oriented card from your store to feature as DOD. Thank you for your understanding and apologies for this limitation.

  • Your card will be added to the Greeting Card Universe Design Challenge Winners Pinterest Board.
  • Winning card will be included in a marketing email to over 100,000 customers!
  • Winning card will be posted on GCU’s Instagram with 2,000 followers and counting!

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Tips:

Check out these tips, tricks, freebies, and tutorials from our own GCU Community Blog which might be helpful in this month’s Challenge.

pantone-color-of-the-year-00-1512592323

Color of the Year for 2018 PANTONE© 18-3838 Ultra Violet
HEX #645394 | CMYK 72, 77, 11, 1 | RGB 100, 83, 148

Color of the Year for 2018 PANTONE© 18-3838 Ultra Violet

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Be inspired to create and learn something new!

 

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from → Community Challenge, Contests, Dash of Inspiration, Design Challenge, Design Contest
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