Customer Reviews

Art Explosion Scrapbook Factory Deluxe

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I love to scrapbook and I wanted to try creating scrapbooks on the PC. Finding the right software was the challenge. After I installed this software, I really liked it. It has lots of great pre-made templates which can be duplicated to create more pages, great editing tools, wonderful Journal pages, quotes, clipart, option to convert to a webpage & lots more...

Note: Pictures that you insert are not compressed and take up a great deal of disk space. I suggest converting the pictures to smaller file size (640x480) prior to inserting them into scrapbook.

In summary, I found Art Explosion Scrapbook Factory Deluxe to be easy to use and lots of fun! This is a must have product!

I know some people here have had some problems, and I was nervous to open that CD and commit to it, but I'm glad I did. I did three fabulous complex pages with templates and custom text and pictures in under 15 minutes. I printed them out without a hitch and everything looked lovely with both resized pictures and fonts I had before the program and special fonts that came with it. (You can, however, expect some font problems if you try to print it from a machine other than the one where the software is installed. This is true with any software.)

I will say it was a bit slow, but overall I was able to create a beautiful page with cutout pictures (no problems making complicated crops like the Hallmark sofware) and print them myself for about $1 a page, when traditional scrapbooked pages would have cost several dollars for the photographs, special paper, die cuts, stickers, and printing text. There are about 200 preset scrapbook templates (the 2000 advertised includes cards, web pages, etc.) and hundreds and hundreds of backgrounds, graphics, and borders to create your own. I managed to create jpgs with a workaround by exporting as HTML then saving the picture it created on the web page. I'll stick a page with samples on here although ...

If you take digital pictures and also scrapbook, this really is perfect perfect perfect for you!

I bought this program on a whim from CompUSA without first checking out reviews. I really regret that I can't return it. The pre-made templates are awful looking. They are very computer generated looking unlike Hallmark's scrapbook studio.

I can't comment on the user interface because I haven't bothered using the program much after discovering that:

- You can only print out your projects. You cannot save them as a jpeg or another other standard file format. I use my printer for some of my scrapbook pages but others I want to have printed professionally on photographic paper (like from Shutterfly.com). Can't do that from this program!

- You cannot export any of the graphics that came with the program to use in another program (for instance Photoshop). Sometimes you just need to tweak a graphic. Hallmark Scrapbook Studio allows you to export graphics as JPEGs.

- If you read the licensing agreement carefully, you find that you are not allowed to use any of the graphics for commercial use. This means that if you create something with this program you cannot sell it. Again, Hallmark Scrapbook Studio does not have this limitation.

Mind you, Hallmark Scrapbook Studio has some shortcomings too. But that's another review.

I almost didn't buy this program because of the negative reviews. But having worked in retail before I realized that people are more likely to complain than say anything posative.

I love this program. I could go on all day about it. I have so many ideas for projects, and thats great because there are endless possabilities with this program! You can make your project as personal as you want it to be. Add graphics of your own, or alter their graphics to suit your mood. You can add pictures, and make them look antique, as well as shape them into various shapes and styles. Add text here, lighten here, change colors... it's fabulous!! As far as the pictures printing out clearly, I've had no problem. Of course when altering your pictures if you force it into a shape that the pixels can't accomadate, certainly there would be some problems. Digital pictures work best, but my scanned ones have done well too. Just have fun, and play with it.

I would reccomend this program to anyone interested in a unique and fun way to save their memories.

I was disappointed when I tried to play around with this product. It is going back to the store today. You cannot print out just an element of the scrapbook, other than "stickers" without printing out an entire layout. So, if for example you want to use one of the few borders that comes with the program, or have the time to tweak shapes into borders or mats or whatever... beware. You must print the whole page. And you can't export images either. This is basically a limited, unflexible clipart program that might be good if all you want is to design for the web using the few choices of graphics they have. Otherwise... stay away and save for a ... "real" scrapbook program. (I haven't tried Hallmark) Keep scrappin. With scissors and paper if this is the best there is out there.

Even though I am an experienced user of Photoshop, Corel Draw, and Pagemaker, I still found this software useful. It is like having the basic tools from those programs all in one application. It is especially good if you can't invest in those expensive applications. Even though the premade templates are somewhat limited in themes, I found it very easy to modify them, and create new ones very quickly from scratch. My major complaint is that the program is really slow when importing high res photos. It's also a bummer that you can't export the finished layouts. But I have found it very useful and fun for super quick layouts.

My husband picked up a copy of Scrapbook Factory Deluxe for me on Amazon, and I just LOVE it. First of all, can I say how great it is to be doing scrapbooking on my computer. As someone who has spent years doing it the old-fashioned way, I can tell you that Scrapbook Factory is a breeze. There are all the familiar traditional scrapbooking tools I'm used to using, plus a whole lot more - like a cool photo editor, a neat cropping tool, and loads of other features. Plus, I've now figured out that when I make a scrapbook on my computer, I can actually make multiple copies for family members - which I was never able to do before. That's a nice bonus!

But the neatest thing about Scrapbook Factory may well be the templates. There are tons of them - not even sure how many. And they're really nice designs. They're in pretty much every category you can think of. We took a trip to Florida this summer, and I was able to find a few really nice beach vacation templates. I just hooked up my digital camera, brought the pictures over, dropped them into my template, and voila, I have my kids on the beach inside a "beach vacation template." It doesn't get any easier than that, I tell you.

I tried the Hallmark scrapbook product a couple years back, though I haven't seen it in stores in some time. I wasn't impressed. Pretty kiddish really. But Scrapbook Factory is really neat!

I ordered this product to do a family scrapbook in a hurry. I'm a database coordinator for a large healthcare company and am thoroughly familiar with computers. After I became familiar with this program a little, I loved it. But as my files became larger, and I moved quicker, the program would lock up and then corrupt the files, causing me to start over. It isn't my computer because the PC is brand new and has plenty of memory. I did finish the book - 101 pages - but it was frustrating. When I took it to a professional printer to have it printed, the files wouldn't print right and several of the fonts were lost, so it didn't turn out like I'd hoped. Even now, when I go to print from my printer...it loses fonts and takes FOREVER. There weren't enough graphics either, and you can forget about importing graphics from other programs. You need a lot of patience - and time. It's still quicker than the old-fashioned way, but I expect better performance. Make sure and do the research - I'm hoping I'll find something better before I get started on the next book.

Program is easy enough to use, but I am very disappointed with the graphics & clipart. Since it advertizes over 10,000 graphics I figured there would be something I liked - but it is all cheap cartoonish graphics. Nothing for the sophisticated look I was hoping for. It will not let me import graphics from other programs- so I am stuck with these cheap cartoon things.

I found this program to be very fun. Some have commented on poor templates and not looking further--look further. It is what you make of it. I have created many pages from scratch, using their backgrounds or creating new ones. They have enough clip art/fonts/borders for most tastes. I like the fact that I can fade objects, etc... Doing all this on the computer and being able to change something with just a click is a plus for me.

I would buy this again