A Christmas-y palette in July! Here's mine:

It's pretty subtle, but I did tint the area behind the big "Joy" by coloring a rectangle with a green to white gradient.

To make your own mask "from scratch" or to isolate your own line art, you need to start with a an image that has a solid "foreground" on white and remove the white. I tested this method in Affinity. For simplicity's sake I'm saying you have to separate black from white, but really you're...

I love the elements in this kit - thank you so much. People here who know me know I'm not crazy about using Affinity Photo to scrap with, but I am enjoying its "live" previews of the effect of brushes on my masks and blending modes on layers. (I've been able to delay upgrading from Phtoshop CS5...

Credits: Carol W Designs Love Blooms Challenge Kit Buddha by Neal Elias, folded by me from tissue foil Daffodil by Ben Goldberger, folded by me from kami Journaling: (top left): love blooms, but not my black thumb... thus paper blossoms (main): When I run after what I think I want, my days...

Thank you for the template. I especially liked the big edge layer.

Credits: Aimee Harris 2025 birthdayday template, Anna Aspnes APP H20, Artsy Cameras 3, Wild Word Transfer, LoopDaLoop Arrows 1, MMBranches 5, Painted Leaves 1 Origami model is Limet's Squirrel folded, photographed and extracted by me Font: Good Brush (dafont.com) I had to create a new clipping...

Sometimes the clipping mask and frame provided by a template doesn't work for your photo and you need to create your own. I've known how to do this in Photoshop for awhile and figured out how to do it in Affinity (AP). Before trying this I recommend reviewing the information about mask child...

Thank you for the challenge. It led to internet research showing how grateful we should be to all of our service members. I was inspired by “19” by Paul Hardcastle and by several years of attending mass at a local VA hospital.

The prompt for the LO was the song “19” by Paul Hardcastle. It's about young soldiers, but the average age of soldiers today is closer to 28, and 34 for officers. When I was in school I usually attended services at the VA hospital near my apartment - the priest almost always gave the same homily...

I shamelessly scraplifted myself - but I got a lot of time to reflect on the themes of action and rest - thank you for the challenge.

The art journal theme of "peace" caught my eye, so I created version 2 of a LO I did for the birthday party. Repeating my description of the visual journaling technique I used: I'd be careful with this technique because posted in a public forum it can reveal stuff you might want to keep private...

Thank you for the challenge. I skimmed the entire Cars script looking for the right Mater quotation.

Testing out a visual journaling technique I just learned about. I'd be careful with this one because posted in a public forum it can reveal stuff you might want to keep private, but there are of course ways to hide that stuff. You take what the presenter called a "platitude" (in this case a...

Thank you for the word art, Diane. I made a hybrid because the play on "Happy" could not be passed up!