*Winners*Alphas as Elements Challenge | Summer School 2021: Week 1 LANGUAGE ARTS CLASS

Congratulations Winners,
The $10 prize goes to @ad77
The $5 prize goes to @julianz
The $3 prize goes to @sberkan
I will be in touch by conversation when I have a prize code to send each of you.
UPDATING to add - prize codes have now been sent.
Thanks everyone. I was blown away by the creativity you all showed!
________________________________

Welcome back to Summer School 2021 & Language Arts!

Today's challenge is to:​

• use at least one set of alphas on your page but not to spell anything with them.​

Instead of building a word or title, which is the obvious use of an alpha pack, the basic idea for today's challenge is to use random letters, numbers or punctuation and pieces from an alpha pack as part of the page design, just like any other element.​

"Don't spell anything at all?!?!" I hear you thinking.
Let me give you a few examples as inspiration.

On this page, the artist has arranged a heap of alphas and has given the idea of 'love letters' a fun twist! She has used an envelope that enhances the love letter theme and this would work with heart papers, ephemera and really any kind of alphas! The alphas are a bit like a huge scatter and the way they are clustered makes them look fluid and like they are being poured into the envelope!


On this next page, the stamped alphas are really symbolic of something else. Each letter is really a drop of water or rain with the cloud providing the context for the alpha pieces. Notice how near the cloud the letters are all clearly separate and the spacing changes as the raindrops pool together as they hit the umbrella and make puddles near the child.



This next page is similar, but rather than their placement conveying the obvious vertical movement of falling rain, it uses their placement to show a transfer of meaning or knowledge. The book again gives context and the alphas are used as elements and symbols and again there is no obvious word or title made with the letters. It is the way they have been used that gives this page meaning and it doesn't matter what your native language is, I think the meaning is universally understandable here.


You can also think about alphas completely differently, they are all just a bunch of lines really, curved, linear, zigzags etc. (This is more obvious when you look at text in other languages because we have been taught to see a specific letter when we are shown it in our native language, so a capital D on my QWERTY English keyboard is more than just a 'D', it is a straight line & a curve that joins the two ends). With that thinking, they can be used to make shapes, patterns or pictures. I have used this thinking in making my own page.

And finally, these pages have used a mix of alphas (either the same letter or different letters) to create a pattern, border or add an embossed texture to the plain background. This would be great for a birthday page, using the same number repeatedly in contrasting alphas or make them all match by using the same Photoshop style. Also potential for pages about school, hobbies like wordgames, or just when you have no words about something! Use random nonsensical letters or a dozen different question marks or exclamation marks to emphasise a devastating emotion or a view that leaves you speechless with the option of trying to describe how you feel in your journalling. Click on any of these to see them in more detail - everything came from a pinterest search on alphas and scrapbook pages.


I will post my page in the next post shortly.

I hope you have found something to inspire you.
So, in creating your page featuring alphas as elements, here are some points to think about:

• is there some other thing that gives the alphas context on your page? Like the cloud, book or envelope? Another element or maybe something in a photo that is also on the page?
• pay attention to the placement and how you arrange the alphas. Are you using them clustered together to make something bigger, like a border or shape? Can you nestle them together by rotating them and fitting them together more like puzzle pieces? Or are you using them separately, like the rain page?
• do you need to use repetition for a letter, number or punctuation mark to give it significance? does the texture, style or finish of the alpha need to be considered? Are you using them as part of a tone-on-tone background to give an embossed appearance to the paper, or do you want to maximise contrast?

Prizes:
There will be a $10 first prize, a $5 second place, and one random draw prize for all other entries of $3! So you have 3 chances at a prize!

Rules Recap:

• The deadline to upload your page to have a chance at winning the prizes is the end of Summer School week 1 Sunday July 11, 11:59pm EDT [New York time zone]
• Your page must include at least one alpha product by a current Lilypad designer. The alpha should be used as an element in page design only and must not spell anything.
  • As always, credit the products, including the alpha/s you have used to make your page when you upload it in the gallery. The alpha/s can be from a kit or separate alpha pack, they may be currently available or no longer available from the store.
• You can include 1 piece of wordart if you wish & you are free to use any other papers, elements, templates, styles etc for your page.

• Normal challenge rules apply
  • Your page must be a new page for this challenge.
  • Your page must contain at least 75% Lilypad product.
  • Your page must be posted to the Lilypad Gallery and then posted in this thread so I can track entries and comment on your page.

 

This is the page I made for this challenge using 3 alpha packs (full credits in the gallery shortly).



I used a lot of Allison Pennington's Schooled alphas, rotating them and nesting them to make a flourish shape (I started out thinking I'd make a border strip down the left side like some of the inspiration pages but i ended up liking the freeform shape it became and just rolled with it adding some elements in and around the flourish).

With the papers by Lynn Grieveson particularly, there was a lot of cool blending and I added Paula's Graffiti Spray alphas in white in parts (there's an X and H in the upper left, an R, the P & J are rotated by 180degrees so that the long lines give a drippy paint effect, there's also a few 8's turned 90degrees to extend the wavy water lines from the photo and an O in the centre of the flower under a Q from Kim Jensen's Boho alpha which I used in a few different places. The plus signs ( which work well again with LynnG's paper patterns as seen on the yellow arrow paper strip on the right) and brackets and asterisks are all from her pack that contains several mix and match alphas.

I used one small piece of wordart as a more minimal style of title, as allowed and have not spelled/spelt anything with the alphas I used as part of the page design.

 

This post reserved for questions and answers

***Just to clarify to be in the running for the prizes:***

• your alphas can not spell anything.

• you do not need to use an entire set of alphas (that is, every letter from A to Z) That is not required but you need to use some kind of alpha (not just a font), one(1) or more different alphas are required and it should be noted in your crediting in the gallery.

• you can use numbers and/or punctuation symbols instead of (or with) letters, again from an alpha, not just a font.

• you can change your alpha/s with styles or recolouring as you like (again, just credit that so I know)

• You can include 1 wordart & you are free to use any other papers, elements, templates, styles etc for your page

thanks everyone

 

ok let me try to fix it

 

Are you able to see them now?