March 07 - Scraplifting Etiquette

I hope I don't get into trouble for this.

The Art & Etiquette of Scraplifting by Allyson Bright (Nov 21, 2005)

For today's scrapbook artist, ideas are everywhere. There are numerous industry magazines full of page layouts and album ideas, and fantastic websites like Scrapjazz featuring extensive layout galleries. Sometimes, though, you may find yourself wondering exactly how to translate those fantastic ideas into pages and albums of your own. The act of taking someone else's scrapbook art and copying it or slightly modifying it into your own creation is called "scraplifting." When done appropriately and correctly, scraplifting can bring a fun look to your personal albums and help you save time by using the design work of others. Ways to Scraplift Perhaps the easiest method of scraplifting is to CASE a layout. CASE stands for "Copy and Steal Everything." CASEing a layout involves purchasing the same supplies as the original creator, and creating a layout with the exact same design and layout as the original, making only minimal changes, such as the page's title and photography. CASEing is excellent for new scrapbookers because it allows you to try out many different styles quickly and easily. Another method of scraplifting (and perhaps the most common one) is to simply adapt a certain part of a layout design for your own purposes. See a layout online that you love? Take a moment to carefully examine it. What exactly is it about the layout that draws you in? Use of color? A photography technique? Try isolating one or more elements that particularly appeal to you, and try them on a page of your own. Consider the following elements when analyzing layouts: Color combination Theme of the page Use of a particular product or embellishment Overall design/layout of page elements Use of handmade creations (i.e. freehand drawing, hand-cut elements, etc) Photography Storytelling/journaling perspective By isolating the elements of a page that you truly love, you can quickly and easily adapt them into ideas of your own. Quite often, pages "lifted" in this method become your own creations, bearing little or no resemblance to the original! Scraplifting Etiquette As with any art form, the most important thing to remember when scraplifting is to give credit where credit is due. For example, if you CASE a layout and then post it online without crediting the original page, that would be both insulting and unfair to the original artist. When scraplifting certain elements, it is simply a matter of judgment. If you see a page designed in red and blue and then decide to create your own page in the same two colors, and your page looks nothing like the page you first looked at, you probably have nothing to worry about. If you copy a hand-cut design from someone else's page, giving credit to the original designer is probably wise. The etiquette of scraplifting is especially important to remember when entering your pages into contests and submitting them for publication. Only pages which you can honestly claim are your own creations should be submitted under your name. (However, remember that scrapbooking is an incredibly saturated industry at the moment. Sometimes pages will bear a resemblance to one another. This does not necessarily indicate that one page was lifted from the other, or vice versa.) Scraplifting can be a fun and fast way to create fantastic pages, or try out design ideas that might present more of a challenge if you were left out on your own. Remember that scrapbookers love to share their ideas—this is the essence behind websites, like Scrapjazz, and major industry magazines. Share your own ideas regularly, and don't be afraid to benefit from someone else's!