I'm still here... and still freebie hunting

Phew! I've been amiss from this blog for a  good fortnight or so and I apologize - I had to impose a ban on myself.  Not from you so much lol, but from downloading any more freebies until I managed to wrestle down the 50 GIG zip archive I already had (and that's just on one computer, all up I have 130G to unzip) as it was making my computer very sluggish and blogging, not to mention ANYTHING else was exceptionally slow.  Mind you, I did happen to make a decent dent in the ominous "unzipped" folder which will now ensure I can open Photoshop at least, lol
 I didn't have any room for months to allocate to the scratch discs (whatever they are - I set mine to be 3 GB do you think this is enough, wisely designer peeps -who may read this?)


As you may recall, last week was IDSD  (International Digital Scrap-booking Day) and there was 14 pages of Craft Crave just to begin with, five worthwhile blog trains and of course the Goodie Train. I liked the novelty and prettiness of the theme, The Orient but I think overall some designers felt extremely inspired by the palette and theme but generally most designers most of felt a little flummoxed/stifled at how to create original pieces, for instance I now have fifteen geisha elements and twenty Asian coins, which I think I won't ever use, but I couldn't resist their cuteness. Fall Carnival remains my number one contender for best train of the year. Did you spend up big on the DSD weekend?  One of my biggest motivators for designing myself is so I can raise just a small amount of funds to spend on paid kits - they really are ten times better than freebies.
And you know that I love my freebies. It's nice to just have everything co-ordinate rather than attempting to disguise the fact you have created a layout from a hodge podge mix of different designers, kits and colour schemes. However, beggars must not be choosers and for now, I am extremely grateful that freebies exist, so I can partake in this excellent creative outlet - I find just the process of planning layouts and collecting freebies cathartic, so I can imagine actually using my collection will be an immensely rewarding task. I still have only made one measly layout. But I am going to change that this week, as I am ready to post some layouts here - not on any gallery yet (argh!) and we can all have a chuckle - I am sure that I will be my own best/worst critic!

I also really enjoy MScraps (but how could you not with all of those esteemed designers in one place!) and lately I have been really impressed with the generosity of CatScrap, and have some beautiful QP albums as a result.  What are your favorite blog trains?  Do you prefer PSP heavy trains such as The Brat Pack Train or prefer the minimal elegance of an Mscraps train?  I do love Jen Yurko's contributions every time along with many others (ok I will name names but my memory is flawed remember so excuse me if I spell you wrong or get the name muddled, I am recalling these from the top of one's head!)  Doodelle, Scrap Matters peeps, Pixel Perfect Designs, Flergs, Ellie Lash, Vicki - A Work In Progress, Fei-Fei's Stuff, Captivated Visions, Caged Bird Designs, Aprilsa Designs -- ooh I know I am missing some, so I might in fact put together a list of best blog train submissions and award a prize - maybe take a vote?  Yes, let's do that.
Let me know if you have a blog train favorite or perhaps you yourself are a designer, you are most welcome to nominate yourself (encouraged even!)

 and I was right back to the red zone, with only 96mb to run the pc on (I do not recommend this, weird things start happening, I have expected to open my case and see twenty mischievous goblins having a drunken party inside, such was the inoperability of my computer.
Even though I'm 31 and therefore still acceptably permitted in nightclubs without looking entirely desperado, I am a bona-fide geek-chic. Give me gigabytes over an ice cold G&T any day.  I've always been enchanted with the  border-less freedom and instantly teleporting to a million (billion) cultures and locations of the Internet.. In fact, I was rather hoping the enamourment  would subside into something less intoxicating, so I can return to the days of bone idle laziness occasionally.  "Whatever can I do with myself today?" that seemed reassuring rather than the frenetic nojob ever gets finished before another one starts pace of middle age.  Remember being bored?  Doesn't it seem like ions ago, much before kids, careers that will not wait and everyone wanting a little piece of you that you can't even find for yourself thesedays?  Yes, the internet is speedy time travel and my cultural passport with a click of the mouse.

You may have noticed I left a particularly touching comment or feedback on your blog, and this is why you are now reading this, as I left a link - that is not self-promotion really, as I travel to hundreds of blogs in a week and have no way of ever finding out what the designer or writer said in response, it's quite sad really. But, it won't stop me from leaving these warm-fuzzies or customer feedback (which as I am qualified in Marketing Research and customer relations, I'm one of those  "can sell ice to eskimoes kind of girl" ).

 I have decided I will post my comments here, so I can remember them and also invite my readers to add their thoughts and opinions, besides I do wish to model " Freebie Fan Club Model Behaviour Code" which states that leaving contexual comments on posts that you feel you are taking something valuable from away from or you just feel implored to cheer that designer up who for baffling reasons seems to have no readers judging from the appalling lack of thanks or comments, despite having a downloaded tally in the hundreds for the hard work and talent they share.
I always like to make those designers feel heard - it can be very unnerving to be carrying on daily diatribes and conversations with oneself, in reality this is called insanity but online - it is called Blogging!

So, on that note,   Goodbye to myself - and to whomever may be reading along.
I'll be posting more regularly now, this was quite easy to type (as I love to write and talk - can you tell lol?)
and I will be sharing my commentary on what posts I have read and commented on, which will provide some interesting discussion and exploration of some excellent designing talent at very least.

Fondly,
Miss Renee

p.s Spread the word and my link, I would be eternally grateful - talking to oneself can get terribly mediocre!
I am now going to list the freebies via my side link - which I will update every day (if needed) This way I can also share discussion and freebie hunting tips and news in the main blog post for our beloved readers.
Always check the sidebars for great links to great freebies - all personally handchosen by myself and if you work down the list, you will be assured of getting the maximum hit of freebie goodness from all over the world. So get your google translate ready - because a good freebie hunter must be fluent in all languages freebie style!    Telecharger away!

Mediafire Vs 4shared - The Fight for Survival

http://scrapbookideas.wordpress.com/2010/10/25/fall-fun-digital-scrapbooking-kit-free/
Oooh this one is a lovely full kit (4shared) and I happened upon it purely by chance.

I've been getting really busy unzipping my files to make room for the "Goodie Blog Train -The Orient".
I also notice that many other blog-trains coincide with the start of the month.  I love it!!
I really thought Fall Carnival was my favorite blog-train so far, given the huge variables of talent and experience (hands down Trish really has the best blog-train no contest in my opinion) I felt all the entries were beautiful and very useful for compiling a huge kit to use outside Fall as well. The Carnival theme made the elements extra exciting, I think - I think it is best to have the theme be a combo theme like Fall Carnival perhaps?

http://designbydani.com/girltalk/2010/10/huge-giveaway/    >>  get all those templates above too!

It is essential when using 4shared for this train to clear out your cookies after every third download max (I normally do it after two accepted downloads) all it will take ages - and 4shared has been giving people a lot of errors if they have an abundance of cookies in their browser - it is definitely not the designers fault. If a 4shared link is not working - it is either a 4shared outage (which can be confirmed by trying to download one of your own hosted files on your account) or you are being stuffed about because 4shared figures you have had plenty of download privileges and makes you wait whilst some other user gets the bandwidth.
The fastest workaround is to clear all of your cookies, log in if possible and if still not working then favorite the file so you have a recorded link to the file (you should try to upload it to this account) and try again once the outage is fixed (usually about three hours maximum)

You can also use these principles and apply them to the freebie files hosted on Mediafire downloads.
 I notice that more and more designers are opting for Mediafire, which apart from the prolificness of pop up ads and noisy PIMP pages (is it just me that gets bombarded with pop ups using Mediafire? I am wondering if I indeed have a computer virus as I am noticing a lot more pop up action on blogs and mediafire when freebie hunting.  Is anyone else finding this?
Leave a comment in the comments if you have experienced this.  I know that there is new way for ads to operate via a mouse-over activation which I think is being utilized by a lot of add ins and plug-ins for blogs and media sharing sites. Basically you no longer have to click a pop-up link, instead they just activate the link if you happen to "mouse-over" the area of the page - quite cheeky if you ask me.  I find Mediafire's PIMP page is just a horrible  association for an otherwise professional and easy to use site. I am disappointed that Mediafire would taint the user experience so much, given that the site has very good potential - no wait times is definitely a bonus, but I wonder if we pay for this bonus by being subjected to popups from a wide range of suspicious websites.

Whoops!  My horribly flawed memory had a slight malfunction -  I forgot I had a blog almost - almost!

I have been on a unzipping blitz for the last four days and admit that I am now getting more of a feel of what my sorted scraps do and don't need.  It seems to me that a lot of elements are repeats of the same things namely flowers and epoxy! Flowers of all kinds - paper, beaded, ribbons, ceramic, felt - it seems flowers are popular scrapping items. Nothing against them personally, but I have enough of them now - ditto for butterflies, flairs, psp anything (honestly I really am done with those kind of elements, I almost crave real items - real buttons, real ribbons and real extractions. The artistic interpretations are best left to doodlers, as I can never have too many of them. I really enjoy designers who think outside the box when creating elements for themed kits. One of the goals I will have a designer is to be creative and constantly injecting personality and individuality into the design so my customer can tailor the layout to them specifically, through clever elements that allow maximum participation and interaction. I'm going to have a look around the shoppes and web to showcase some specialty elements and the designers here on the freebie fan club. It would be handy to know - especially if we can get some exclusive freebies for the blog to publish.  I am curious to hear about your freebie stashes - what folders are bulging?  What elements do you love receiving as freebies?  I love getting anything for my "specific date related" folder meaning date wheels, mini calenders, elements that you can show the date on the layout in an eye catching way.  

I also love anything memory keepsake related - camera elements, labels, cursive script minimal word art, neutral colours, journal spaces that are unique.. in fact, I have noticed that I am moving away from collecting glittery clustered items and now seek a cleaner, more sophisticated use of whitespace and a few themed elements to accent the story of the layout, rather than using elements to tell the story.  Posh indeed!

Running List of My Freebie Travels Tonight (list updates)

http://designbydani.com/girltalk/category/freebies/    Dani's Freebie Archive for Halloween Goodies.
http://suzee-q-stuff.blogspot.com/2010/10/wackadoo-wednesday-freebie-post_27.html Starting Here.

The neverending archive debacle.

Just when I get all chuffed that I have finally freed 6 GIG from the overloaded hard drive of my computer, all the designers seem to get all generous and creative at the same time, and in one foul swoop, it was all gone. Not that I am complaining, I love what I got, but I cannot even use it as my Photoshop won't let me work without at least 3 GIG for scratch discs or something.
Understandable, I guess, it is a magical program.. What am I going to do? I cannot afford a dedicated drive, I could stop collecting.. but how do I know if what I have is actually what
I think I have..

http://jen-at-chaos-lounge.blogspot.com/2010/10/i-love-reading.html
That is an amazing colour challenge entry if I have ever seen one.. beautiful doodle work and expoxy layers, how can I possibly turn a blind eye to that kind of thing.
Sigh. Maybe, I should store things online, but then I am worried that I won't be able to see them all, and will need to download them just to see the file. I am using picassa, so I could make contact sheets... (thinking aloud here) Oh yeah, this is my third week with Picassa and I
am going to stick with it, it is simply the fastest and most intuitive application (meaning it can keep up with me changing my folder structure endlessly and moving things from section to section, without me having to tell it anything - take note elements organizer humrumph!)
I have a wonderful system in windows alone, but as we know you can only tag jpegs in windows 7 and not tiff, png or psd - not a fault of Microsoft, blame the actual makers of those formats.
Picasa solves this issue by adding your own tags to any file used in scrapping (just not brushes, styles and specific photoshop or psp file formats) to the exif data.
It allows you to batch edit, and to attach as many tags as you like.
I think I am getting too nitty gritty with the organisation part.
I have papers by colour and one of the colours is mixture (which means I could use it a variety of matching papers) which divides them into themes (like hearts, seaside, kiddies, yuppie mod)
and then I have got each colour sorted into best of, general, pattern dots and squares, flowery/planty/girly, geometric, grunge, stripy, ultra-rich, (i have an entire pastel range in the colours as well as a central grunge folder for grunge that is just a hodge podge of colour)
My favorite folder to fill is geo/mod/posh as I love those designs and I also love filling the fabric designs for each colour into which I place all gingham, paisley, plaid and any wool or silk papers for that colour. Is this too wierd and obsessive - I have no idea.
I don't know any real life digi scrappers to compare with. I know I am proud of my collection and the orderlyness of it, I know I can find a paper in mind rather quickly, as I am also tagging each item with the folder name it is in (all tags replicate the windows folder they are in) I am sure if anyone looked at how many hours I have spent making it all just work, they would think it is a waste of time. However, I really want to be designing and getting to work with quality colours and finishes is important to my layouts. I have been very dissapointed
with a few of the european freebie kits that I could have sworn looked so good on the preview, and I have also discovered a bit of copycat freebie sharing, which is a little annoying.
Why bother recolouring a feature element that a lot of people already have - and it was better the first time, no offense.. I am hoping that I am just going through a bad patch of the archives, as I know when I began I didn't really know much, and PSP kits are just not for me.
I nearly get hives, I don't know why as it is very colorful and some of the PSP work is very well done, but most of it, especially 3D stuff, makes my skin crawl.
I think it is because I love minimalistic as a core design, but then again I do like a good cluster and I go ga ga over doodling, when it is done very well.

So, I better get back to the grindstone.
I have no idea if anyone is reading these posts, so I am just journaling all my emotions here, why not! Get it all out, so I can handle the tedium of unzipping infinite files :)

Hope you all are well,
I have twitter and things, but no idea how to make a blinkie.
But I am going to have a go! EEK!