Rainbow Connection: New Colors for 2015
Every year, designers in many fields including home furnishings and fashion look forward to new, hot color combinations. Since we’re nearing the end of 2014, it’s time to take a look at the freshest colors and hues that you can look forward to in 2015 to use in your card designing. Have fun!
Sherwin Williams 2015 Paint Colors
Here’s a sample, some nice neutrals here. Punch ‘ em up with a hot color to make a special palette.
Top 10 Wedding Color Ideas for 2015
Beautiful palettes for upcoming weddings, useful not just for bridal.
Pinterest: Color Trends 2015
Lots of great palettes, plenty of inspiration to be found for your designs.
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Font Frenzy: Fruits
Here’s a fun dingbat font that would work for many different styles of card, including the popular blackboard-type designs. Fruits is great and currently on sale at 40% off the usual price. The foundry also offers similar fonts like Meats and Seafood, Dairy, and Bread and Confectionery. Tablet owners, these fonts are great for hand coloring to add some real pizazz. See the example below.
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Dash of Inspiration: New Fonts Released Fall 2014
A Dash of Inspiration, New Fonts Released Fall 2014 by Doreen
New Fonts Released Fall 2014
Since many of us have family, friends, pumpkin pie and turkey on our minds this week – I’ll make it quick by simply listing a few brand New Font Releases we designers can be grateful for – add them to your wish list or grab them now if you fall in love.
Have a Safe, Peaceful and Happy … Thanksgiving!
Densia Sans
http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/densia-sans
Fantasy – by Typesenses
Fantasy
Silver™ – by Fenotype
Silver
LHF Encore™ – by Letterhead Fonts
LHF Encore
So until next week … Learn … Create … Inspire and have a HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
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Critique Clinic – November 21-23, 2014
How does it work? For three days a week (Friday-Sunday midnight), I will open the clinic to any artist who wants an honest peer review and critique of a card which gets plenty of clicks but no sales, so something’s probably not quite right, or you’ve got a new design you want to test drive, or you’re unsure about the marketability of a card. Or perhaps you’re a newbie who isn’t sure if a card is up to a marketable standard. Anyone is welcome to participate. In fact, I encourage everyone to at least look at the cards in question and read the critique comments – you may learn something. The purpose of the clinic is to help artists improve the commercial appeal and marketability of their cards.
THE RULES
- ONE card per artist only.
- Card must be intended for sale at Greeting Card Universe.
- To submit a card for critique, post a link to the card at GCU in the comments section of this clinic post. Allowances will be made if you’ve had a card declined, or made a new design you’d like advice on before submission. Give us the link where we can see the card, such as your private gallery, Flickr, Tinypic, etc. If you do give a private gallery link, be sure your private module gallery is ON. Please do not post links to your Manage Cards section – do you really want strangers tinkering with your cards? And please don’t ask us to critique a card that’s pending review – we can’t see it until it’s approved.
- Any artist is free to comment and/or give a critique of a submitted card. HOWEVER, post-and-run comments like “great card” or “you suck” will not be tolerated, nor will abuse. Criticism should be constructive, not destructive. Play nice or you will be banned.
- I also won’t tolerate temper tantrums if you decide your “artistic integrity” is being stepped on because you asked for a critique, and someone told you the photo you’re using isn’t in focus. If you can’t take honest criticism, don’t submit. Once gets you a warning; twice and you’re banned from submitting in the future.
- Artists who critique may do so by giving their opinion, posting an example of another card, or pointing the submitter to a video, on-line article, or other helpful suggestion.
- Don’t forget that artists who are giving you tips and helpful advice are volunteering their time and trouble. Be nice. A link back to their store on your website or blog is appreciated (but not mandatory).
- You are free not to take any advice offered. There’s no guarantee any card will be a bestseller, so don’t come into the clinic with unrealistic expectations.
- Rules may change as we go along and we see how things turn out, okay?
So without any further ado, I declare this week’s Critique Clinic open!
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Tips and Tricks: Guest Blogging, Part 4
In the previous parts of our guest blogging series, we talked about making first contact with a blog owner, how to increase your chances of success and other helpful information and tips. Today in the final part of the series, we’re going to discuss the guest post itself.
First, if the blog owner has specific requests or requirements, don’t ignore them. Do your best to accommodate. If there’s a problem, contact the blog owner and politely explain the situation while offering an alternative. Never give more them one choice—in other words, don’t say, “I can do this or this or even this.” Offer one alternative only to prevent overwhelming the blog owner with too many choices.
Writing a blog post is easy. If it helps, work with an outline of some kind. Otherwise, here are some general guidelines:
- Always be succinct. Get your message across in 300 words or less, unless the blog owner has a definite word count in mind.
- State your name, shop name, other details of your business in a brief manner.
- Keep it relevant. If your card collection is about (for example) get well cards for cancer patients, relate how you became inspired to create your designs because of a family member with cancer or some other reason. Any detail you put in your blog post, make sure it relates to the cards you’re highlighting.
- Keep it personal. Remember, you aren’t doing this as a big corporation. You’re a freelance artist and greeting card designer promoting this special card collection because you’re filling a niche, representing an often ignored group of people, trying to help people make connections with one another, etc.
- Check your spelling and grammar. Twice.
- Re-read your post. Remove any unnecessary words or sentences. You want to pare down your prose.
- If necessary, get an honest second opinion.
- Include card links to serve as examples. Don’t forget a link to the collection. Every card I make has my name, “Corrie Kuipers” as a keyword. Cards with a similar theme or in a series will also hare a specific relevant keyword. I can then easily do a search on GCU for “Corrie Kuipers keyword” and get the URL of the search page.
Send the post to the blog owner prefaced with a quick note that here’s the blog post you talked about. Thank them for their time. Request they let you know when the post will run so you can share the news on social media.
Keep track on your list of when a guest post runs on what blog. That way, if you have a new card collection that would also fit with this particular blog, you have a toe in the door with the blog owner already and can make contact.
That’s it!
Now armed with the tools you need to market your cards to blogs relevant to your interests, with a little practice you can develop your mad promotion skills and draw more customers to your cards.
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Tips and Tricks: Guest Blogging, Part 3
In case you missed them earlier, you’ll want to read Guest Blogging, Part One and Guest Blogging, Part Two before you begin this post.
Okay, you’ve sent a first contact e-mail explaining who you are and what you’re all about. Now what?
You wait.
The last thing you want to do is pester the blog owner until they consider you an annoyance. So give them a couple of weeks to mull over your request. If you haven’t heard anything by then, send another e-mail. An example is below.
_________________________
Dear (blog owner’s name),
This is (your name). I contacted you on (date of first contact e-mail) about the possibility of doing a guest post on your blog and I’m just checking to make sure you received my e-mail. If you have any questions, please contact me..
_________________________
If you don’t hear anything at all from the blog owner, they probably aren’t interested and you can strike the blog off your list. If they respond with hostility, as sometimes happens, don’t get upset. Don’t respond. Don’t throw a hissy fit of your own. Just take the blog off your list and move on.
In sales, we learn that out of 10 people you contact, more than half will say “no, thanks.” Remember this isn’t a personal rejection, an attack on your credibility, or a critical reaction to your art. If you don’t get a positive response, go on to the next blog on your list.
Don’t be afraid make contact. The worst that can happen is that someone tells you they aren’t interested.
And keep this mantra in mind: “If you don’t ask, you can’t get a yes.”
When you receive a “yes,” then it’s time to get together with the blog owner and find out if they have any rules or requests, including the deadline for submitting your guest post. We’ll go into how to write a generic guest post and how to customize it to fit a blog in Guest Blogging, Part 4 tomorrow.
TIPS
- Be organized. Make a list of blogs to contact. This list should contain information like the blog’s name, owner’s name, facts about the blot which may help you tweak your pitch.
- Make a note each time you contact a blog owner. Write down if it’s a first-contact or follow through. Include the dates so you’ll know exactly when you sent an e-mail.
- Make a note of the results of your e-mail contacts. This will help you keep track of your efforts so you don’t contact a blog owner who has already indicated they aren’t interested.
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Dash of Inspiration: Categories Needing More Cards
A Dash of Inspiration, A Cup of Creativity by Doreen
Categories Needing More Cards
New categories at GCU pop up all the time, particularly as a result from the Wanted Cards thread on the forum. Many of us know that whether the requesting customer of a ‘wanted card’ purchased the card we made or not; future sales often happen from other customers looking for the same theme/occasion. So, it makes good sense to be inspired by these new categories and infuse them with new cards.
These categories could use some fresh, new designs and in several cases, there are sub-categories to design specifically for:
NOTE: Please DO NOT fast track these cards as the Wanted Thread in most cases in well beyond the initial customer’s request.
The request for this category came for a very specific theme, however there are many dance studios all over the world, so create a variety of themes for this new category.
Holidays > Christmas Cards > For Son’s Girlfriend
Holidays > Christmas Cards > For Daughter’s Boyfriend
Occasions > Thank you Cards > Choosing as Godparent / Godparents
Occasions > Congratulations Cards > Dog Show / Competition
and don’t forget some female papercarrier Christmas cards too
So until next week … Learn … Create … Inspire!
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Notice: My Apologies!
Sorry, folks! Our computer suffered a major melt-down last weekend and it’s taken this long to get a replacement. We’re working right now on updating so posting will begin as normal tomorrow.
If you have any questions or problems, drop us a line – there’s an email link on the right side of this page.
Corrie
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Dash of Inspiration: FREEBIE Week
A Dash of Inspiration, A Cup of Creativity by Doreen
FREEBIE Week
You know how I love to find great design goodies and being a gal who was brought up with good manners, I love to share – so here is an eclectic bunch of great stuff I’d like to share with you.
Design Elements:
5 Grunge Paint Texture Overlays By Photoshop Tutorials
http://www.brusheezy.com/textures/50786-5-grunge-paint-texture-overlays
Swirly Shaped Frames by Star Sunflower Studio – Grab this set of CU swirly frames brushes, shapes and PNG clip art.
http://starsunflowerstudio.blogspot.com/2014/04/delicate-swirls-brushes-and-shapes.html
Rhombuses Patterns, Photoshop + Illustrator – by SuccoDesignIt – Pattern (.pat) Photoshop + Vector (.ai) for Illustrator users.
http://www.succodesign.it/en/2013/02/rhombuses-patterns/
Fonts:
GrutchShaded Font – Useful for those chalkboard designs and/or kid’s cards
http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/GrutchShaded
Komika Axis by Apostrophic Labs – Great choice for cartoon and lighthearted designs.
http://www.fontsquirrel.com/fonts/Komika-Axis
Tutorials
How to Create Scotch Tape in Photoshop – By Photoshop Star
http://www.photoshopstar.com/effects/how-to-create-scotch-tape-in-photoshop/
Recreate a Popular Inked Typographical Style – By Tom Ross
http://psd.fanextra.com/tutorials/text-effects/quickly-and-easily-recreate-a-popular-inked-typographical-style/
So until next week … Learn … Create … Inspire!
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Critique Clinic -November 7-November 9, 2014
How does it work? For three days a week (Friday-Sunday midnight), I will open the clinic to any artist who wants an honest peer review and critique of a card which gets plenty of clicks but no sales, so something’s probably not quite right, or you’ve got a new design you want to test drive, or you’re unsure about the marketability of a card. Or perhaps you’re a newbie who isn’t sure if a card is up to a marketable standard. Anyone is welcome to participate. In fact, I encourage everyone to at least look at the cards in question and read the critique comments – you may learn something. The purpose of the clinic is to help artists improve the commercial appeal and marketability of their cards.
THE RULES
- ONE card per artist only.
- Card must be intended for sale at Greeting Card Universe.
- To submit a card for critique, post a link to the card at GCU in the comments section of this clinic post. Allowances will be made if you’ve had a card declined, or made a new design you’d like advice on before submission. Give us the link where we can see the card, such as your private gallery, Flickr, Tinypic, etc. If you do give a private gallery link, be sure your private module gallery is ON. Please do not post links to your Manage Cards section – do you really want strangers tinkering with your cards? And please don’t ask us to critique a card that’s pending review – we can’t see it until it’s approved.
- Any artist is free to comment and/or give a critique of a submitted card. HOWEVER, post-and-run comments like “great card” or “you suck” will not be tolerated, nor will abuse. Criticism should be constructive, not destructive. Play nice or you will be banned.
- I also won’t tolerate temper tantrums if you decide your “artistic integrity” is being stepped on because you asked for a critique, and someone told you the photo you’re using isn’t in focus. If you can’t take honest criticism, don’t submit. Once gets you a warning; twice and you’re banned from submitting in the future.
- Artists who critique may do so by giving their opinion, posting an example of another card, or pointing the submitter to a video, on-line article, or other helpful suggestion.
- Don’t forget that artists who are giving you tips and helpful advice are volunteering their time and trouble. Be nice. A link back to their store on your website or blog is appreciated (but not mandatory).
- You are free not to take any advice offered. There’s no guarantee any card will be a bestseller, so don’t come into the clinic with unrealistic expectations.
- Rules may change as we go along and we see how things turn out, okay?
So without any further ado, I declare this week’s Critique Clinic open!
GCU Community 