Creative Memories Digital 411 Blog

The Character and Symbol Thing

 You've heard of or the , and have seen some commercial using  .

Funky names, names using characters, or symbols you don’t know what to do with (and with that not quite knowing how to pronounce these.) Some come and go whereas others stick around. Ever wanted to re-create any of these characters, maybe for some journaling for your abroad experiences, and weren’t quite sure how?

There are a bunch of languages that use symbols, some called Umlauts such as ü and ä, Germany being one of them. These can usually be replaced with “ue” or “ae” to give the same effect, which I only resort to when I am too lazy - I have memorized most keyboard shortcuts for German letters. Keyboards in Germany are set up a little different, so is Z and Y reversed for example, and they also offer separate keys for the Umlauts. This in turn moves some other keys and functions around, which makes switching between a European (German) and US computer/keyboard interesting reading and writing at times when I travel or communicate with my family or the German Creative Memories Home Office.

Now, if you want to use special characters and are not fortunate enough to have an option to have these situated right on your keyboard, or memorized them for some reason, the following may come in handy. Our friends with Mac’s may want to check this site out http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1518.

The Alt key on your keyboard doesn’t stand for Altitude, but for Alternative. Holding down the Alt key while typing in numbers (often referred to as Alt codes) on the numeric keypad allows to type special characters not normally available on the keyboard. For example, holding down Alt while typing 0216 on the numeric keypad will results in Ø. I have seen some Laptops that also use the Alt key to access a third function on some keys, such as to adjust the brightness of the Laptops display and sound.

Some software has also options built in to insert not only images, graphs and shapes but also symbols.

StoryBook Creator, for example, allows you to insert Symbols. Just right-click on a text box you created and select “Insert Symbol…” (or use the Insert ribbon and select Symbol in the Text group) and pick the one you want from the list. Note, you will only see the characters and symbols for the font you have currently selected.

 
Above: StoryBook Creator (Wingdings)

You could also check out the Character Map, usually to be found on Windows computers, under Start > (All) Program > Accessories, or further under > System Tools. If it isn’t present here, navigate to your Windows folder on your hard drive and look for a sub-folder called System32, then look for a file called Charmap.exe. Once you located it, right-click on it, select Send-To and then Desktop (create shortcut) to have easy access to it in the future.

This nifty tool allows you to choose different fonts (the ALT code, or the associated symbol may differ from font to font). Once you chose a font, scroll through the list of characters and symbols, and when you find the character you are looking for, click on it. You will see a larger version of it and the corresponding code and you can even copy it, or a series of selected characters, to your clip board, ready to be inserted elsewhere. Some applications may not understand the code and give you no or a wrong result, some (programs or fonts) require you to highlight the inserted portion and re-format it. So just check it out and play with it.

 
Above: Character Map (Wingdings)

Here are a few codes to play with.
ß = ALT + 0223; ‡ = ALT + 0135; ö = ALT + 0246; ñ = ALT + 0241; ¿ = ALT + 0191

Some symbols are already sort of coded into software, so, for example, can Microsoft Word and others understand if you type (R) and automatically translate that into ®. The same goes for (TM).

There are no limitations as to what characters you use in your StoryBook Creator projects for example, all can be printed. However, if you were to personalize your album using our Persona Imprinting service for Albums, there are limitations and I recommend checking out the samples provided as well as using the spell check tool.

Ever wanted to have your own stamp of approval or some other character and you could never find an existing character you liked among the thousands of fonts, including the Wingdings fonts 1, 2 and 3? Well, one option you may want to check out is a not very well know nor well documented Microsoft Windows one.

Navigate again to Windows/System32 and look for a file called Eudcedit.exe. That is a Private Character Editor build right into Windows. You could create your own font too, if you have a lot of time and patience. Again, it’s not very well documented and the built-in help is pretty much all documentation you can find elsewhere too and there are limitations, but it works to import your own unique characters into StoryBook Creator projects for example. Once you created your very one, just retrieve it in the Character Map, copy it to the clip board and choose the “Insert > Place clipboard text on page” from within StoryBook Creator. From there, you can manipulate it just as you can regular text.

 
Above: Private Character Editor

Guten Tag

   

Love framing? Put it in your StoryBook!

I will always believe that you can turn any photo into an extraordinary piece of art with a few mats and a frame. So, why not apply this in my digital scrapbooks? I love the new framing option in StoryBook Creator 3.0. I can pick out mat colors and even match colors from my photos perfectly. Here’s one example from my latest project about my dog Abby:

Here’s the original page with just the photo:

 
I wanted to highlight the photo a little more and give it some ‘depth,’ so I decided to add a mat. I clicked on the photo and then clicked on the “Format Photos” ribbon. I clicked on “Select” and then on the pop-up selected “Frames” from the drop-down menu. For this one I selected “Beveled mat.” To change the color select the drop-down under “Format” and click on “Edit the current list of frame effects.” Click on “Bevel cut mat” and you can change the color and size on the right. I choose to sample the color brown from the swirls on the page and went with a width of 10. Here’s what it looks like:

 
I wanted to actually imitate a real framed piece on my page, so I did the above steps and clicked on “Redwood Fancy” under “Select Effects.” Then under “Format” I changed the flat shadow mat to brown and matched the bevel cut mat to the yellow leaves. Almost looks like this is ready to hang on my wall!

Creating your own templates

 

Creating your own templates may seem like a complicated endeavor, but it can be such a timesaver when you implement it into your digital scrapbooking. Think of it as creating your own coloring book, you're setting up the outlines now and later you'll add all the colors.

Start by creating a new project in the size you'd like your templates to be. For the one I've used for this post, I created a new 12 x 12 blank project.

Now that you have a blank canvas, you're ready to begin. If you follow a few simple rules, you can create templates to fit all your needs.

Photos boxes in templates

Rather than inserting photos onto your page (see screen shot below), you'll be using the Insert tab in SBC+ and choosing "Empty Frame" each time you want to add a photo box to your template. Once the empty frame is added to your template, size and position as desired. Then add shadows and borders you wish.

Shapes in your templates

From the insert tab, you will create the spaces that you will later fill with papers or colors. Click on the "shape" button to add rectangles, circles or other shapes. Color each new element a different shade of black (see screen shot below). You can treat each of these shapes as you would any other paper in your files. Add shadows, torn edges, etc.

Text in your templates

Again, from the insert tab, choose the type of text box you want to include in your template. Size and position as desired and click on create. No need to format any text once the box is placed. You'll do that later when you use the template to create pages. (again, see screen shot above)

If there are any embellishments that you want as part of the template, add those now. Once your template is complete, save the file and close the template.

Using your templates

Open or create a project the same size as your templates. From the home tab, click on "import page". Navigate to your template file. In the preview pane, you will see thumbnails of your templates. Choose the one you want to use and click on "get pages". (see screen shot below)

Once your template is imported

Let the fun begin. Drag and drop photos into the photo frames. Click on the shapes you've created and fill with papers or just color if you prefer. Add text to the journal boxes and other additional embellishments, papers to complete your project.

Creating even just a few templates for yourself will free you up to focus on what it is you want to create. Do you like to always get 4 photos on a page? Make a bunch of templates featuring 4 photos! Like lots of journaling? Set yourself up with a journaling template. Planning on creating a larger StoryBook and want all the pages to have the same layout? Save yourself some time and make a template first (see screen shots below).

Want the template from this post?
(note: this template was created in SBC+3 and is not compatible with earlier versions)

Simply RIGHT click here, then select "save target as".  Next, navigate to a place on your hard drive where you want to save this file and select "OK".  Open StoryBook Creator Plus Software and create a new project (this project should be a 12 x 12 page print type).  Once your project has been created, on the "Home" tab, click on "Import Page" icon to the far right.  Navigate to where you saved the page file at, then click on it, then click "Get pages". Your page will be all set for you to drag and drop photos in, change fonts, add journaling!

Calendar Templates: Defining your time

tem•plate: A pattern or gauge, such as a thin metal plate with a cut pattern, used as a guide in making something accurately.

Wow. I made my first calendar pages this week. At first thought it was going to be cool to show you how you can drop in 12 x 12 pages or Page Prints you've already done into the calendar templates. However, that doesn't even begin to scratch at the surface of what you can do with the new calendar templates.

You can:
• import completed pages as photos and just drag and drop (or, you can copy/paste from another SBC+ file if you still have items you want to change)
• start from scratch and create something new
• make any photo or paper the background of the calendar
• change the calendar style
• change any month to a new month (switch January to July without starting over)
• change the color of anything in the calendar, change the fonts
• add photos, embellishments or text to any cell on the calendar

I discovered all kinds of versatility within the template. Check out the screen shots below to see some of the great things you can do with calendars.

cal•en•dar tem•plates: a starting point, a guide to making your calendars just the way you want.

Insert your already completed pages

1. If you haven't already, save your pages as 300 dpi jpgs. From your calendar project, click on Get Photos. Import pages you want to use as photos.

2. Drag and drop on to calendar template. Size to fit the upper portion of the template.

Change the style of the calendars & adding a photo as your background

1. It doesn't get much easier than this. Right click on the calendar grid to see the pop up menu. Go to "Use a different Calendar Style", choose your favorite from the pop up window.

2. Adding the photo as a background is amazingly simple too. From the content menu, choose your photo, right click and choose "Make background". That's it. (You can do this with paper too!)

3. Just like any StoryBook page you create, you can add any embellishments or type you like.

Personalize the calendar grid

1. Right click the calendar grid, choose "properties" from the pop up menu. From this menu, you can change colors, fonts, spacing and more as it applies to the calendar grid. (see screen shot below)

Cells within the calendar

 

1. Drag and drop an image or an element into any cell within the calendar. Or, right click the calendar grid and choose "Edit Calendar Cells" to add text or make other changes to the individual days of the month.

When you're all done creating your own unique and fabulous calendar grid, you can sample the grid and apply the same features to any other grid in your project.

Find more great tips & videos in the Help Zone.

The Number and Letter Thing

Guten Tag.
Have U ever had T42&24T with your BFF and were LOL or even ROFL? Do U and your friends ^5 each other?

Numbers and letters surround us every day, and, I know you’ve seen or used these - no not letters or numbers ☺- number-letter combinations of sorts. They even make their way into commercials.

There are some numbers and letters that can make things work, or don’t, and others can mean a whole word on their own. Put a few of these together and you have an abbreviation, acronym, or some funky combination.

Some actually make sense whereas others are just plain confusing. Sometimes it doesn’t make any difference, but unless you’re in on the secret, you have no clue what one talks about when using gibberish, regardless whether it is an abbreviation or the actual description.

How’s this? (A) In my mumble opinion, you have already used a Digital Versatile Disc or a Universal Serial Bus device to store files, such as Joint Photographic Expert Group’s and also used these files in Memory Manager and StoryBook Creator. (B) IMHO, U have already used a DVD or a USB device to store files, such as JPGS’s and also used these files in MM and SBC.

What do U prefer,A, or B, or a fair mix of it? Does it depend on how and when “shorthand” is used, and do you question or research it?

Do you know what all these mean; and no, it’s not product placement ☺?
AFLAC, BMW, INTEL, SPRINT

What’s your thought about writing in all CAPitalized letterS? Writing in all CAPS is considered yelling in the online community. In other areas one would think it should not matter whether you use upper or lower case letters and it often does not. However, it is important to use letters the way they are provided in instructions, for example the Serial Numbers and Activation Codes for MM and SBC should be entered in all CAPS. Some download links for software are also case sensitive and it can make a difference whether you enter Sorybook or StoryBook for example.

Serial numbers, for MM and SBC, can contain only the following characters:  B, C, D, F, G, H, J, K, M, P, Q, R, T, V, W, X, Y, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9.  This eliminates any confusion between similar characters such as ‘O’ and ‘0’ or ‘I’ and ‘L’, since they are never used in serial numbers. For Consultants that use BusinessMate, you may have noticed that this software doesn’t follow that standard and its Serial number starts with CMBM00-xxxxxx and the two zeros are often confused with the letter O, causing an error during the installation and registration process.

Some numbers for our software; Storybook Creator 3.0, to-date, has 3 updates and Memory Manager 3.0 has 4 updates to-date. For any software you want to be certain to stay up-to-date and on top to have the most recent updates installed. This will assure that you get the most accurate information and newest features, including any corrections that may have been made since the original release of the software. Both, Memory Manager and StoryBook Creator are able to check automatically for updates, if your computer is connected to the Internet and if you did not adjust the original settings to do so.

CUL8ER
Auf Wiedersehen.

p.s.
BFF (Best Friend Forever); T42&24T (Tea for two and two for tea); LOL (Laugh Out Loud); ROFL (Rolling On Floor Laughing); ^5 (High Five); DVD – (Digital Versatile Disc or Digital Video Disc - a high capacity optical storage medium); JPEG (Joint Photographic Expert Group - the most common file format for digital images); IMHO (In My Humble Opinion); MM (Memory Manager); SBC (StoryBook Creator); USB (Universal Serial Bus - standard for connecting external devices such as cameras, scanners, and disk drives to a Windows-based computer); AFLAC (American Family, Life Assurance Company); BMW (Bayerische Motoren Werke); INTEL (INTEgrated Logistics), SPRINT (Southern Pacific Railroad INTernal communications.)

Where's my project

 

I wanted to pass on something interesting that happened after I installed my CD upgrade of the StoryBook 3.0. When I first got it installed, I was excited to start. After I activated it and checked for updates I looked at my projects and packages but didn’t have too much time so I closed it out. The next time I went into the software I became concerned that I could not find one of the projects I was working on! I know I saw it the time before plus I could see it on my hard drive of my computer. If this happens to you or your customers here is what I did to fix it. I closed my software and then I went to the location where my project was, if you don’t know where it is located you can always search on your computer by the title. Once you find the project double click on the file and there you will see a lot of Page files but there is only one file titled “book.xml.sav” . All I had to do was rename the file “book.xml” so basically all I had to do was delete the .sav. Once I was done changing the name I just exited out of that screen. When I reopened my StoryBook 3.0 and opened my projects I saw it there!

Looking for 2010 Calendar Overlays?

Well, you won't find them in the normal place because we've added calendar functionality to StoryBook Creator 3.0!! We're so excited about this fabulous new feature - it launched last week with an Update to the software. And I'm personally excited to have an option to the yearly "Weather Calendar" my husband loves to buy!

Here's what's new:

• When you're inside a project in StoryBook Creator Plus 3.0, just click on the Insert tab and on the far right you'll find a new option to add a calendar object to ANY project! You can customize the look, the month, the year - all the flexibility you've come to expect from StoryBook Creator Plus software!
• A new project type -- that's right, you can now build, upload and share our fabulous new 12x18 Calendars in BOTH StoryBook Creator 3.0 (free version) and StoryBook Creator Plus 3.0! These gorgeous calendars feature a 12x12 design on the top and a calendar grid on the bottom. We perforate above and below the 12x12 design so once the month is over you can remove the grid and save the page! This project is a bit different from other StoryBook projects in that you must start with one of our Predesigned or Basic Calendar Pages. 

• For StoryBook Creator 3.0 users (the free version), you will start with SBC 3.0 2010 Predesigned Calendar Pages. There are 3 options for each month -- seasonal/holiday, decorative or basic. You can add your photos and journaling to the top half of the calendar and add text to each individual day.
• For StoryBook Creator Plus 3.0 users, you have 2 choices:
  • The Basic Calendar Pages give you just the calendar grid itself, which you can still modify and customize, and then add your own page design on the top of the calendar.
  • The SBC Plus 3.0 2010 Predesigned Calendar Pages give you a starting point for each month and allow you to enter photos OR text OR both in each individual day!

And the best part? These gorgeous new calendars retail for only $20.99 ($28.99 CAD)! You can start creating them now and upload to the CM Photo Center to view and share. You'll be able to order starting November 1 so start having FUN now with this new addition to our software!  

A special note -- if you downloaded the free artwork packages on either 10/1 or 10/2, please download and install them again -- we had to make a few tweaks and you'll want to have the latest & greatest!

 

Digital Beginner

Wow, when I first saw StoryBooks I remember thinking these would be great, but then someone showed me the software.  What was it Charlie Brown always said, good grief!  After getting over my initial intimidation, I started playing around with the software and it became easier and easier.  I scheduled myself some playtime to work on my first Storybook.  I did take the time to watch the Getting Started Online Training on the Help Zone on creativememories.com (also can be found in the same place on your consultant's personal website).  Then I identified the pictures I was going to use in my book.  This worked pretty slick as I moved the pictures from my computer into the StoryBook following the easy Getting Started Guide.  Before I knew it, my scheduled playtime was over and I wasn't ready to stop.  I had my fist 8x8 StoryBook completed in 2 hours!  (I sometimes take an hour on one traditional page). 

The ability to change colors, size the picture (one of my favorite things to do) and add embellishments was much easier than I thought.  Now my first book isn't extravagant, but it tells the great story of my niece, Michelle, completing her second Ironman competition and it made a wonderful gift.    

   

What was your first StoryBook project?  Do you now consider yourself an intermediate or advance user of the software?  I think I am an intermediate user after 1 book!  Let us know what resources you have found helpful as you create your StoryBooks.