It’s normal to feel overwhelmed by the number of photos you’ve taken at an event – but Shimelle Laine has the perfect way to deal with image overload. Just take a deep breath and count to ten!
Click on the image on the right to see full-size photos of Shimelle's Bonfire Night album!
Shimelle Laine says: "One of my favourite techniques right now is to use just ten photos of any one event. I open the whole set on my computer and discipline myself to select ten – and only ten! –to tell the story of the occasion in a rounded way. It means I avoid that “Oh no, I haven’t got round to scrapbooking the event yet” guilt, since those ten photos can be scrapped quickly before I forget the details for my journaling!
Bonfire night last year seemed like the perfect event to be recorded in this kind of mini album. With American friends visiting the UK for the first time, we had every excuse to throw a bonfire bash and photograph the flames and the fireworks.
Our camera fun resulted in just under a hundred shots of the evening, so there were plenty for me to choose from to make my mini album and include all the elements of our party.
I printed my ten chosen photos at 4x6in size and selected a handful of patterned papers with an autumnal feel. Once I decided on the order for my photos, I started to construct two types of pages that would alternate in the finished book. Half the pages were made with transparent acetate sheets that had been cut in half to encapsulate a photo, then stitched together by machine. I practised on some spare bits of acetate first, as it’s a little tricky to get the tension right, and I found I needed to experiment so that the stitches weren’t too tight or too loose. I also found that it was best to use a sharp new needle and to use a longer stitch length than I would normally use on fabric.
The remaining five photos had a simpler construction, with a cardstock border to allow a margin for the binding.
With all my pages ready, I stacked them up in order so they alternated between the transparent page pockets and the tabbed pages, then punched holes along the side of each one to make the binding. To make a protective front cover I used a transparency sheet, with letter stickers spelling out ‘Bonfire night’ as the title. I chose gorgeous, deep red velvet ribbon as a binding to go through all the pages’ punched holes to keep the album together, and to give a sumptuous, autumnal finishing touch."
One of the patterned papers was a lined ‘school exercise book’ design - just perfect as a designated journaling spot! I included a section on each photo. The remaining space on the back of each photo was covered with strips of a few of the other papers, then trimmed to the same size of the photo. I chose the patterned papers for their autumnal feel - not traditional images of leaves and fruits, but rather a mixture of muted tones, with stars to give a sense of fireworks exploding.
The transparent cover makes it possible to layer items under the cover. You could also add decoration right over the top of the transparency by stamping with StazOn ink or painting with acrylics.
To make a page with transparent acetate, first I used my trimmer to cut the A4 acetate sheets in half. I placed the photo between the two pieces of acetate without adhesive, then used my sewing machine to stitch the two layers of acetate around the photo. This would also be a great way to incorporate any memorabilia from an event, as flat items like tickets and maps can be included to display both sides through the clear plastic.
For each of the photo pages with no acetate but just a simple edging, I scored a strip of cardstock to create a folded border over one end of the photo. To strengthen the border, I covered the inside of the folded area with a permanent adhesive, then folded it over and attached it to the edge of the photograph. You can embellish either side of the tab with any embellishment you like - I used ribbon and rick-rack to add some colour to the solid cardstock.