Just returned from our annual family vacation and am diving right into making the album, which is always a Christmas gift for each family. This year I'm doing things a little more cohesively, thanks to an aA album course I took not so long ago. I've taken the time to do a hard edit/organization of my photos, pre-selected my template choices (FotoInspired and Scenic), and am batch-producing several spreads at a time. I begin work by altering the templates to suit, populating the masks with photos, and writing the journaling while it's fresh. And then I move on, the idea being that after I get four or five spreads in the bag, I'll go back and add the artistry. So far it's working, as I am not angsting over choices as I usually do and the process is enjoyable and efficient.

For this layout, the opening page of the album, I used the Evenfall Artplay Palette and Fotoglos to create a magical sunset effect. I employed two Artsy Papers in the manner of Artsy Transfers, blending them on multiply blend mode at reduced opacity, and layer-masking to suit, and then I added even more texture and dimension by bringing in transfers/overlays from the Artplay Palette. The tiny bit of yellow behind the map that picks up the kyack color is made with an Edge brush.