Project Spotlight – September 15th

Congrats to this week’s Project Spotlight winner, Catb22! Check your email for your $10 Elle’s Studio gift certificate to use in our shop! Her True Happiness layout incorporates a mix of our Cameron collection & August 2013 kit! We love her photos and the nice layering! Head on over to her gallery to check it out and you can even add it to your favorites by logging into your account and clicking on the “I (heart) this!” button. 

You never know when your project will be chosen to be spotlighted! Each week we pick a new project out of our member gallery to spotlight. For your chance to be spotlighted and to win a $10 Elle’s Studio gift certificate, just upload your project to our member gallery and tag the Elle’s Studio item(s) used!

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A special giveaway with Scrapbook Circle!

We are excited to bring you a special giveaway today from Scrapbook Circle! Scrapbook Circle is a monthly kit club committed to bringing you the newest scrapbooking products delivered right to your door! They also have a shop full of fun products and a blog with a ton of inspiration!

This month, their Photo Goes Here kit features some Elle’s Studio products, along with coordinating products from other manufacturers and we get to give one away to you guys!

To enter to win Scrapbook Circle’s Photo Goes Here kit, just leave a comment below! We’ll draw a winner on Monday, September 16th!

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Design Team Highlight: Limited Edition ES September Kit

Happy Friday!

Have you snagged your limited edition September kit, yet?  What are you waiting for?!  Our exclusive kits are available in limited quantities – once they’re gone, they’re gone.  You don’t want to miss it!

Our talented design team definitely worked their magic with this month’s kit.

Janna dove right into our kit with a seasonal themed layout.  With multiple layers, she indeed creates a cozy themed project!  I particularly like how she used the Picture Perfect frame as a tab on the right of her photo instead of how it might typically be used.

Stephanie also used multiple layers in addition to the Picture Perfect frame from the September kit for this layout.  Notice that with just a few changes in embellishment selection, the color scheme of the layout totally transforms.  You’d never guess that these first two layouts were created with the same kit upon a first glance!
A neutral background on this layout from Corrie really lets our September kit shine!  Bits and pieces from the kit are tucked behind her photos to help keep this adorable girl front and center.
And of course, our monthly kits are a great choice for documenting your life in weekly layouts.  Jen paired our September kit with our Cameron collection to create this layout documenting her summer.
We’d love to see what you create with our September kit, too!  If you’re sharing your projects online, don’t forget to use hashtag #ellesstudio so that we can see them!
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sketch thursday

Happy Thursday! Today’s sketch is inspired by Janna’s Fantastic layout from last month’s DT gallery.

DT member, Annette played along this week and created this beautiful layout:

Love Janna’s layout and was inspired to pull out two polaroid type photos from our beach trip and make a page about how much we love the beach. I used her photo and layering with tabs as inspiration as well as the title placement. Love this layout! –Annette

For a chance to win a $10 gift certificate to the Shop create a project inspired by today’s sketch, upload it to our Member Gallery and post a link here. A random winner will be selected and announced with next week’s sketch.


Last week’s randomly selected winner is…tpgirl!
Congratulations!! Please email michelle@shopellesstudio.com the following info:
Name/Address:
Contest: Sketch 09.05
Prize: $10 Elle’s Studio gift certificate
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Project Life

This week’s Project Life covers the week of August 12-18th.
This week was the last full week of summer at our house.  The last full week is always jammed pack with fun activities, which is why I included an insert.   This is also the last week in the second volume of my Project Life album for 2013.  The first week of school starts my third album.

For this spread I used the exclusive Elle’s Studio September Kit, (which is available TODAY).  Did you know that our exclusive kits are available for $9.99 on launch day only (regular price $11.99)?   That would be today!  So hurry and grab your kit TODAY for $9.99!

These kits are limited, and once they sell out, we will not be restocking.  Have I mentioned they are perfect for Project Life?

This week was full– a trip to the pool, the zoo, bowling, horse back riding, art lessons… oh and my family and I dressed up like the Skywalker family, no biggie.

I wanted to use a large photo on the front side of my insert, but didn’t have a photo on hand that was enlarged.   I found our zoo brochure and I trimmed a photo of a lion and included it on the front.  I love the impact the photo brings and that it’s trimmed down the center of the image.

I included a few items from the Cameron Collection and the menu card is from a past Elle’s Studio exclusive kit.

I LOVED the vellum card and the “goodbye summer” tag found in the September Kit.  I journaled on the kraft “Big Story” card about my thoughts on the end of the summer and layered the vellum on top of the pocketed page.   I stapled the vellum to the page and used staples on the tag as well.

We want to feature your Project Life album!  During the last week of each month we will be featuring a couple Project Life spreads that caught our eye in the Member Gallery.  We will be posting Project Life spreads on our blog tomorrow!   If your spread is featured we will be sending you a $5 gift card to use in our store.   Good Luck!

Project Life was created by Becky Higgins as a way to simplify how you document life and preserve memories. Photo pockets used in my Project Life album are created by Becky and can be found here.  You can read of all the Elle’s Studio Project Life posts here.

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Our September kit is here, along with some new inspiration!

We are excited to welcome in the changing season with our exclusive and limited edition kit for September! It is full of tags that are perfect for your layouts, cards, mini albums, Project Life and MORE!

You can find our exclusive kit for September in the shop! These kits are limited and once they sale out we will not be restocking! Look for a new kit each month on the 10th, and as a special bonus to celebrate launch day, kits will be on sale for $9.99 for today only, regular price after that will be $11.99. These kits will be able to ship first class: shipping for USA residents will start around $2.00 and go up from there, depending on the weight of what is in your cart. For overseas, it will run about $6+ depending on your location.

And, since it is September 10th, that means we have some BRAND NEW inspiration in our, Inspiration Gallery, from our amazing and incredible Design Team and special Guest Designer this month, Becky Novacek! Look for a special blog post all about Becky, coming soon! Here’s some sneak peeks of what is in store:

There are so many wonderful projects to check out – many use our September kit and some even use our newest collections (Penelope, Noel, and 2014) that just started shipping to our retailers! Look for those new lines at your favorite store, or in our shop later this month! And don’t forget, while you’re checking out the Inspiration Gallery you can bookmark your favorite layouts by clicking on the “I heart this” button!

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Capture Life – Capture the Process + A Giveaway!!!

Capture the Process – Step by Step
Today we are going to talk about capturing the progress of an activity & how to adjust to different lighting situations. Whether it’s your kids building a Lego creation on the living room floor or you dishing up your favorite recipe in the kitchen; each situation presents different lighting challenges. 
Recently my life has been filled with tomatoes, yes tomatoes! LOTS of them. We have spent hours canning, freezing, & doing everything we can think of to use them up!
I wanted to include this process in my Project Life album not only to look back on next year as a reminder to NOT plant so many plants, but also to capture how we are turning our hard work into something we’ll get to enjoy all winter long.

The lighting on this photo is of course natural lighting as it was taking in my garden. I like to shoot in the early evening hours to get that beautiful golden glow of the summer evening and to avoid harsh shadows.

Canon 24-70mm f2.8 1/200 ISO 320
After begging my husband and kids to go out and pick bucket loads of said tomatoes, I had a sea of red on my kitchen table. 
I used my large kitchen window to the right of my subject for this situation. This is my “go to” lighting spot in my house.  Do you have one of those “spots” in your home? If not, find one! It makes shooting images such as this much easier & consistent.
Canon 50mm f3.5 1/400 ISO500
Other than the one window in my  kitchen, I don’t have the best lighting in there leaving my counters & stove top resulting in wonky colors. I typically have to amp up my ISO or use my external flash to bounce off of my ceilings. 
Canon 50mm f3.5 1/100 ISO1000
The next image was captured by standing on a step stool and shooting from above. I wanted it to include not only the salsa cooking on the stove, the old metal funnel that was my grandmothers, but also the mess the process creates!
Again, you’ll notice the very high ISO to get the lighting I wanted.

Canon 50mm f3.5 1/100 ISO3200
Once I finally got the point of having a few cans finished it was dark outside; leaving me with only my one yellow “yucky” color light in my kitchen. This is where I bring out my external flash. 
Canon 24-70mm f2.8 1/32 ISO 3200 with Ext Flash
When using my flash I typically don’t point it directly at the subject. I will point it either straight up to bounce off the ceiling or at slight angle to bounce off of both the ceiling and wall behind. This helps eliminate those harsh shadows as well.
Canon 24-70mm f3.5 1/100 ISO2000 with Ext Flash
Now, let’s get those photos on a page & our memories recorded!
This week I am working on catching up with my Project Life album.
I created a simple 4×6 insert for my page with the tomato plant photo, a variety of the tags from the September Kit (that goes live tomorrow!) as well as a tag from the new Penelope collection.
Be sure to check back tomorrow to not only pick up this wonderful new kit at a discounted price, but to also be inspired by the amazing design team gallery!
I hope today’s post gets you snapping in a whole new light.
Now go on – get out and Capture Life!

We have a special giveaway for you guys today!


We are excited to giveaway a spot in the next Big Picture Class called Picture Everyday! One person will win a spot in this class that starts on September 12th with Tracey Clark. Just leave a comment to be entered to win and we’ll draw the winner on September 11th, and post it here on our blog!

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Project Spotlight – September 8th

Congrats to this week’s Project Spotlight winner, ScatteredConfetti! Check your email for your $10 Elle’s Studio gift certificate to use in our shop! Her Snapshots layout does a great job of highlighting the photos!  She used a few items from our Serendipity Line and The Sweet Life Cutouts. Head on over to her gallery to check it out and you can even add it to your favorites by logging into your account and clicking on the “I (heart) this!” button. 


You never know when your project will be chosen to be spotlighted! Each week we pick a new project out of our member gallery to spotlight. For your chance to be spotlighted and to win a $10 Elle’s Studio gift certificate, just upload your project to our member gallery and tag the Elle’s Studio item(s) used!
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Design Team Highlight: Frames

Hello, ES fans – and Happy Friday!

Today I wanted to highlight three layouts from this month’s Design Team Gallery that use our ES Frames.  Our frames are the perfect choice to highlight a smaller photo or a portion of a larger photo and that’s exactly what our talented team did!

Laurel used a piece from our Saltwater Frames to highlight one of two similar photos on her “Heart You” layout.  The colorful frame draws your eye directly to her photo.  A perfect choice.
Corrie also used a Saltwater Frame to highlight a single photo on this layout.  Corrie’s photo had a large amount of white space so the frame easily draws your attention to her daughter and her daughter’s best friend.
Today’s last layout highlight uses a frame from our limited edition August kit.  Janna framed a smaller photo of memorabilia in the center of her layout.  Again, the colored frame on a neutral background  instantly allows you to recognize what’s most important on this page.
We hope these highlights from our talented design team inspires you to put your Elle’s Studio frames to use!  Which ones are YOUR favorites?


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