GWL | Preparing Templates

Last week I posted about planning Grow With Love mini photobook. At the end I mentioned next step was doing it and that's what this post is all about.

I don't have an entire day to scrapbook, not even an entire evening, that's why it's essential that I break down the doing in small steps. So I started by the templates. First thing I did was to visit the photobook print service website to check sizes and designs so I could create my templates accordingly. I'm in Brazil, so I chose a Brazilian service to make my first photobook. I intend to try an international one in the future because then I'll be able to compare and choose the best quality/price option. The website is FotoRegistro.


I chose a hardcover square blank 14,8cm photobook to add my own designs. Then, I downloaded DBook program so I could design the photobook offline. After that, I started creating my templates.

I started by the front and back cover, then the first page that will be a dedication page for my daughter explaining why I'm making this book for her. After that I created a double page template for each prompt. 

If you remember my sketches you noticed that I didn't even draw all pages because I decided to go with a repeating pattern for the double page spreads: a journaling spread including prompt number and title and a full photo spread.

I can't understand why it's kind of gray because the original image has a white background. Weird.

Well, I believe you are wondering why I made templates for all pages if they are all the same. I promise I have a good reason. I can't number how many times I have lost pages because of using the same template without creating a copy, I always forget that and then I have to redo everything. So this time it took me a little longer to create all the templates, but I won't have the risk of doing pages over and over again. Besides that, it's a great way to have a full vision of the outcome.

Another detail is that I created the templates with left and right pages together, even though I will save them separately, because I want to design them together to be sure to match colors, embellishments, story and wordarts.

And that's it for now. What I haven't designed yet is the spine because I have no idea how to do that, I'll take a look at the program to check size and how to add it.

All this template preparing process was inspired by Lynnette's Hybrid Mini Photobook. When she posted her photobook I felt in love with it and decided one day I would make one myself. 

Next step will be choosing products and fonts. Be tuned!