Card Design: Digi Darla's Challenge #81--Copy Cat

Maybe it was a little backwards prophecy but just Saturday afternoon, I thought to myself, "wow, it's been awhile since the Internet has gone out on me.  I wonder if I can expect more consistent service to come."  Well, my mind NEVER should have gone there at all because when I went to sit down last night and put this post together--yup, you guessed it:  NO INTERNET CONNECTION!  Thankfully it is back on and now I can finally get on with this post.  However, I better get moving because I don't know how long it will be back.  Sorry Digi Darla's Challenges for any inconveniences this may have caused by not having my card posted this morning.

I am happy to bring you the latest challenge going on over at the distinctive Digi Darla's Challenges Blog. This week for Challenge #81 the theme is "Copycat".  Yes, that is right, that means there is a freebie of the image I used on my card available for you to grab and use in your card this week.  All you have to do is head to the challenge blog and download it over there. 

Since you need to use the image we are giving away on your project, that means that everyone is eligible for the opportunity to win eight images!  How awesome is that!

 Here are the card and details, I hope I haven't forgotten anything...

General Comments:

• Once again the picture quality is not very good due to the fact that I must continue to scan my projects until we get a new camera.  Where the poor quality is really noticeable is with the greying around the gemstones due to the shadowing effect of using an object on my card with any depth.
• I did learn something interesting this week.  In the program I use to add my watermarks, Inkscape, the only option I have for saving the images is in the png format.  To save space on the blog I normally convert the images of my cards to jpgs.  Since I have had to resort to scanning, I can't do that if the base of my card is mainly white.  For some reason the picture quality gets even more greyed over and very grainy. About 10 x worse than even what you see now.  I have absolutely no idea why it only affects the scanned copies and generally just the white cards.  Things that make you say hmmm....
• I have kept this card extremely CAS.

FRONT

Digital Images:

• The boat:  Available on the Digi Darla's Challenges Blog for this week only.  

Other Details:

• As you will have noticed, I made the artistic choice to not colour the boat.  I wanted to keep the colours strictly in the nautical theme of red, white and blue throughout the entire project.  Therefore, I simply changed the colour of the boat to blue before printing.
• I also wanted to try something really cool but it didn't work out.  I took some blue lace and squished it up and affixed it to the bottom of the image to simulate the idea of water.  However, it didn't look quite right so I nixed the idea and just went with what you see above.

Embellishments:

• The floral gemstones are Crafts brand from Dollarama.

Cricut Cartridge:

• I use my Elegant Edges cartridge to cut a frame and then a shadow piece in behind the frame.  I took the pieces and flipped them so that instead of using a square, I used a diamond.  I really like the overall effect.

INSIDE

Digital Sentiment:

• The saying and resulting word art are ones I created.  The phrase came to me one night when I was in bed thinking about an upcoming card.  I am sure I am not the only person to coin this saying but I did do a search to make sure that no one else had popularized this phrase; so, as far as I know, I'm not ripping anyone off.

Other Details:

• Before printing out the sentiment, I brought it into Publisher and added some border art.

OVERALL
Paper Products:

• Card base: Michael's Recollection's Cardstock Kit, white.
• Designer Paper:  
• Blue cardstock used as a frame (front) --Michael's Recollection's Cardstock, Cool Water Collection.
• Red cardstock used as a shadow behind the frame (front) and as matting on the inside --Michael's Recollection's Cardstock, red. 

Challenge I've Entered...
I've followed Suze's advice and linked my project to Craft Your Passion Challenges since my digi is not coloured this week.

So, how about you come over, grab the image available for free and create something wonderful to enter in our current challenge this week over at Digi Darla's Challenges?  While you are there I would ask that you please take a look at the wonderful creations designed my colleagues on the design team.  We always look forward to seeing the delightful creations you come up with.

Thank you so much for stopping by.  As I've now added to my comment section, whether you are a regular, here for the first time or popping over in your official capacity as a DT member, please know how much I appreciate the words that you leave behind.  Your encouragement helps me to become a better designer.   I try my best to reply to your comments (when an email address is available) but that is getting more and more difficult as my plate fills up with new responsibilities, new roles, and new obligations.  If I don't get the opportunity to thank you personally, know that I don't take a single comment for granted. Thank you for your understanding.

Until next time,