Today’s little tip has to do with organizing your digital layouts! Organization is definitely a matter of personal preference, so I am be no means trying to tell anyone they have to organize their LO’s the way that I do, this is just a suggestion and the method to my madness!
I save all of my layout files as PSD (or whatever program you use), and also JPG. I also run a “save for web” on my LO’s, but that folder is not included in this blog post because I just put those files in a temporary folder on my computer called “web files” and purge those periodically throughout the year. All of my JPG and PSD files get saved on my external hardrive, and I occassionaly back them up on to discs and then keep them at my mom’s house in case of fire or any other damage. Here is my first image of how my initial folder looks:
My Digital Scrapbooking folder is for all my kits/supplies, and my Scrapbook Pages folder is where I keep all my layouts. When I double click into my Scrapbook Pages folder I see this:
So in this image you will see I have three folders. One for cards, which is just a collection I have going of cards that I can quick load and print off for special occasions. The second folder is labeled JPG LO’s. In the next image you will see this is where I organize my LO’s that I use to upload to have printed. I will explain more about that folder in a moment. The third folder is labeled “New to Print”. This is the folder that houses all of my PSD files – any and all LO’s that I have ever done.
Ok, so here’s where you need to stick with me. For some reason when I show people this they get a little confused. Within my JPG LO’s folder I have three folders. In the “NOT Printed, NOT Saved” folder I put all my current LO’s that I have not printed off yet and have not saved to a CD/DVD yet. I print LO’s off about 2-3 times a year, so sometimes I can have 50-100 LO’s within that folder. This past weekend I ended up uploading the LO’s from that folder to Persnickety Print and getting the LO’s printed off to put in my albums. Now that those LO’s are printed off and on their way I select them all and do a copy and paste and put them into my “Printed, Not Saved” folder. This means the LO is printed and in my albums, but has not been saved to discs yet. This way when I am ready to save to my discs I can just select all the LO’s in that folder and send them to the CD. Once they are saved I select all of those files and paste them into my “Printed and Saved” folder! Doing my organizing this way is an easy way for me to know what I need to print yet. OK – so another question I get is “do you have folders within the JPG LO folders for each child?”. My answer is no. You will see in the next image I have all my PSD files organized per child and general family, but my JPG files all get lumped together. You see, when I upload to print the LO’s I can choose how many of each copy I need of each LO. So if I have a LO with two or all three of my daughters in it then I will choose to print that LO two or three times.
And here is my final image of how I organize my PSD files:
These files are pretty self explanatory. I have a file for each of my children, a general family album, and most importantly a “work in progress” folder! ;) Any time that I am working on a LO and I don’t have time to finish it up, or I just am at a loss for which direction to take it in, I save it to that folder! When I finish the LO then I move it to the appropriate folder. I am fortunate enough to have used this system from pretty much day one with my digital scrapbooking, so that makes it easier, but if you don’t have much of an organizational method for saving your LO’s I suggest you take a little time and get it organized now, so that whenever you go to upload them or print them or save them you will know exactly which ones to grab! It really is a time saver in the end!
If you are organized and in tip top shape and have a system that works for you…that is GREAT! It’s always fun to just see how other people have their folders set up!
Scrap On!
MandaKay
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