Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Inspired by Beth Opel

Remember Wednesday is OLW day on Jennifer's Blog!

Yet another card maker inspired me through Card Creations magazine. This time, it's Beth Opel's fabulously colorful and clean get well card that uses three strips of designer paper and three brads. How cool is this?!?!?!



I sifted through my much-neglected designer paper and didn't find anything comparable to Beth's strips. But I DID find this funky polygon paper in a soft pink and browns, which meant a different color scheme...softer and girly but still a bit graphic. My stash of stamps also didn't have a comparable sentiment, so a little simple repetition gives a similar effect. I used brown half-pearls in place of brads.


My ribbon stash had some fun, bright colors, so I wondered what would happen if I used a landscape-oriented card and ran ribbons all the way across. [Note: the ribbon is attached with Scor-Tape and trimmed flush to the sides of the card.] Moving the sentiment up and to the right still balances the rhinestones across the wider space. Another way of unifying this design was to stamp the sentiment in the same color as the bottom ribbon. Black would have looked out of place here.


Finally, I remembered my Papertrey polka dot paper and paired it with this fun sentiment from Hero Arts. No need for brads or rhinestones, which would have been too much. Oh how I love the flatness of this card...yet the colors really make it fun and interesting!



I really hope these inspiration posts are helping those of you who are intimidated by adapting other cardmaker's designs feel better about the whole process. If you loosen up and play around, it's really not that hard to use someone else's cool idea as a jumping off point for your own variations. Too many times, beginners or stampers who think they aren't creative feel they have to copy cards exactly. In fact, varying ideas with what you already have on hand is lots of fun!!!

13 comments:

  1. great job. all came out lovely, but my fave is the bottom one. always a sucker for polka dots!

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  2. great variety on a theme, well done

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  3. I like your last card even more than the original. I so admire your design sense.

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  4. Great inspiration again today Susan, wonderful CAS cards, love the polka dotty paper particularly:0) xxx

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  5. Love the way you have shown that a card in a magazine can be used as inspiration for so many alternative cards.. definately thinking outside the box!

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  6. Totally awesome samples. Great inspiration.

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  7. Loving these inspiration posts - so much food for thought.
    Thought of you when I went on Moxie Fab today and saw that pear pincushion. It set me off on a good giggle. You've forever ruins this fruit for me!

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  8. Susan, I LOVE these cards! The colors just jump out at you. I love using scraps of paper, CS, or ribbon. With the right sentiment and colors, these just came out gorgeous. I love your interpretations of a card I'd certainly have passed by in the magazine! Your creative streak is amazing.

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  9. These are great Susan and love your take on the original card :)
    Jenny x

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  10. Susan, I positively love the cards today. I couldn't agree with you more about putting your own creative spin on a card using the supplies your have. Great inspiration!

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  11. VERY cool cards...all of them!!

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  12. I love what you did with this! My card's color scheme and paper choices were actually based on the "Feel Better Soon" rub-on. That's the beauty of cardmaking...finding inspiration and making it your own! :)

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Thank you so much for taking time to comment!