Liven Up Your Photographs

I love looking at photos online, especially when my bloggy friends post them! And obviously I enjoy sharing my photographs with you all too. One thing that makes photo browsing so neat is seeing how people use their creativity to present them. Over the years I've come up with a few neat ways to show my photos off on my blog so I'm going to share them (and their templates) with you guys! Take a peek at these then find the link to download ALL my templates at the bottom of the post!

You might not think breaking up your photo into pieces would be a good idea, but for most photos that do not include people, it works! Just remember to keep the rule of thirds in mind when breaking up photos this much. In this example I had three levels: sand, water, sky. I knew I wanted the sand only in the bottom row to give the photo some balance.

Another example of breaking up your photo. Like my typo in 'photograph' up there? Perfection is so boring, ha! Anyway, this example really makes me want to reach into the screen and pick up the pieces and put them together like a puzzle!

My personal favorite ;) If you are familiar with Photoshop or Elements, the possibilities are endless for doing these types of collages. This took all of 15 minutes to put together then I added the photos using clipping masks, journaled the center and it was finished. You can incorporate whatever shapes you'd like to make it unique.

I love scalloped edges. Zig zags are neat too. This one kinda reminds me of a place mat ;)

Using the same photo from above, I merged the text layer with the shape layer to create this clipping mask. Same photo but different feel! The neat thing about this is that you can do whatever word you want! I have a photo of my son with his name under the frame like this, love it!

One of my favorite ways to display my photos online is by using layer masks like this one. You can make these yourselves if you have time, or you can download free ones like I did for this example. Get this mask here. GOODNESS! Another typo! I shouldn't type on an empty stomach again!

Feel free to download all my templates and use them however you'd like. There are basic instructions for them included in the zip file. [download here]