Creativity on the Move (1): the map

Hello and welcome! Today, it's Creativity on the Move: using your iphone and/or ipad for memory-keeping and scrapbooking. Whether you scrapbook digitally, consider yourself a hybrid scrapbooker, or prefer purely paper, I hope there is something for you in here - even if it's simply knowing what's out there!

When I am setting off anywhere, I like a map: a sense of the lie of the land (or sea!). Today is an overview of what you can use or might need, with the detailed how-tos in subsquent posts and pdfs. If you have any questions, please do pop them into the comments below so that I can be as helpful as possible. Off we go - this is my travel kit ...

1 Taking photos and storing/transferring them
There are a couple of options here ...

• iphone/ipad with a built-in camera: at least one of these. If you have both, you can 'sync' them through icloud (I'll show you how to do this if you're not sure) so that a photo taken on one shows up on the other. This is handy if you want a larger screen to work on, but you can work quite successfully on the iphone alone.
• If you have an android phone with camera, there is a version of the photo-editing software I use (Snapseed) for android phones too - keep reading! However, the software for page-making which I use works only with the iphone and ipad.
• optional: your own camera, and a connection kit for the ipad (check your camera's compatibility). I also use my slip-in-my-bag Canon Ixus: a connection klit means that photos can be transferred easily straight from the camera to the ipad in seconds.

2 Editing Photos
You may, of course, be perfectly happy with your photos the way they come out of your camera! I often find mine need slight adjusting for brightness or contrast, and a bit of sharpening; sometimes, they need a little repair, or I want to do something more interesting with them too. Out of the photo apps available, I find Snapseed the most versatile and easy-to-use. There are iphone and android versions and here's what it does ...

You'll see above, down the left, the vast range of its capabilities. Open each window (Automatic, Tune Image etc.) with a screen tap for further sophistication. Its genius lies in its great ease-of-use. Tap the screen to reveal the list of options, slide your fingerup or down on the menu which appears to choose the function, and slide left/right to decrease/increase it - that's it. Here's the Tune Image screen, for example ...

And if you like to play around with your photos, there are a host of interesting filter options in Drama, Retrolux and Grunge. The latter has 1500 possibilities which you can zip through quickly by dragging your finger across the screen ...

3 Making a scrapbooking/journalling page
The best and most versatile app I've found is not a scrapbooking app at all. It's Keynote, Apple's piece of software for putting together a presentation. It has a host of adaptable features, and you can add video and music too, if you are so inclined. Again, it's easy to use and I'll be showing you in detail how to do this - as well as giving you some additional useful items which enhance and work with Keynote's current functions. Think "presentation = album" and "slide = page", and you're on your way! It is a lot easier (and cheaper) to use than Photoshop Elements, and can produce a huge variety of pages ...

You can make whole pages or parts of pages and print them out, or quick and pretty 'mini-pages' on-the-go which can either be added digitally to, or printed out for, a pocket in your Project Life pages. You can email them straight to friends and familly or, once saved to your camera roll, upload them to Facebook and Twitter, or blog them directly without needing your computer.

4 Printing the finished page
It is quite possible to print directly from your ipad or iphone if your printer is wireless and Air Print compatible. Or you can upload your pages to your computer, and print from there. This is my preference, as I sometimes want to print several mini-pages on a single sheep of photopaper. I also like to keep a copy of my work somewhere else besides the iphone or ipad. This can be done via syncing and the iCloud, or via Dropbox (www.dropbox.com) - a handy and free way of storing any data which you can then download when and where you want.

Next steps
If you're interesting in having a go, then the next move is to equip yourself with Keynote, plus Snapseed (if you want to a neat photo-editor), and Dropbox (if you want a handy place to keep a copy of photos and pages and an easy way to transfer them to your computer). I'll share with you over the coming months what I'm learning, and hope you'll dip your toes in the water too. (And I should let you know that I have absolutely no financial interests or affiliate links of any kind.)

Please do ask questions if you'd like to, or let me know of anything you want to know in more detail. Hoping you'll be coming along with me, even if you're just peeping over my shoulder for the meantime :).

Comments

[Alison]

Thanks for this Alexa...a gentle reminder of our session in MK is just what I needed...I am just waiting for my adaptor to arrive (the REAL thing this time!) and then can start transferring from my camera..I shall be following avidly!
Alison xx

[Cheri]

I feel so behind the times. I use a blackberry (work issued) and don't have an iPhone or Android phone. I don't have an iPad or tablet. I just inherited my husbands old Kindle Fire because he bought himself a tablet. Guess I'm stuck toting around my super heavy laptop!

[Miriam]

This is just the push I need, can't wait to play. Thank you x

[Becky]

This all looks really interesting! Will be following these posts and hoping to do some scrapbooking with my ipad. I have the adaptor - arrived last week, now need to find the cable to connect my camera to the adaptor!

[Gail]

This is really interesting Alexis. I'm saving this right to my favourites so I can easily find it again. I'm looking forward to your other posts. Hopefully this will be a way I can do something with the pictures I've taken with the iPad and not just my camera ones. :)

[Debs]

Having recently become the proud owner of an ipad and already having an iphone, I can't wait for this information to experiment with. Thank you so much for doing a tutorial!

[fay]

Brilliant tutorial Alexa. This isn't something I normally do but have bookmarked to come back too. Looking forward to the next installment.

[Louise]

This is great Alexa - I am book marking and revisiting when I have time to absorb x

[Wanda]

This is an AMAZING post! I'm a recent convert to iPhone and updated to an iPad mini a few months ago. I love the iCloud connectivity and convenience they offer--plus they are just plain cool! You, however, have presented a new opportunity/challenge to productively use these devices for something above/beyond the norm. I'll be keeping an eye out for updates on this project.

BTW, I love your phone cover!

[Karen Walker]

I've been waiting with baited breath for this series of posts to begin. I think I have everything I need except Keynote, but that will be easy to get. Believe it or not, I don't know how to sync my photos from my iPhone to my iMac, so there's something I definitely want to know how to do.

[Amy]

I am such a dinosaur ... my scrapping is done at a desktop, in fact, all of my computering is! There is so much more than photoshop out there and I have found your post fascinating, I really will need to sort out a few technological advancements!

[Linda]

Oh gosh! I am such a dinosaur too! I do all my computing from my laptop, I don't have anything 'i', and have never scrapped digitally!

[Paul B]

Great insight into how you scrapbook on the move. I love using Snapseed though I suspect you've delved into it's use far better than me. I've recently downloaded PIc-Tap-Go which is pretty good. PicFX is very similar to how Photoshop works, with adding editable layers but I haven't quite mastered it yet. Looking forward to the next chapter in this series :) Px

[Melissa]

Interesting information! I've just started using my iPhone more for photos, but still send them to the computer to be printed for traditional layouts.

[Honoré]

Eagerly awaiting the second installment and all those that follow. Off to install snapseed and play around with it. this is going to be great fun and can't wait to learn some of your magic! wheee!
cheers~

[Ginny]

Hi Alexa,
I've been lurking here on your blog for ages, but I just had to comment on this post. Love it!! I have all the tools you have suggested, so I can't wait to learn more about how to use them. I have always thought there must be a way to simply 'scrapbook' on the go, but as I only resorted to searching for 'scrapbooking' through the app store, I have never come up with a satisfactory solution. I like your ideas though. And your finished products so far look wonderful.
I will be most interested to read about Keynote and it's file formats. How do you go about printing? I would prefer to create something now and then save it to print later. Can you create a JPEG in Keynote? ...just the ideas running through my head...
Thanks so much for sharing, look forward to reading more.
Ginny

[Fiona@staring at the sea]

It's amazing what you can do on the go. I don't have an ipad or iphone, but will have a look at Snapseed for my HTC :o) It's always interesting to read about technological advancements and I love your phone case xx

[Jo]

wow Alexa, this is a really very helpful post. I have learnt loads
Jo xxx

[rinda]

This is fantastic Alexa. I've been experimenting with numbers 1 and 2 this month, but still need some help with snap seed. And it's going to be a while before I get to step 3. But I really appreciate this.
Rinda

[Clair]

I'm loving this series, Alexa! I have a little Nokia and it's so useful for keeping track of Project Life notes, photographs and little snippets of life. Hopefully, your tutorials will help me to make the most of them all x

[Sharon]

Hi Alexa, I've just come back to re read these posts re scrapping using ipad. I've been toying with simple collage makers but they don't seem to be high resolution enough to print into a photo book. Does using keynote give a high res result? thanks!