A favorite scrapbooking technique that allows you to be creative in your page layout is the use of collages. The word ‘collage’ comes from French and means literally a group of items ‘glued together’. In English, the word has come to be used for a collection of different images, clippings or other materials brought together (usually glued onto paper) in an artistic arrangement.

As far as scrapbooks are concerned, collages are usually congregations of photographs or news clippings. These items can be placed in any order or pattern. Collages can have a theme such as a single individual or an entire family group combined.

Collages create great funky scrapbook pages. This method is especially useful for surprise scrapbooks meant to overwhelm the reader either with all of their accomplishments or all those that care for them.

In addition to photographs and news clippings, collages can also contain blocks of text or embellishment. These additions can be used to increase the busy and energetic nature of the collage or reduce the effect slightly by distracting the focus away from the collage.

To reduce shifting of the photographs as you select an appropriate collage design, place temporary tape on each photograph or newspaper clipping. Once the display is set, start permanently attaching the collage to the background.

Once you start on your scrapbook, you’ll probably find that new ideas for layouts strike you all the time. That’s one of the things that makes scrapbooking such fun: there’s no limit to your imagination and you can make every page in your album different and unique.

As you pursue the craft of scrapbooking, you’ll develop a sensitive touch for what works best on a page. Laying out your material to the best effect requires imagination and a little flair, but you can develop your skills with practice.

One of the most difficult decisions can be getting the right spacing of items. There is a fine line between having a balanced scrapbook page and a gaudy mess. If items are too closely spaced your reader will feel overwhelmed. If your items are spaced to far apart your viewer will feel as if you haven’t enough material.

Try this technique to develop your visual judgement for what works well on your scrapbook page:

• look at your page
• close your eyes
• open them again

Does your page look cluttered? Does it have more photographs than background? Are your embellishments drawing the focus away from your mementos?

If the answer to any of these questions is ‘yes’, you need to simplify your page a bit and increase the spacing between objects. Remember, you can always add more pages.

Is your page bare? Or is it uninteresting and colorless?

If so, think about adding some more mementos and colorful embellishments. In this way, you can decrease the spacing between objects and make your page more energetic.

You’ll find more ideas like these in our main section on scrapbook layouts - or browse through some of the other articles listed in the sidebar.

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