WARNING: Digital Scrapbook Pages That Become Lost Forever! …Don’t Let This Happen To You!
By Cheri Barlow
I have always loved digital scrapbooking and as soon as I could get a hold of a digital camera I was off creating digital Scrapbooking pages and albums. So some years ago, I was really excited when I flipped through a magazine and saw an ad for a company that made special software devoted only to digital scrapbooking (and nothing else).
At the time, I already had Adobe® Photoshop®, and I even had Adobe® Photoshop® Elements (which, in a nutshell, are photo enhancing software programs that also can be used for digital scrapbooking), but back then they just seemed overly complicated when it came to digital scrapbooking. Not to mention, there wasn’t much in the way of digital scrapbooking supplies available; Adobe® Photoshop® and Adobe® Photoshop® Elements didn’t seem to cater to digital scrapbookers nearly the way that these programs do now. When I saw this new software that was completely devoted to digital scrapbooking, I was attracted to it because I just wanted something simple; that would make digital scrapbooking easy.
So I bought the software program that was made completely for digital scrapbooking. At first, I was very pleased with the program; it was easy to use, and it contained all the digital papers and supplies within the program itself so that I didn’t have to buy additional digital papers, frames, embellishments, or other digital scrapbooking supplies.
I completed several digital scrapbook albums, and everything seemed to be going smoothly. I loved the way the digital scrapbooking pages that I created looked on-screen. But at that time, printing them out on home printers was difficult because the technology was a little behind; so the print-outs of my digital scrapbooking pages didn’t look quite as good as they did on the computer. Online printing was still very new and none of these printing companies were set up for digital scrapbooking printing yet, so I was very limited in my options when it came to printing and putting them in real albums.
A few months later, my opinion of this new software devoted only to digital scrapbooking began to change, and I started to see why others might not want to have such a program as their main digital scrapbooking software program. First of all, the digital supplies inside these digital scrapbooking programs were limited, and several finished digital scrapbooking pages later, I began getting bored using the same digital supplies over and over again! I felt like I was creating the same page layout using the same digital papers and embellishments every time I digitally scrapped, and I became frustrated that all my pages looked just like the one before. What was really aggravating was that I was not allowed to bring any other digital supplies or papers into this software! I was stuck using their digital supplies, and only their digital supplies. It was a huge digital scrapbooking disappointment…
A year later, I bought a new computer and couldn’t seem find this digital scrapbooking software or its upgrade anywhere. My new computer didn’t want to work with the original version that I had bought, and so I couldn’t transfer this digital scrapbooking software from the old computer to the new computer. It seems as though the company that made the software either went out of business or just quit making the software all together!!!
To top it all off, when I tried to email my digital scrapbooking pages from my old computer to my new computer, it could not save the scrapbooking page in a format that other programs or that my computer could read. The digital scrapbooking pages I had spent hours and hours creating were saved in its very own, specialized format that was not readable by any other graphic program… Arrgh!!!!
So, what did all of this mean? It meant that I basically did a whole lot of work for no good reason at all! I eventually lost all the digital scrapbooking files that I made using this specialized digital scrapbooking software and was not able to use the files or share them as time went by and technology advanced. I can’t tell you how disappointing and heart-breaking it was to lose such special memories that I had spent so much time creating.
But, all in all, this unfortunate experience taught me an important lesson about why it is so critical to make the right choice when choosing and using digital scrapbooking software.
After my traumatizing personal experience, I can’t begin to stress how much I recommend using Adobe® Photoshop® or Adobe® Photoshop® Elements® as your default digital scrapbooking software program. Adobe ®Photoshop® and Photoshop® Elements have been around for a long time and are very digital scrapbooking-friendly now. These programs are actually very easy to use once you have the right kind of training (we provide in-depth, easy-to-use training and tutorials on digital scrapbooking using Adobe® Photoshop® or Adobe® Photoshop® Elements® on our Website: www.DigitalScrapbooksandMore.com), and we provide many digital scrapbooking papers and supplies that can be used within the software itself.
You will never be forced to use the same digital supplies over and over again because Adobe ®Photoshop® and Adobe® Photoshop® Elements have the capability to bring in new digital supplies from other digital scrapbooking companies in order to design your digital scrapbooking masterpieces however you would like. You can always upgrade to the newest version of the Adobe® software without worrying that they will go out of business or just totally skip town on you. You can save your work and email it in many different and 
common formats that can be easily read and shared with others. I am more than confident that you can feel extremely safe in investing in Adobe® Photoshop® or Adobe® Photoshop® Elements when it comes to all of your photo enhancing and digital scrapbooking needs.
(Image: of Quick Pages that can be used in Photoshop & Elements and don’t have to be lost forever!)
Perhaps these independent digital scrapbooking software programs have changed since I have used them last; but let me just tell you, because of my personal experience, I will never go back and give them another try! And if I can save you even half of the trouble that I’ve gone through, then I will have felt glad to have warned you in advance. Please learn from my mistake and don’t let your valuable digital scrapbooking pages and projects be LOST FOREVER!
Cheri
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