At this time of year, I find it really hard to know what to buy some people. Some of the people on my list are easy and I see far too many things that would be perfect to get them, but alas I don't have the funds to buy them all.
It's the former that I always fret over. In recent years though, I've been getting magazine subscriptions for people and Christmas seems to be a perfect time to gift these.
Not only that, but it's the perfect go to gift for when you've had it up to the eyeballs with the Christmas rush and even though you've sharpened your elbows to fine points to barge your way through, you still can't quite do it all in one afternoon.
You can buy them online and, through the magic of the internet, they get delivered throughout the year to your recipient's address.
This is all well and good, but it does mean that you will be without an actual physical gift to give. So, I decided to make my own gift card to give. It's a little bit of handmade which is really quick and can all be done last minute from the comfort of your sofa... win win in my book!
All you need is a photo imaging program (I used Photoshop) and some white printer card (but you could use paper).
Step 1:
Choose a magazine that you think your recipient will like. Put it into Google and buy the chosen subscription.
Step 2:
Enter the name of the magazine into the google images search, choose 3 cover images that you like and download them to your computer.
Step 3:
Choose a frame from a free clipart site and download it to your computer. I used The Graphics Fairy, who has a huge library of free images that you can use. The frame I used is a christmas coloured one from her archive.
Step 4:
Open Photoshop with a new document sized 4 x 6"
Open the three cover images and the frame you downloaded into photoshop.
Step 5:
Rotate the frame 90 degrees (Image-Rotate canvas) and drag it into the 4 x 6" document and resize to fit if needed (Edit- Transform-Scale)
Step 6:
Drag each of the cover images in turn into the 4 x 6" document.
Resize and rotate the cover shots using the 'Transform' tool in Edit-transform.
Step 7:
Make sure that the cover images look like they are lying on top of each other by dragging the layers correctly above each other in the layers window.
Step 8:
Using the type tool and selecting a matching colour, write your chosen message and align the type to the right.
Move it to the correct position on the card.
Step 9:
Print the card using print with preview. Make sure that your image wont be chopped off in printing by either changing your settings to borderless printing or by printing the image in the centre of the page.
Step 10:
Cut the card out and put it in an envelope or wrap it up.
This is a very basic way of making a gift subscription card. I'm sure if you are better at using Photoshop than I am you could come up with some really cool cards. Maybe next time I'll make a pop-up card to give!
