An idea for creating a personal calendar...

[Lyne]

I just sat here for 2 hours, modifying 12 of my art images... to be BACKGROUND images for my 8 1/2 x 11 desk calendar... every year I set up a monthly calendar like this, very plain, with big squares to write notes, appointments, grocery deliveries, etc... and as I printed out a couple of sets I thought... Hey! Why not put my own art on as a faded background image for fun?

So I opened up each of my older art pieces, duplicated the image layer, filled the bottom one with white, then turned the opacity of the duplicate image layer down to 50%. Then I used various tools to turn darks, heavy reds, etc. to a paler shades... When I felt it would work behind my black lettering and squares, I flattened, saved and printed out at "normal" (ie: NOT "best") on nice white ink jet paper (NOT the glossy, just flat white paper).

Then once I had 12 images, I ran each image through the printer again, using each calendar month, keeping in mind, for example, my Halloween image needs October printed over it, Christmas image needs December, etc.

Then I staple the very top with two staples so I can turn each month over (or the pages can be torn off, I just happen to keep mine to look back at previous months events).

I'm so happy with the results (every bit as nice as, say a printed batch of checks for my checkbook), that next year I may offer them as a gift treat in December when I'm mailing gifts/cards out!

 

[Miss B]

Sounds nice Lyne. I'm sure it looks great.

 

[Flint_Hawk]

Clever idea! I bet it does look nice!

 

[Alisa]

Sounds lovely - do you have a way to take a picture to show us?

 

[Lyne]

uh... not really, as it's a physical thing...I'd have to TRY taking a photo, and the art is SO pale, it would be a very time consuming image to create... hmmm unless I do screen captures...and combine art layer and calendar layer in photoshop... hmmm where there's a will there's a way!!

PLEASE UNDERSTAND, my printer does a funky thing, I HAVE to stretch images horizontally for them to PRINT properly (ie: or things in the images get "skinny"- just an oddity of my printer and the ancient program I print out of).

er, I didn't crop the image bottom...there is a white border around all 4 sides of the image (layer) Plus I did darken the image a tiny bit more to make it show up HERE...

 

[Alisa]

oh, it's LOVELY!!!

 

[Lyne]

THANKS!

and HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

 

[Alisa]

You, too, Lyne!

 

[Miss B]

That looks great Lyne. What a clever idea.

 

[Pendraia]

Great idea Lyne, last year (2014 not 2015) my sister used an online service to print calendars as Christmas presents for everyone using family photos. At school though we sometimes do something similar to what you did with the big squares for the kids just not with the beautiful images you used.

 

[Satira Capriccio]

Fabulous Lyne, and you get to look at your art all month.

 

[Dylan]

That's a great idea Lyne.

 

[Carey]

I always am a little what do I want to say, timid about surrounding myself with my own work. Sure, I like showing it to other artists, but lets face it...What we are doing is really playing with digital paper dolls, we dress em up, make play dates with other digital paper dolls, play make up, put their hair up in curlers or just play with their hair for a while.

Now, sure those around us at least pretend to understand , but we know, We are the Wendy's and Lost Boys and we all want to one day be Peter Pan....lol

Making art work and I do personally consider what we do as art, "functional" is a sort of betrayal of what real art is supposed to be, I am not at all, all about art just for arts sake, but there is always that discussion going on in my head, yet most art down through the centuries was designed or produced to serve a fairly practical function. Maybe we have it all wrong, taking painting that once served as Photographs of loved ones and hanging them in a museum behind lock doors....

Clever Idea

 

[Lyne]

@Carey awww doesn't it make you feel good to see your own artwork around you? For me it helps me appreciate all the effort that went into making any specific piece. Otherwise it gets made uploaded to my website and I tend to forget about it… Sometimes I actually go back and go through my own website and kind of go "wow I did that?" Because hey, no one sees me or hears me doing that so why not?

 

[Gilraen777]

I did something similar (albeit a bit racier!) using art done of the male characters in my stories. But rather than cover the complete image with the calendar, I left open spaces in corners of my art and placed the calendars there, at about 60% opacity so the background image will still show through. I shared these with some of my friends, putting out a new page each month. I have thought about redoing them as a collection and offering them on a site like Deviantart.

 

[Lyne]

interesting!

 

[Pendraia]

sounds cool Gilraen...at this point I can't remember who I've welcomed or welcomed back but I'm thinking I haven't welcomed you yet...so welcome to the hive!