Making your own greeting cards

[wulf]

Last year I used plain cards with a photo of mine glued to the front (four photos combined actually - one for each of the seasons of the year and also because I didn't have any high enough resolution shots to stand on their own).

This year I am planning on using plain cards decorated with a selection of stickers from moo.com (using my photos again); it will be quite folksy and not look nearly as professional as the examples above but will hopefully get our card list covered without breaking the bank

Wulf

[smc1377]

Hey Clockdoc,

I believe I know the paper you are looking for. I used to work in the paper industry selling paper by the rail car load and happen to come across a product just like what you're describing and cause I worked in the industry, I was able to call the paper manufacturer and get myself a HUGE box of free photopaper.

It's called Kromekote Inkjet Xtra Glossy Picture Paper

99 Gloss
93 Brightness
8.5 mil
Cast Coated C1S

The C1S stands for coated one side which is what you're asking for. The other side is just like your average card stock--no coating whatsoever so it's PERFECT for both printing and writing with a regular ball point pen. Also, there's nothing pre-printed on the paper.

The Kromekote line by Smart Papers come in a variety of finishes on the front side. The Xtra Glossy that I listed above is on the better-than-average side of the line. But you could go down in quality or up in quality if you want to. But what I listed is what I'd use for greeting cards. Maybe I would even go down a grade depending on the picture I want printed.

If you've never heard of Smart Papers, it's cause they don't sell retail normally. There are only a few handful of paper manufacturers out there. They make all the paper that is then re-branded. All the photo papers from Epson, HP, Canon; they come are made and rebranded by one of these main paper manufacturers, though no mills can claim which brand they make. Smart Papers is one of the premier coated paper manufacturers out there and I wouldn't be surprised if they made one or all of the major photo papers on the market.

Now the next trick is to actually get your hands on it as a consumer. They normally only sell paper in large volumes to paper distributors like xpedx and Unisource. But that's also where you might be in luck. xpedx has "retail" locations that have full access to all paper lines.

I'd suggest going to www.smartpapers.com and then at the top right corner, click on swatch books & samples. Then on the left side, click on Digital Samples. Scroll down a page or two and you'll see the paper that I'm talking about along with other products they carry. These samples are free, but you have to pay a shipping and handling charge.

Once you get the paper and test it to make sure you like it, there are a few online paper merchants that sells the paper. I would also try calling an xpedx retail location to see how much it would be as well. There might not be a location near you, but they can ship it to you so you can basically call any location in the country (http://www.xpedxstores.com/StoreLocations.aspx?state=AL) and see what kind of pricing you can get. The pricing is done on the fly so if you don't like it, try to negotiate the price.

I hope that helps. I'm pretty confident that you'll love this paper for this purpose. Not just based on personal experience, but cause lots of greeting card companies use this very same paper for their greeting cards. The only difference is that they use the Kromekote that's optimized for the press, not inkjet printers.

[smc1377]

And now that I think of it, if you have trouble getting samples from Smart Papers (i.e. out of stock), let me know. I do still have a few hundred sheets of this stuff packed in sample packs.

And I suppose if you're not doing too many of these cards and can't find anyone to sell you the qty you'd like, let me know and we can also work something out.

Ohh, I should mention that this paper also comes in textures as well--canvas, linen and silk (fine little bumps). I don't know if they still sell it textured, but I have lots of textured paper.

[prrs4me]

I use Royal Brites double sided matte photo paper. You can print on both sides. I bought a paper scorer to make the fold and its also a paper cutter.
I use a Hallmark program to format the cards.

I make birthday cards throughout the year.

Each year I have one of my grandchildren design a Christmas card picture. I then scan in their drawing and add text. I also make calendars for the family. All different for each family member.

[clockdoc]

My thanks to all who have offered words of wisdom in tackling this greeting card project. I know a lot more this morning than I did yesterday. 8-) But I still have a ways to go to iron out the details. On my list of things to do today are to check into the paper products/samples that 'smc' mentioned in his posting as well as the Hallmark card program 'prrs' uses.
As I mentioned earlier, I just used a setup with Photoshop but importing the cropped images and manually aligning them can get to be tedious, not to mention misaligning the images. 8-( With the prices of greeting cards these days, this may turn out to be the way to go. Perhaps we have encouraged a few other subscribers as well. Thanks again to all who have added to ths thread.

[kairos]

Originally Posted by prrs4me

I use Royal Brites double sided matte photo paper. You can print on both sides. I bought a paper scorer to make the fold and its also a paper cutter.
I use a Hallmark program to format the cards.

I make birthday cards throughout the year.

Each year I have one of my grandchildren design a Christmas card picture. I then scan in their drawing and add text. I also make calendars for the family. All different for each family member.

I have looked on the Hallmark site( UK) ( I take it it is the Hallmark greetings card site?)and can't see any program that would help me to make greetings cards.Only E-Cards and games . Please could you point me in the right direction .Many thanks.

[prrs4me]

Originally Posted by kairos

I have looked on the Hallmark site( UK) ( I take it it is the Hallmark greetings card site?)and can't see any program that would help me to make greetings cards.Only E-Cards and games . Please could you point me in the right direction .Many thanks.

I bought a Hallmark card making program a few years ago and still use it. It's not from the web site but from a retail store. There are many programs you can buy that all do the same thing.
Here is a link:

http://greeting-card-software-review...-software.html

Don't know if this will work in the UK but if you do a search for Hallmark Card software you should come up with some information.

[kairos]

Originally Posted by prrs4me

I bought a Hallmark card making program a few years ago and still use it. It's not from the web site but from a retail store. There are many programs you can buy that all do the same thing.
Here is a link:

http://greeting-card-software-review...-software.html

Don't know if this will work in the UK but if you do a search for Hallmark Card software you should come up with some information.

Thanks for the info. I have looked at the Hallmark site and also used their link to look at other greetings card software. I liked the look of Print Master Platinum at $34.95 or scaled down version ,Print Master Gold , at $19.99.

They both seem very good value for money.

[wulf]

I never got on with card making programs. They always used to seem quite limited in what they would allow you to do (although the last time I seriously tried to use one was almost a decade ago and I appreciate things have moved on a bit since then ).

If I was trying to put together a card today, I would probably use Inkscape. This is a free (and Open Source) program that lets you design vector graphics. You can also import bitmap images, like photos, insert text, rotate elements to any angle and design the page to print at whatever size and layout is needed to print on your cardstock.

Once you have set up a template, I don't see how a prebuilt program would make it much easier (unless that prebuilt program then lets you upload your card for printing on professional machines).

Wulf

[MNstrel]

I don't know if they still do it or not, but microsoft.com used to have templates for word and publisher for greeting cards.