Technobiography

How to make Christmas e-Cards

January 1st, 2008 | by ka edong |

I’ve made Christmas messages for many years, and the most recent ones I’ve sent via e-mail instead of print-outs.

The concern when sending Christmas e-Cards is (a.) to maintain the pretty layout with pictures and (b.) keep the file size small.

For these concerns, I use a combination of very simple tools. This is what I do:

1. I use Word or Powerpoint to layout my card. I insert photos, re-size, layout as I wish.
2. I display my card in full-screen view (or in presentation mode for Powerpoint)
3. I hit the printscreen button (”PrtSc” usually found on the upper right side of a regular keyboard).
   This captures whatever image is on-screen and places it on the clipboard.
4. I open Microsoft Paint — yes, a very arcane but utterly useful software for simple folks like me — then Edit > Paste the screen capture of my card. I crop and align the image to remove excess elements of the image (e.g. the task-bar).
5. Then I save the image as a JPEG. It’s important to save as JPEG so that the file size is reduced, usually less than 250kb.

This image file I send out to my friends via e-mail. I usually copy the text in the body of my e-mail, and usually include hyperlinks to my websites or to my online e-Card.

An alternative is to save the e-Card as a PDF file. For this, I could use PrimoPDF — a free PDF converter software.

By the way, I also make sure that e-Card e-mail recipients are either on BCC to protect their privacy. Or I send the e-Card to groups of people who know each other.

Another by the way, I also keep an online copy, so that I can just send the link (and not the file) in the future.

And that’s how I make Christmas e-Cards.

View my Christmas 2007 e-Card online…

ka edong