Creative Digital Crafts is subtitled Creating Crafts Using Digital Photos and Art. Unlike most books that cover digital photography, this one is packed full of ways to use your images in rather more creative ways than just sticking them in an album. If you're the sort of person who enjoys crafts and customising things with your own little flourish then Creative Digital Crafts will be right up your street.
The author, Helen Bradley has put together thirty projects grouped under four categories, Decal, Fabric, Novelty Paper and Heat Transfer projects.
Very helpfully, the book starts with a list of the projects with each being graded for computer skill and craft skill levels so you can easily see which ones are suitable for beginners or might be of interest to more advanced users.
The first thing that struck me was the number of products I'd never heard of such as inkjet printable slide transfers, much like you get with Airfix model aircraft kits but in A4 size. Armed with these, the first few projects consist of creating graphics to add to your child's bike, a dog bowl or a kitchen clock. This product alone could open up all sorts of possibilities.
The next section is based around different printable cotton fabrics. Again, something I'd not come across. These projects include making pillows, memory quilts or dolls dresses. Each project includes clear step by step photos and a number of hints and tips such as using the Windows Character Map for selecting unusual characters or the best choices of fonts.
I did start to wonder though just how easily sourced some of the materials are such as the printable magnetic paper used to create fridge magnets.
One idea I particularly liked was the iron on t-shirt papers used to create Andy Warhol style pop-art t-shirts. I could easily imagine some carefully chosen source materials becoming a nice little Ebay business based around custom shirt designs.
The only real downside I felt the book had was that some of the ideas were little cheesy and twee but it's the methods and skills that are important and the book presents those in a perfectly fine and accessible fashion.
My concerns about sourcing some of the material used were somewhat reduced by the inclusion at the end of the book of a small section listing material suppliers. I checked a few and they all seemed to be US based but hopefully ship to the UK, Europe and elsewhere. This probably also accounts for why I haven't come across many of the materials before.
One thing the book didn't cover was how durable some of these projects would be, which was a pity as many of these would be used as gifts but you wouldn't want to find out later that half the ink had come away.
From the introduction which covers basic craft techniques and methods through to the projects themselves, the book exudes a can-do attitude and a range of ideas that are sure to inspire anyone with a computer and a desire to use it for a bit more than the run of the mill tasks.
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