Tuesday 26 August 2014

Two free paper packs

Seems I haven't been around for a while -- summer mostly equals busy for me, of the kind that doesn't allow sitting at the computer. Anyway, I've managed to create two more paper packs, and here they are for you to download, all free. 

As usual, both packs contain six papers, all of them measuring 3600x3600 px at 300 dpi, so they are good to print on 12 x 12 inch papers, if you wish. Originally they were made for my digital scrapbooking layouts, but they are free for you to use for what ever you see fit, for your digital scrapbooking, texturizing or whatever you can think of. 

Click on each image to be taken to the download page and enjoy. 







Monday 7 July 2014

Vases, Bikes, Summer Nights and Dogs


On day 64 of Beyond Layers, the challenge was to use a certain texture Kim posted and experiment with some masking tricks she shared. She gave a recipe, which I, for once, followed pretty closely without too much tweaking.  I did, however, add another texture. The photo was taken in April at the student exhibition at the community college where I work.

Pictures at an Exhibition - Vase with Birds
Resources:
- texture Jay by Kim Klassen
- texture Tin Type 1900 by Distressed Textures

The second picture dates from our annual camp with the Finnish Dandie Dinmont Terrier Club. Every summer we get together with other Dandie owners and have a fun weekend. The shot was taken on a cloudy and rather windy night by the lake, and I had a lot of fun post processing it rather heavily.

A Summer Night

Thank you for the textures:
- Distressed Textures by Denise Love @ 2 Lil’ Owls Studio
- Paper Pack 3 by dierat

In the third picture I once again returned to Zwolle, where, among loads of bikes, I found this very attractive feminine specimen, and processed with a texture of my own.

The Ladybike

Lastly there's a scrapbooking layout I made of our youngest Dandie Justiina. Originally she was just lying down on the grass, but the very moment I pressed the camera button she jumped up and rushed towards me to find out what it was I was doing. I have been viewing several layouts lately done in the artsy style, and here's my shot at it. I really enjoyed the creation process of this one.


Resources:
- background paper from paper pack I Can See Clearly Now by myself
- masks from Shadowhouse Creations Splatter Mask Set 2 by Jerry Jones
- brush from Moments 2 by Fran
- flowers from kit Bleu comme une orange by Fran
- stitches from Coutures/Stitches 1 by Fran
- text brushes by Aurorabor
- watercolour brushes by Ron Deviney
- splatter brushes by Robyn Cough
- font Jazz LET
- font Zapfino

Wednesday 25 June 2014

Finding Shapes - Converging Lines

At last I've reached the last installment of the Finding Shapes challenge. What I have this time are converging lines. The first one is just another brick wall, but I really liked the unexpected contrast of two colours of tiles and then the fence on top. Here I applied two texture layers to change the mood of the picture into something a bit more dramatic.

Another Brick, Another Wall

Resources:
- textures from Delicate Paints Textures and Vintique Fine Art Textures by Denise Love @ 2 Lil’ Owls Studio

Next I have here yet another shot from Salzburg, under the same bridge by the River Salzach that I have posted a layout of earlier. I did some adjustments in Lightroom and then textured the picture lightly.

Under the Bridge

Resources:
- texture from The Grey Collection by Denise Love @ 2 Lil’ Owls Studio

In the third picture I'm again by a river, this time the Trave in Lübeck. I shot the picture in May 2012, but the title and the treatment of the photo arise from the fact that I remembered clearly standing at the same spot in the 1980s, when me and Better Half were visiting the city together. Here I was trying to achieve an old, soft and faded look, and processed and textured accordingly.

Remembering

Resources:
- textures from The Stained Collection and The Creative Black Mask 2 Collection by Denise Love @ 2 Lil’ Owls Studio

The last picture this time is sort of me drawing a conclusion of the shapes  challenge - in addition to converging lines, there are squares, rectangles and circles in the photo. This one was shot in Vienna, at the railway station in Schönbrunn. We had arrived from Salzburg that day and were taking a flight back home the next day, but there was time enough to go and visit the Schönbrunn Castle. The station itself was a very nice mix of old and new. Here I applied gently two textures by Sirius-sdz.

Auf dem Bahnhof

Resources:
- textures from Texture Pack 3 and Texture Pack 9 by Sirius-sdz

Tuesday 24 June 2014

Finding Shapes - Circles & Triangles

I'm still looking for shapes. In the first two, it's very obviously circles. The first one comes from the Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow, and like the blue windows I've posted before, the photo is not from an exhibition but the building itself. If I remember correctly, this was the ceiling of the lift. Isn't it like dozens of tiny moons gathered together? All I did to the image was some cross-processing in Lightroom.

Lunatic

Again, my second picture was taken on the same trip, still travelling towards Britain. We were boarding the ship in Ijmuiden, and from the gangway one could look out from these circular windows. When I looked out, I saw even more circles - the windows of the terminal building. This was another picture which I only slightly processed in Lightroom, that's all.

Boarding in Ijmuiden

The third photo is yet another travelling shot, and just happens to be from the Netherlands like the previous one. This was taken at the Schiphol airport when we were on our way to Birmingham to Crufts Dog Show last year, and it has received only minor adjustments in Lightroom.

Local Presence

The next picture takes us back to Finland, although not quite home this time either. I took it on our barbershop singing course in Orivesi a year ago, from the veranda of the lovely Singing Cottage there was - the charming old building was all for the twenty or so of us for the four days we spent there. The hill it stood on diminishes in the picture, but still you can see the twisted shapes of the pines on the slope of the hill and just about discern the fields and woods. What a wonderful place it was, I seriously hope to be able to visit it again and sing the harmonies with old and new friends.

Summer View


Resources:
- texture Word by Kim Klassen

Sharing this one at Kim's Texture Tuesday.


“Texture

Yesterday - four free paper packs!

This time I have for you not one, but four paper packs for your digital scrapbooking, texturizing or whatever you can think of. All packs contain six papers, all of the 3600x3600 px at 300 dpi, so they are good to print 12 x 12 inch papers, should you wish. 

These papers have the Yesterday -titles because they have been sitting idly on my hard drive for a couple of years. When I found them, I decided to sort of dust them off and pack them so they might get used. Originally they were made for my digital scrapbooking layouts, but they are free for you to use for what ever you see fit.

If you like them, it would totally make my day if you could drop me a little line. Click on each image to be taken to the download page. Enjoy.







Monday 23 June 2014

Finding Shapes 2 - Rectangles

Didn't I know this from my writing days - I really can go on tweaking anything I create forever, if I don't simply post it somewhere and call it finished. I used to write and rewrite and rewrite a little poem again and again, literally for years, and now I notice I'm doing the same to my pictures. So it's high time to post these pictures off and be done with them and tackle something new.

I took the first picture in May 2012 while travelling towards Scotland with my students. We stayed overnight in Zwolle, and I found this pretty door on our evening walk in town.

Red Door

I layered the picture with texture Waterfront 17 by Kim Klassen altogether four times with various blending modes, masking off various sections of the texture on each layer.

The second picture dates from the same trip. This time we were heading back home and walked about in Lübeck, waiting to take our boat home across the Baltic Sea. It's just another office building somewhere in the city centre, but I found it attractive, especially how the top floor windows reflected the blue sky and the ones downstairs remained black, but also other contrasts, such as the elaborate 19th century door frame and the modern door with company logos.

Looking at the sky

I started processing this photo as another textured image, but was never quite satisfied with it. Then I revisited some digital scrapbooking sites and ran across these techniques of making a photo look part like a drawing, part like a painting. Tried it, and still wasn't quite happy with it, so I went on to try out another new technique, using frames but painting partly outside the frame. These techniques are certainly something I'm going to play with later on, too.
 Resources:
- Brushes & frame
- Brush stamp 
- Papers 
- Font 1
- Font 2 

The third picture is from Salzburg, on a trip we took to the World Dog Show immediately after my trip to Scotland. We walked along the Salzach under a bridge, and high up there was this cage, for maintenance, I suppose.


Kein Eintritt

This one was created much like the one above: I started by texturing the photo, then decided needed a frame, then decided I'd make it into a scrapbooking layout. *sigh* Now I'm letting go of it. No more tweaking.

 Resources:
- texture Cool Grunge by Kim Klassen 
- mask by Julie Mead Designs
- background paper from paper pack Green Finch and Linnet Bird by myself
 - font Dusty Rose NF
- font Mary Helen JF

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme free paper pack

A free paper pack you can download. I created these actually already in May, watching all the different greens emerge. Spring always brings to my mind a certain part of a poem by Tolkien in The Lord of the Rings. It's a song old Bilbo Baggins sang in Rivendell, I think, when he gave Frodo Sting and his mithril-coat.

"For still there are so many things
That I have never seen
In every wood in every spring
There is a different green"

Anyway, the title of the pack comes from a very different song, which I also love. I give you exactly one guess as to what the song is called. ˆ__ˆ 

Click the image to go to the download page. Enjoy!




Wednesday 4 June 2014

Finding Shapes 1 - Squares

Beyond Layers day 63 challenge was to find and photograph geometric shapes. The first shape was a square. Here I'm posting two square pictures.  The first one was taken in February when we were rehearsing for our Easter week performance of Stabat Mater. These are windows in the Suomussalmi church. There was beautiful light, but I needed to lighten and smooth the image up, so I applied a bokeh texture.

Winter Light
Resources:
- texture from October 2012 Bokeh Set by Jerry Jones @ Shadowhouse Creations

The second photo was taken at the Gallery of Modern art in Glasgow. All in all, I found the building itself far more interesting than the exhibitions at the time I visited the gallery. To match the flowing shapes in the windows, I applied a texture to give the same kind of effect to the rest of the photo.

Blue Window
Resources:
- texture from Creative Black Mask 2 Collection by Denise Love @ 2 Lil’ Owls Studio

All By Myself free paper pack

Yet another freebie paper pack I've created this spring: All By Myself. Click the preview to get to the download page. Enjoy!


Tuesday 3 June 2014

Freebie paper pack Wineberries, Dogwood and Tea

Here's another free digital scrapbooking paper pack for you. Click the preview to be taken to the download page. Enjoy! 


Monday 2 June 2014

I Can See Clearly Now paper pack

Here's another free scrapbooking paper pack for your pleasure.  Just click the image to be taken to the download page. Enjoy.


Wednesday 7 May 2014

Pieces of Me, Days 4 & 5

I'm posting some pictures to the originally one-week Beyond Layers challenge Pieces of me. This'll be the last installment in the series. On the fourth day the topic I chose was A Light Fixture.


The light in the first picture is one of many at my work place, they are all over the building, along corridors and in the concert halls. I think they are lovely in their clarity and simplicity, they create a beautiful play of light and shade against the white walls. The picture was taken on a  typically dark Friday afternoon last December when I was walking the corridors and thinking how I longed for more light, and how the days would still continue to grow shorter.


Resources:
- font Denigan by Måns Grebäck


The challenge for the second photo was a favourite beverage. Well, I have many, tea being the everyday favourite. This one is a sort of festive variety, Chai Latte - I first tasted it a couple of years ago in Britain and have since discovered it is to be had in Finland as well, but unfortunately not in my home town, so I can only have it when travelling. This particular drink was enjoyed at Birmingham Airport on our way back home from the Crufts Dog Show in March 2013. It still makes my mouth water.

Resources:
- font Chopin Script by ClaudeP
- brush by Coreaux 
- texture Soft and Sweet by Kim Klassen

The third photo was brought aboout by the prompt Through your window. The squirrel seated on the roof of our woodshed is one of at least eight that have frequented our bird feeding post this winter. They still hang around, since we still feed the birds, because the nights are so cold, below zero almost every night. Now they have started to change colour, most of them are wearing their summer clothes and have turned red or at least reddish.

Frequent Visitor

Resources:- texture Revolution by Kim Klassen

Sharing at Texture Tuesday

Thursday 24 April 2014

Pieces of Me, Day 3

Another picture post to the originally one-week Beyond Layers challenge Pieces of me. On the third day the topics were Kitchen faucet and Your front door.

The first image needs little explanation. It's the kitchen faucet installed in our kitchen at the time our house was built 11 years ago, very typical in Finland. I still love the tiles we chose for the wall.


Photo taken on 23 February, 2014.

Resources:
- ribbon by Mediamilitia
- texture Waterfront 19 by Kim Klassen
- font Janda Elegant Handwriting by Kimberly Geswein

The second photo dates from last autumn. Without the chrysanthemums, it could have been taken last weekend, or any weekend when we have no longer or not yet snow. Just like yesterday, on a day off we like to work in the garden doing this and that, and the dogs keep watch. They sit or lie at the door, on the lawn, under the trees, occasionally even in the flower beds and let us know immediately if any suspicious-looking strangers try to pass by our yard in cars, on motorbikes or bikes or, horror of horrors, on foot.


Photo taken on 12 October, 2013


Looking at the picture more closely, now I actually notice another thing that tells this is an old photo. The girls (Justiina at the bottom left, Marleena at the top right) nowadays look much more adult. 

Resources: 

 - texture Empty Page by Kim Klassen 
- paper Wineberries Dogwood and Tea 03 by myself (coming soon)
- font Sweetly Broken by Brittney Murphy Design
- PhotoMask 53 by Julie Mead

Sunday 6 April 2014

Pieces of Me, part 2


These pictures are for the second part to the originally one-week Beyond Layers challenge Pieces of me. The topics for day two were Your Breakfast and The Mailbox.

For once, I actually took the photos for the challenge and didn't dig into the archives. The first one was taken at breakfast table - would have liked to have a photo with the doggies lurking at the background waiting for their morning cucumber (they're crazy about it). But as usual, when you want them to be there, they are not, or else they are running circles at such a pace that there's no hope of catching them with the camera. So it was our breakfast only.


Photo taken on 10 November, 2013
Resources:
- texture Carnevale 26 by 2 Lil' Owls
- font Snell Roundhand


The second picture shows the row of mailboxes where ours is, too, seen from the mirror of my car when I went to fetch the post. Wanted to have a photo without showing any of the names of the neighbours, and this way the mailboxes were suitably blurred.



Photo taken on 27 November, 2013

Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep - a new paper pack

I have been rather prolific with scrapbooking paper packs lately. I really enjoy putting them together, layering texture after texture and tweaking them. There are two new sets after this almost finished, so stay tuned if you like them. Like all of them, this one is free to use for anything, download and enjoy.


Saturday 22 March 2014

Pieces of Me, Day 1


Changed my username on deviantArt, so I thought I'd create a new blog here as well. It seems I'm not primarily posting scrapbooking layouts, as I thought I would when I first started, so I felt  it a bit restricting to call myself ScrapEija. Now I'm Eija Ite (or Eijaite), exactly as on flickr, and happy with that, since it means Eija Herself. Life's busy, but I have managed to steal some time for photos and for Beyond Layers, which of course has been long officially over, but I'm going to plod along and only then tackle Beyond Beyond. That naturally means that particular course will be long over, too, before I have any chance to work on it, but so be it then. I'll do what I can when I can and am not going to stress over it.  I'm a bit sad to have missed the community side of it, but glad to have met nice people anyway in Blogland.

The pictures I'm posting this time are my take on the originally one-week BL challenge Pieces of me. There were two topics for five days, and I've covered at least one of them for each day. Here's my Day 1 challenge.

Favourite Chair

Resources:
- paper Blue Jean 02 by myself
- font Milton Burlesque NF by Nick's Fonts
- font Skia

The pictures show our Dandie Dinmont male Renny in his favourite chair in our study. I took the picture on in February, but it could be anytime (for example right now). Yes, he is in the small picture as well, hidden under the cover.  He might sleep for a good while under the cover, but at some point it gets too hot there and then follows the really fun part, when he starts manouvering himself out. You see a wriggling, twisting blanket, then it usually falls down and some feet appear under it, then after some shaking and puffing, out dives a dog on a bad hair day. This is a favourite chair, though, because there's almost always somebody there, at least whenever either one of us two-legged family members are in the study.

Another challenge for day 1 was On My Feet. I couldn't decide which one of these picture I prefer, so I'm posting both. The first one shows another favourite spot of the doggies in the study: lying on the feet of the person sitting at the computer. Here we have Renny and his daughter Marleena, while I'm typing this the one warming my toes is Grandmother Foxy.

Dogs on my feet
Resources:
- background texture Scripted by Kim Klassen
- font Bradley Hand ITC

My other take for the challenge is a picture I took of my feet in socks knitted by Marjo last autumn. They have been my favourite footwear at home this winter. I blended two textures by 2 Lil' Owls on the background and used this lovely brushed mask by The Scrappin Cop on the photo.

Homemade Socks


Resources:
- textures Carnevale 45 & Vintique 5 by 2 Lil' Owls
- mask by The Scrappin Cop
- font Windsong by Bright Ideas

Wednesday 19 March 2014

Paper pack freebies

Long time no see. I suddenly noticed there are quite a few digital scrapbooking paper packs that I have made and published on deviantArt, but not here. So here goes. They are all free for you to use, click on the image to be taken to  the download page. Enjoy!