It was 12 years ago (roughly) when I was at art college and University studying for my degree in Visual Communication. I would often store any visual inspiration, like pics from magazines, photos and postcards by pasting them into a sketchbook so I could flick through them later when I was stuck for ideas for my creative projects. The problem was I ended up with lots (and I mean LOTS) of books that took up space, and were far too heavy to carry around.
And frankly I didn’t take that much notice of them after anyways, they were put on the shelf and kind of forgotten about.
Fast forward to today and I’ve just discovered a way I can store images of anything I like, without the weight of heavy sketch books, that I can access at anytime using the brilliant (in my opinion) Pinterest (kind of like twitter and Facebook squeezed together just leaving the images?!)
I like to think of Pinterest as a web based visual scrapbook that allows me to save (or the preferred term Pin) any images I like while browsing the web just by clicking a button.
This kind of saving images I like isn’t new to me, in fact I’ve been doing this for a while now using Evernote. But the big difference, and why I think Pinterest is so cool, is that you can share your Pins with the people who are following you, which means you can also follow other peoples Pins too.
Here’s a screen shot of part of my Pinterest home screen -
When I log in to my account I get a visual feast of all the latest pins in my feed, both my own Pins and those of the people I’m following. If there is an image I particularly like I can Repin images, add a comment or Like them. I can also organise my Pins into “Boards” which is a simple way of categorizing my Pins into themes.
And here’s a screen shot of my Pins -
Seeing other peoples Pins and Boards gives you a great opportunity for inspiration for your own scrapbook page ideas, but don’t forget you can get great ideas from a vast, diverse subject matter further afield than scrapbooking. For instance I have graffiti and photography Pins which have great elements I like that I can use as a basis for a kit or new scrapbook layout.
How to get started
At the moment Pinterest is still in its infancy, so you can’t just go and get started you have to be invited first. You can do this by requesting an invite yourself – just log in with your twitter or Facebook account and you’ll be added to the waiting list. This is a bit frustrating as you may have to wait a looong time. Or if you know someone already with a Pinterest account they can invite you.
The good news is if you leave a comment below I will hook you up with a Pinterest invite so you can get started Pinning right away. I really think Pinterest is going to be a great asset to anyone who is creative and wants to gather all their inspiration in one place and be able to see other peoples inspiration at the same time!
So if you want to join me leave a comment below.
P.S. If you use an iPad come back soon for a tutorial on how to add the Pin it bookmarklet without syncing your bookmarks in iTunes. Subscribe to my RSS feed so you don’t miss it.
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