A Brag Book in terms of graphics is usually held to mean the same thing but more ornate. Brag Book pages are prominent in the Digital Scrapbooking arena and are often given away as incentives to participate in Challenges or Contests. They are often offered as a marketing strategy for Scrapbook Graphic Designers so you can see how their kit content looks all arranged into a cohesive layout.
To be able to easily work with them you need a graphics program that will handle layers. One that I use and that is free is Paint.Net.
Many designers offer scrapkits and/or Brag Book pages for free. Some offer complete Brag Book albums. You are allowed to use them for Personal Use. It is important to credit the designer when putting your creations online or in publications.
In the kit you get background papers and elements to make your pages up with. Elements are all the decorative pieces you would put on your page like frames, flowers, brads, ribbons and stickers to name a few. Each is an image.
A Brag Book page is a flattened image, usually in PNG format, with a blank space where you can add your photo. This is why you need layers. You put your photo underneath the page so you can see it through the “hole”. The image is then flattened, this is when the layers are merged. It is saved, usually as a Jpg file then it is ready to print.
The page is made at a standard size, 6 inches by 4 inches, a normal photo size – so will print easily, quickly and very cheaply at places like printing kiosks.
To print a small album or book of 10 pages (or photos) plus a cover currently costs less than $2 here in New Zealand.
Here are some Brag Book pages I made with a kit called “Miss Tomboy” by LilySky Designs – Marie Hallis.
Here are a couple of complete examples with photos added.
Article and images Copyright Mina Keenan
