This and That: Where Memories Are Made
       By Elizabeth B. Wright  July 2006

The summer seems to have sent my brain on vacation. Most of my computer efforts have been in the nature of trying to edit old digital photographs and seeing if any new ones are worth editing. Recently though we made a trip to WaltDisneyWorld with our son and his children, so naturally there were opportunities for really good pictures. Unfortunately, not many of mine were very good at all. I guess part of the reason was getting caught in tropical storm Alberto. Lots and lots of rain, so getting the camera out of its protective pouch was often not an option. However, I am looking forward to receiving a CD with pictures that my son took, many of which I already know are quite good. So all was not in vain.

One recent software purchase was a Digital Scrapbooking program. I chose Leeza Gibbons Scrapbooking Software from Mountain Cow for one main reason. On the box, it indicated that the software is capable of fitting text to curves. I did not see another program which indicated that feature on the box. The program was somewhat more expensive than others, but the uniqueness of the text option was enough to potentially justify the cost.

However, expectation and reality soon conflicted. One thing that bothered me in particular in the real world was the requirement to install Microsoft network files from the CD before the program would finish the installation process. Possibly this was to make sure the product would be registered since the CD disk only installs a trial version initially. In order to activate the software with all of its features, the installation routine apparently uses the aforementioned network files to access the “activation number” online. This seems to be a new trend in software. I guess the new programs aren't Microsoft compatible for no eason. I now hope the installed files have not corrupted something else on my computer.

And after installing the program, I'm not sure it lives up to the blurbs on the box. Specifically, it is not particularly user friendly. Without some knowledge of how such programs work, it might take a really long time to figure out how to use this one since the help files are tedious, not well written and slow down anything you are trying to achieve. Certainly browsing for images to use is a cumbersome process, although with a lot of trial and error I was finally able to bring my own pictures into a page layout. The single biggest drawback to the software is its inability to handle multiple image manipulation except in one final step for inserting images into a page. Otherwise, each image you want to use must be individually imported which can require up to six steps. There doesn't even seem to be a utility that allows you to copy and paste images from other programs.

As for the touted “curved text” routine, it turns out to be nothing more than predefined shapes for text, a tool available in many other programs which make greeting cards, etc. I mistakenly thought (since the blurb did not spell out the process) that I could create my own shapes and fit text to them, but I guess that is only in high end drawing programs. It was my mistake, so I have no one to blame but myself. If there is more to the utility for curved text than that, I have yet to figure out how to do it. However, this does seem to be the only scrapbooking program which offers shaped text of any variety, at least from what is on the boxes for other software. It is an advantage if you want to add some special touches to your scrapbook pages.

Bottom line: I'm not sure any scrapbooking software is worth the money and trouble. However, if you want to share images with other people, this might be another way to do it in an attractive way. Without actually trying any other program of this type, I just don't know whether any of them are necessarily a good buy. Use your own judgment on this one.

I will keep trying to use the program, if for no other reason than one of these days I would like to print out some scrapbook pages and actually put them in a real book, one with hard covers and everything !!!

Elizabeth Wright is a member of the CCOKC and secretary to the Board. She is a regular writer for the eMonitor