It’s that time of year. Baseball season is in full swing (no pun intended) as indicated by the baseball games I kept flipping through on Saturday.

I miss watching my husband play. Our first few years of marriage were spent at the ballpark as he played both fast- and slow-pitch softball and even played Roy Hobbs–baseball for men over 30. He would have gone to a Roy Hobbs World Series had I not been pregnant and due right about the same time. It was so fun to watch him pitch a game. He’s got quite an arm and is pretty amazing . . . if I do say so myself. ;)

So in honor of the ol’ ball game, I’m having a Grand Slam day . . . not to be confused with Denny’s Grand Slam Breakfast. There’s no bacon and pancakes here. (mmmmm….paaaancaaaakes….)

This Grand Slam is all about the storyboard templates though . . . so here we go!

On First Base
We have “The Page”.

Okay, note to self, don’t wait so long between scrapping. Oy! It takes so much to get back in the groove to make something. And with this page? I tried stepping out of my “all cardstock” box that I loooove doing so much. I think that threw me for a loop too. I’m used to things having a cleaner look. ;)

I used two templates for the photo collages here. I looooove photo collages. I love telling a story with many pictures and keeping them the focus (which is why I love cardstock usually ;)).

 

 

And not only did I use the templates, believe it or not, I used shapes and images from SIX different kits!

You know, even if you aren’t into making the This & That trays, there are usually around 20 images in those kits that can be used for anything!

Look at the telegram image below here. I printed it onto some 7gypsies patterned paper so that it looks even more authentic, right down to the distressing and watermark!

 

 

 

Now, with this event I had a plethora of photos to use, but didn’t want to spend all my time making pages for them. So I trimmed an 8.5×11″ page protector to 4.5″ wide and used some Heidi Swapp tape to adhere the open edge closed. The tape went perfectly with the spread. With this little insert, I was able to add eight more photos (front+back).

So in the end, this is what the spread looks like.

 


 

One other tip I’d like to share here is the beauty that is Photoshop Actions! And they do make PSE versions as well. Basically, an ‘action’ is a recording of keystrokes or steps so that you can get the same result every time via a push of a button so that you don’t have to go through all the steps yourself each time.

I downloaded some free Actions from The Pioneer Woman some time ago and loooove what they can do! (I also use Totally Rad Actions as well.) On these vintage photos I used actions called Soft & Faded, Seventies, and Quick Edge Burn. I highly recommend downloading these actions to see what you can do with them! You can find them HERE. Although, for PSE, getting all the actions isn’t quite as easy, but you can read about how to get them from The Pioneer Woman HERE.


On Second Base
We have “The Photo Template”.

Now, if you’re looking at that page on the right and thinkin’ to yourself, I don’t recognize that template . . . well, you’d be right! This is a brand new template that I am giving away as a free download until Wednesday only. It’s kind of like “bat day” at the ball park. ;) After Wednesday it will find its way into a template kit as a little bonus that you will have purchase.

Alas, Wednesday is now over. Sorry if you missed your chance to download this for free, but it will make an appearance in another kit down the road.

 

And you need to go check out what Nichol Magouirk did with one of the storyboard templates from the Storyboard #2 kit. FAAABuolous!!! Genius!


On Third Base
We have “The Video”.

I’m still in the process of getting my real copy of Photoshop Elements (I had a trial version), but the steps behind this are all the same between PS and PSE and Mac vs. PC with one exception. PSE has a bin at the bottom that shows all your open windows (see images below). I can’t guarantee the differences between versions though–although again, I think they’d be basically the same process. I’m using CS5 and the screenshots below are PSE8.

Also, I set up my palettes on the left as opposed to on the right, like the default. I like not having to move across the screen to use the Toolbar and the Palettes. Everything is pretty much on the left and that makes more sense to me.


Okay, I’m not sure why this video stretched after uploading, but it is. I’ll figure it out and repost it, but for now, it will get the job done–just everyone will look a little wider. ;) I’m new to this whole thing, so please forgive my noviceness (yeah, it’s a word).

 

I have some screen shots that I took before my trial version of PSE ran out so you can see a little better visually about what’s going on.

Open a template and the photos you’ll need. Look at the bottom and you can see all the files I have opened.

 


With the template showing in your open window, click on the photo down in the bin and drag it up onto the template.

 


Look at the Layers Palette on the right in the example above and the example below. Notice how I moved the photo so that it sits just above the layer where I want to clip the image to. Hover your mouse between those two layers in the Layers palette, press Alt then click your mouse, and your image is now residing in that square. Resize as needed.

 


And the homerun hitter up to bat . . . 
We have “The Giveaway”.

I’m giving away one storyboard template 
of your choice to FIVE different people! 

Just leave a comment about your favorite spring thing to do and I will draw a winner on Wednesday.
So tell all your friends to come get a free storyboard template, watch a little video on how to use them and enter to win a storyboard template of your choice! It all ends Wednesday  though, so don’t miss out! 
[this contest is now closed]

On another note, if you didn’t notice Wednesday through Friday last week, Blogger was having issues. No posting. No comments. They even lost 30 hours worth of posts and comments. So my Wednesday post disappeared for a bit and I think comments were lost–but they did get the post restored. So frustrating because you can’t even blog about Blogger being down. lol Hopefully all is well now.