Monday

10 ideas for creating bright and bold backgrounds for your layouts


Colours help to convey emotions and that's why my family layouts are often in bright and bold colours. It always makes me happy when I flip through my albums. Are you shy about using bright and bold colours on your pages? Here are 10 ideas for creating bright and bold backgrounds for your layouts.


My-little-helper
My little helper
1. Go with bold colours in a graphic pattern.

Strips of paper scraps helped to anchor the photos and smaller circular elements (buttons and brads) helped to tie the elements together.

Sweet-birthday
Birthday cake in bed
2. Create a "faux" grid.

A grid makes it easy for you to place your elements. Repeated elements like the floral design complete the visual triangle (the misted background, the strip of foam blooms and the girl holding a bloom) and pull the composition together.

Level-33
Lunch at Level 33
3. Extend the colours from your photos.

Tie the elements together by using a strong grounding colour like black. Black and white is an optically arresting combination with powerful graphic qualities.

Boy-meets-world
The super cheeky phase
4. Try some drips.

Here the drips from the Dylusions mists helped to guide the eye both horizontally and vertically. Try tilting the paper or blow using a straw.

Happy-SRM-stickers-layout
Happy miss sunshine with her milk-drinking pig!
5. Help guide the eye with obvious cues.

The repeated elements here create harmony even though the background is a little messy.

We-are-family
My new "skill"
6. Play with diagonals.

Diagonals can add movement and help to guide the eye across your layout. The washi tape, stamped words and tilted photo helped to tie the elements together even though the background is a little noisy.

Yay
A whimsical scene
7. Create a "scene".

Make the bold background the backdrop of your fun "scene".

We-love-our-angry-birds-watches
Their eyeballs pop out

8. Play with a chevron design.

One powerful design element combined with the power of "threes" (three boys, three watches, three photo blocks) pull the elements together on a relatively simple layout.

Cute Sophie
That sweet smile and flat nose

9. Go with black and white photos.

The contrast of black and white photos against a bold background always create a visual impact.

Shy-guy
The one about the shy guy 
10. Go wild with layering stencil designs with different mediums.

Have a little fun creating your own custom patterned paper. A starburst stencil was first applied with some gloss gel, then coloured with Ecolines (liquid water colours). Next, Dylusions inks sprays were applied with another stencil to create an artsy messy background. The rectangular photo mat helped to anchor the focal point and serve as a dramatic contrast to the background.

There you have it. 10 ideas for creating bright and bold backgrounds for your layouts. Which one caught your eye? *winks*

Share/Bookmark

Pin It

16 comments:

Lizzyc said...

These all look wonderful! Bold bright backgrounds! Cannot pick a favourite! Love each one!

Jasleen Kaur said...

Wow !! All your layouts are super duper awesome. How creative you are with the background ideas !

Lizzy Hill said...

Love how you often do 'rainbow' colours cascading down with the stencils...looks BRILL....the chevron one really attracted me. Errrm....I rather like big bright bold colors. Did you notice????!!!!

Julie Tucker-Wolek said...

You always create the MOST amazing backgrounds with gorgeous colors!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Dr Sonia S V said...

So many ideas....very inspiring!!
Cheers
Dr Sonia

CREATIVE KHADIJA said...

This is really interesting article, thanks for sharing :)

Suman Pandit said...

You have a way with colors Yvonne !! really can not pick a favorite...all look awesome :)

Audrey Pettit said...

OMGosh, you really are amazing, my friend! These are all SO gorgeous, so vivid, so playful, so bold! You combine elements like no other!

Lisa said...

They are all absolutely amazing!! The colors are fabulous!! Too hard to pick a fav!! They are all creative and beautiful!! Have a great day :)

Lisa
A Mermaid's Crafts

Annette Allen said...

you always rock bold and bright. all of these layouts are outstanding and designed perfectly..

Shylaashree said...

your background colours are always awesome and very beautiful layout designs

Lynn said...

Gorgeous layouts...I'm so impressed even if this is the second time I'm seeing some of them. You have mad artistic skills! They are all eye candy for my mind....thanks!

Sharon Fritchman said...

What a wonderful collection of your pages, Yvonne! Each one is a beautiful work of art! Thank you so much for your amazing tutorial!

Deepti said...

Stunning layouts :)

Cindy deRosier said...

They all look great!

Val-Belle said...

Wow Yvonne, all of these backgrounds are so pretty and each one so different. I am such a chicken when it comes to things like this... it is all about control for and letting go. I love love the look of this on other peoples layouts but when I do it I always think is just looks like a mess. I want to control it and I can't :D THank you for the inspiration.

Post a Comment

Thanks for visiting my blog and taking time to leave a comment. I really appreciate it. Have an awesome day!:)

Cheers, Yvonne.

>
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...

LinkWithin

Pin It