Personalized Holiday Photo Cards - Excite Your Recipients!

Question is: Are you going to create holiday photo cards which are unique, or just send generic Christmas cards with generic greetings? Well, sending generic Christmas cards is what most of us do. But this is an outdated practice and your recipients would probably think that your Christmas card reflects impersonality. If, however, you take the time to design custom Christmas cards, it can be highly appreciated by your recipients, whether they are family, friends or customers. Today, more and more people send personalized photo holiday and with the advance in

computer software and hardware, this trend is getting more popular because it's easy and fast and FUN to create holiday photo cards. One of the sure knock-outs of Christmas photo cards it a family photo depicting family members in casual posing, preferably not noticing the camera. Spend time with your kids while they play indoors and outdoors. Let them get used to the presence of the camera and they'll gradually ignore it. Now is the best time to take pictures, when they act themselves: fooling around, building blocks, smearing chocolate on their faces, opening presents, hopping on your bed, wearing an over-sized garment or shoes. You name it. Keep it simple and natural and real. Casual is much better than stiffly posing and looking smart and dandy. Have your kids wear Santa costumes; have your dog wear Santa stockings; experiment with creative composition and bold cropping - this way you'll have an excellent photo card which will excite and move your recipients rather than make them toss your old-fashioned Christmas card and never give it a second thought. Think of it this way, what's more likely to grab your recipients' attention: a card they saw a zillion times or a personalized and somewhat wild moment of captured eternity of your family?

When designing your card, use the colors which are associated with Christmas: red, green, white and gold. Add your personal touch, preferably with some verse in your own hand-writing. That makes all the difference. You can write some anecdote about your children or personal life, and what you are doing at work. Christmas cards purchased at a printer or online can be personalized by including a unique message and scanned signature. You can create a black and white photo, which adds a dramatic touch to your card. You can go for a photo-collage. For this purpose, use a free digital scrapbooking software such as Photomix. Or simply compose the collage on a blank card and then scan it to your computer and print it.

If you want to grab the attention of your Christmas card recipients you need to remember that they first see not the card itself but the envelope. So if your envelope is unique and personalized, your recipients will happily open it in anticipation to read your special Christmas card.

Turn the design of your Christmas cards to a family activity. Brainstorm ideas for graphics, composition, colors, fonts and of course words with your spouse and kids. Open your family albums and pick a photo or a number of photos that can make an exciting and moving Christmas card.

If you really want to have fun, here's an idea: create a home-made personalized Christmas card using magazine clippings, ribbons, advent calendars, peel-off stickers with seasonal greetings and so on. All you need is blank cards with envelopes. Preferred background colors for Christmas cards are white, cream red or green. If you don't have the materials, get a Christmas-card-making-kit. Play with your materials on a blank card until you come up with the perfect design for your personalized Christmas card. It's incredible what you can do with your imagination (so Elmo says, and he's right!). It might be frustrating at first, but keep trying and don't stick or glue anything yet. Try different colors, shapes, compositions, materials until you hit gold. You will know when it's right. Again, there is a wealth of wonderful designs buried in your imagination. You just have to dig them out. Trust me, you will love your Christmas cards so much it'll be hard for you to part with them. And you can bet they will excite and move your recipients, because they were personally created by you, by your creative imagination.

So…

Have fun. Creativity is life.