Inspire Me Monday - Combining Digital Images

Hello! This is Gloria Stengel, one of the NEW Instant Gardeners! I have the privilege of bringing you the Inspire Me Monday project this week! I hope you had fun during our Christmas Remix Hop! I sure had fun coloring the new images! And, congratulations to all the prize winners! 

Now that you have lots of new digital images to play with, I wanted to show you a few ideas for combining them to make "new" stamps! To learn how to work with digital images, please review Julie's amazing post HERE. (I have used Photoshop Elements to create my new images.)

To create this lovely combination stamp you will need three images. I used the wreath from Wreath: Boxwood and Cranberry, Candy Cane Classic (which is only $1), and a sentiment from Twinkling-Eyed Snowman (any sentiment will do).

Open all three images in Photoshop Elements (or a similar program). Follow the directions HERE to erase the white backgrounds. Save each transparent image as a new file name.

Place the new, transparent wreath onto the work space, then size and crop as desired. 

Drag the new, transparent candy cane image onto the page (or use the FILE, PLACE feature). The candy canes will overlap the wreath as shown. 

Drag the sentiment into place. Save your NEW creation and print!

Color your image and create a card or tag! I printed my image at 5" x 5" and created a simple 6" x 6" card. I colored the image with Copic markers, which made it color up quickly! 

Once you get the hang of working with digital images, you can create lots of new images. Like this one...

To create this wonderful coloring page, I combined the watering can and branches from Country Home Christmas with several other images and a sentiment to create this lovely decorated branch.

Open the image and delete the white background by following the process HERE. Size the image as desired. (Some images are already on a transparent background, but many image files are JPG files with a white background.)

Open the Glittering Glass Santa image, then remove the white background. Use the eraser tool to erase the tree branch.

Place the altered Santa image onto your branch image, size and position as shown above. If your altered Santa image is in the Photo Bin at the bottom of the screen, you can simply drag him into position, then size him accordingly.

Continue to add elements until you are happy with your NEW image! I added the pinecone bauble and the tiny pumpkin bauble from the Forest Finds stamp set. (To see the Forest Finds image colored, check my blog HERE.)

I also added the ornaments from the Acorn Ornaments stamp set to the branches. After I erased the white background, I rotated and resized the ornaments to fit my tree branch.

The final touch was adding the sentiment from the Winter Flora digital stamp set to the bottom of the new image.

I printed the NEW image at slightly smaller than 8 1/2" x 11" to make a full-sized coloring page! It would be tons of fun to pass out coloring pages to all the little ones during Christmas events, or to have a coloring challenge with adults! You could print this in a smaller size to make greeting cards. The sky is the limit!

An easy way to alter digital stamps is to add your own text to the image.

I personalized a stocking image by adding my name to the stocking from the Joyeux Noel Stocking digital stamp set. You simply open the digital stamp with Photoshop Elements, click the text tool and add your text! Text can be sized and rotated. You are only limited by the fonts on your computer!

You can make a cute set of tags with this technique!

Thank you so much for joining me on this digi stamp adventure! If you'd like to see more of my work, please visit my blog, Scraps of Life. 

Until next time, have a Merry Christmas and a most Blessed New Year!

Gloria Stengel