What is Digital Scrapbooking?

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Digital Scrapbooking, digiscrapping, is a relatively new form of traditional scrapbooking, using computers or smart devices and software applications to create layouts. Digital Scrapbooking first started surfacing as an organised hobby in the mid-1990’s. If you have been a paper scrapbooker for a while you may already have heard about digiscrapping. But if you have never scrapped before, or are still very new to scrapbooking, and you are here reading this post … then welcome! Let’s take a quick look and together answer the question “What is Digital Scrapbooking” and learn what digi’s really all about.

Contents

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Digital Scrapbooking: A Definition

Digital Scrapbooking:
A special hobby dedicated to
preserving life stories as beautiful works of art.
The photographic capture, decorative recording
and sharing of important family moments.
A memory-keeping creative craft and
pleasurable pass time for those of us who love it.

Preserving Life Stories through the Art of Digital Scrapbooking

Essentially scrapbooking, and by extension Digital Scrapbooking, is the practice of celebrating and preserving precious family memories and life stories as beautiful works of art.

These works of art, known as layouts, can be created in many forms and styles and often incorporate significant items of memorabilia and journaling. Items used on a layout can include anything from photographs – which are usually the main focus of the page – press clippings, children’s artworks, personal letters and ephemera, together with purely decorative elements ranging from flowers, ribbons, paint and other items, through to random and non-personal decorative elements of any type.

Whatever is included on the layout is entirely dependent upon the creator’s unique taste, style and preference.

Archiving for Long Term Preservation

Traditional paper scrapbookers strive to create their works using archival quality materials … think back on the disastrous magnetic / sticky photo albums that destroyed photos back in the 1970’s [cached] and you will appreciate why acid free and archival quality paper is a real thing and a big deal for scrapbookers. Digital Scrapbookers strive to achieve the same result with the added advantage that, when securely backed up, digital layouts have the potential to be accessible in their original format long term, and indeed possibly indefinitely.

The forms of family memory archiving and striving to achieve long term preservation on the best quality materials possible is an ages old goal of many. We digiscrappers are very much the same in that regard.

Who Does Digital Scrapbooking?

It is not necessary to be a four-eyed computer geek to be able to take up this hobby … although I just happen to be one and love it!

Seriously, all you need is the ability to turn your computer on and to connect online.

The learning process is fun and many digiscrappers have gone on to develop lasting friendships with other scrappers that they first met online through the various digital scrapbooker online communities, forums, chats, webinars, block parties and even at Crops.

When Did Digital Scrapbooking Start

There really is no definitive date on when Digital Scrapbooking was first started.

However, the birth of Digital Scrapbooking was driven in part by the resurgence in the USA of paper scrapbooking as a popular hobby, especially after the company Creative Memories exploded into the marketplace, combined with the emergence of digital cameras and imaging software and even software that was not specifically for image manipulation like Microsoft Word or Publisher or PowerPoint.

In fact here in Australia in the late 1990’s the flatbed scanner that I purchased for my business came bundled with an early version of Adobe® Photoshop® together with a suite of other driver software applications in a clever bid to achieve greater market penetration.

My own early interest in digital photography and graphic design was sparked at around that time when my late husband and I were running a wedding suit hire business.

Seriously Crackers

This page was created as a fun interpretation of a series of photos of my younger son taken when he was just turned three. He was such a ham!

I’ve tried to keep the layout slightly off balance to support the photographs in a fun way with the slanted lines on the paper crops as well as the discordant angles on the acrylic alphas combined with the vintage ephemera style of the postage stamps style alphas … flowers are a boy pages’ best friend too! Many digiscrappers shy away from flowers on masculine pages but I totally embrace them and add them to the majority of my layouts.

The deeper significance of this photo series from a memory keeping and family heritage perspective is that it was one of the last few sessions that my late husband shot with our children and the shirt that my son is wearing was from our old wedding suit hire business inventory … memories of great days and great times.

Digital Scrapbooking Today

Today, Digital Scrapbooking is a memory-keeping and creative craft in its own right … although there are still a few purist traditional paper scrappers who might disagree.

There are numerous active and inspiring online communities of artists and creatives leading the cutting edge of the Digital Scrapbooking industry through personal blogs, website forums, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and other social media services.

Both print and digital magazines have recognised Digital Scrapbooking’s place, and over the last two decades numerous stories, articles and special features have been published about our craft and the designers & creative artists who enjoy preserving their family memories through digiscrapping.

Documenting the Digital Scrapbooking Hobby

I am working on pulling together a history of Digital Scrapbooking to document the evolution of this fabulous hobby. However, in the meantime, if you are interested in learning more about the history of traditional paper scrapbooking please take a look at the entry about Scrapbooking on Wikipedia and this brilliant article published on Scrapbook.com [cached].

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Preview: scrapSNAP 003 — scrapSNAP Single No.003

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Conclusion

Having said all that, and in conclusion, this is but a brief explanation of what Digital Scrapbooking is and a lot of it comes directly from my personal experience. So if you are new to digiscrapping and need more information, or if you are a seasoned digiscrapper and would like to share your recollection of how you started, where you used to / currently hangout online, what stores and designers you used to and/or currently frequent, support and follow and anything else about digital scrapbooking that you’d like to share, please leave a Comment below.

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