How I photograph my pages

When I did a week-long blog for Write Click Scrapbook this year on two-page layouts, one commenter asked me how I photographed my pages. This summer I asked my son, the intrepid techie, to take pictures of me while I took pictures of my page. (pardon the blur on the photos--the shots were good but I saved the photos too large for what I should've from a phone. Oops.) Here's the scoop, in all its steps:

1. I place my page on an ottoman near a west-facing window not near the end of day to photograph it.

I have almost no windows in my house, really, so I must photograph the page before it gets too late and the light too intense. I could place the page on the floor, but I'm a fairly tall woman, so I can get closer when I place it on something. I like the ottoman because it is about 2 feet off the ground: not too high, not too low, with a neutral navy background.

2. I stand directly over it and photograph it.

This is the important step. I have to hold my arms steady at my side and move the camera until the layout is about square in my screen. I then take a couple shots.

3. I get down close to take some details shots.

This is harder for me to hold the camera steady. I could kneel to get closer, but I don't have great knees (many sprains from high school field hockey and torn cartilage from volleyball) so I stand.

4. I fix up the shot in PSE 10 afterwards.

I'll share what I do step by step here:

• If the image is crooked, I straighten it (Image-Rotate-Custom-.5 degrees right or left is usually enough to tweak it a little).
• I crop the photo, unrestricted, to eliminate all background.
• I usually do an Auto Smart Fix under the Enhance menu. Like I said, I tend to have bad light.
• If the page is for a design team, I use the required template. If not, I skip this step and move on to the next.
• The next step is to sharpen the image (if it's on a template, I flatten the image first.) I go to Enhance-Sharpness to do so. I usually keep it set to 85% for an Amount and .8 Radius in pixels. That seems to sharpen the photo nicely without getting too sharp.
• Then I Save As in a file folder--my Fancy Pants Designs pages get stored in a different folder  from my personal pages.

And here's how the page above turned out when all was finished:

And that's how I shoot and edit my photos to get them ready to put online! Thanks for reading about my process. Let me know if you have any questions--or share your process so people (like me!) can improve their process.