Wedding Review: Making Your Own Wedding Printables

Friday, December 2, 2016

A quick search of the blog for 'wedding printables' will show you that we've assembled our own fair share of paper and graphic design elements for this ginormous event. This is just some tips and tricks for creating and designing your own printables for any event. 'Doesn't have to be a wedding.

Or you can just ignore all these tips and do whatever. Fonts aren't going to make or break a party!

1. Start with a 'font story': Pick a FANCY-ish header typeface and a legible, plainer DETAILS typeface. Maybe one more ACCENT typeface.
   We didn't do this super consistently, but we generally used 'Century Schoolbook' for our details, Empire BT font for formal headers, Jenna Sue font for more informal headers and signatures, and MF Queen Leela for the occasional extra fancy thing. Our Save the Dates, invitations, advice cards, table tents, and escort cards all generally followed this. The exception to all this is the cookie bags in which we just did whatever the heck we wanted.
   
   APW has a really good collection of freely available handwriting fonts and script fonts, which are a really great start for figuring out what typefaces get you going!
   
   
2. Etsy and Google are your inspiration friends: Rely on other people with legit graphic design skills to be your muse.
   
   
3. Live Trace artwork you like in Adobe Illustrator: I don't use 'Live Trace' much, and prefer to hand-trace since I get cleaner results. But there's a pretty steep learning curve to hand-tracing, so live tracing might be a better option. Select object to trace > 'Live Trace / Tracing Options' > Make sure 'Preview' is checked > Play with 'Threshhold' slider until you get something that resembles what you want.
   
   
4. If Live Trace in Adobe Illustrator isn't possible, hand-trace or use The GIMP (free): I've got a somewhat-outdated tutorial on the blog, here but you can find a slightly more coherent tutorial up on my personal website. Adobe Illustrator can be a bit pricey, so if a trial or one-month subscription isn't an option you can always try your hand at The GIMP. It's free and has a lot of the same functionality as Illustrator.
   
   
5. Use free printables or templates: I've included a bunch of templates and completed printables throughout the blog, which means lots of people on the Internet likely have other designs to share.
   
   
6. If all else fails, buy on Etsy or elsewhere: Graphic design 'n stuff is a hobby around these parts. If it isn't one of yours, screw it, it's not worth it. I really like the work of etsy/ Larissa Kay Designs and the more affordable printables of etsy/WellingtonCoveDesign. But Printable Press also has tons of lovely stationary suites. Zazzle sells lots of matching template suites & prints it for you, at more affordable rates.