Nevermore
01-06-2007, 04:29 PM
The printing template and rolodex template can be downloaded from here http://www.4shared.com/dir/1693144/1155649f/Dexxies.html
Until last weekend, my Dexxie collection was in its original, digital form. I had a deep hankering to print them out and put them on display. It actually took me three days (!) although I wasn’t doing it full time. I thought others might benefit from my experience and might want to share theirs, too. I love tips.
1. You can buy a punch for 4 x 2.4 rolodex cards. The punch is very cheap. If you are Canadian, the only place I have found it is at Office Depot. And I have looked! The rolodex holders for cards this size are also inexpensive compared to the larger sized ones, especially if you buy them without a cover. I didn't want the cover. I added elements to the thick blue index cards to separate my series of Dexxies and since I don't have a cover, I don't have to worry about squishing any elements I have adhered to the index cards.
2. The high res Dexxie cards swapped as 5 x 3 cards resize perfectly to 4 x 2.4 cards.
3. Cards that are not official size, even by a few pixels, do not make for straightforward printing.
4. Cards that are created with a white border all around them as a frame are very difficult to cut out. It would be easier if these cards had a coloured outer border of a few pixels so that that coloured border could be used as a cutting guide.
5. The bottom ½ inch of the card is is the “slot” zone with the vertical midzone of the slots at 1 ½ inches and 2 ½ inches. This is rough indeed but if you keep important stuff out of here, the card should punch up nicely. I will provide a rough template. We no longer swap the cards with premade slots and this is a good thing; however, it has meant that some of my cards and some of the ones others have created have important bits in the slot zone. With me, it was “out of sight, out of mind” and I just ignored the slot zone. Hardly a tragedy but it does mess up the “integrity” of the card.
The way around this is not to use a 5 x 3 template to create and ship as the slots do not resize correctly. Many of the cards in the first two series were pre-slotted. When resized to 4 x 2.4, the slots do not line up with the Dexxie punch slots. What is a scrapper to do? I suggest working backwards which is to say open my 4 x 2.4 template to begin, upsize this template to 5 x 3 to create your card. This will give you proper slot placement in the event people want to downsize for printing. Do not actually put place markers for the slots in the card! The template is just a visual of what will be punched away if your card is printed and and punched at 4 x 2.4. It is insurance that nothing vital is put in the slot zone.
6. You can print eight 4 x 2.4 cards to a letter page. I have included a printing template with each guide on a separate layer. I did that so I could clip some of the cards to the printing guides—necessary for the cards that are not regulation size. Some may want to print the over/under sized Dexxies at their shipped size and will not care if their Dexxie cards are not perfectly aligned in the Rolodex holder but I have gone to EXTREME measures to make mine align and it was worth it as far as I am concerned because my holder rocks!!!
7. In order to punch in the middle of the Dexxie, I taped a blank Rolodex card onto a cutting mat and taped my Dexxie punch on top of that. That let me align the Dexxie I was punching on either side of the punch. Worked very well. The way the punch is constructed, the card you are punching is hovering in mid air so it is nice to have guides.
1
8. I did round all four corners of my Dexxies and it gives the cards a very neat finish and does help them slide back and forth in the Rolodex holder. The tip of the year for corner punching is to hold your corner punch upside down, fit the tip of your card precisely in the “v” slot of the punch and ignore all other guides. You may have to remove the bottom of your punch to see the “v” slot. I have not had a mis-punch since MizAmigo pointed me in this direction.
Until last weekend, my Dexxie collection was in its original, digital form. I had a deep hankering to print them out and put them on display. It actually took me three days (!) although I wasn’t doing it full time. I thought others might benefit from my experience and might want to share theirs, too. I love tips.
1. You can buy a punch for 4 x 2.4 rolodex cards. The punch is very cheap. If you are Canadian, the only place I have found it is at Office Depot. And I have looked! The rolodex holders for cards this size are also inexpensive compared to the larger sized ones, especially if you buy them without a cover. I didn't want the cover. I added elements to the thick blue index cards to separate my series of Dexxies and since I don't have a cover, I don't have to worry about squishing any elements I have adhered to the index cards.
2. The high res Dexxie cards swapped as 5 x 3 cards resize perfectly to 4 x 2.4 cards.
3. Cards that are not official size, even by a few pixels, do not make for straightforward printing.
4. Cards that are created with a white border all around them as a frame are very difficult to cut out. It would be easier if these cards had a coloured outer border of a few pixels so that that coloured border could be used as a cutting guide.
5. The bottom ½ inch of the card is is the “slot” zone with the vertical midzone of the slots at 1 ½ inches and 2 ½ inches. This is rough indeed but if you keep important stuff out of here, the card should punch up nicely. I will provide a rough template. We no longer swap the cards with premade slots and this is a good thing; however, it has meant that some of my cards and some of the ones others have created have important bits in the slot zone. With me, it was “out of sight, out of mind” and I just ignored the slot zone. Hardly a tragedy but it does mess up the “integrity” of the card.
The way around this is not to use a 5 x 3 template to create and ship as the slots do not resize correctly. Many of the cards in the first two series were pre-slotted. When resized to 4 x 2.4, the slots do not line up with the Dexxie punch slots. What is a scrapper to do? I suggest working backwards which is to say open my 4 x 2.4 template to begin, upsize this template to 5 x 3 to create your card. This will give you proper slot placement in the event people want to downsize for printing. Do not actually put place markers for the slots in the card! The template is just a visual of what will be punched away if your card is printed and and punched at 4 x 2.4. It is insurance that nothing vital is put in the slot zone.
6. You can print eight 4 x 2.4 cards to a letter page. I have included a printing template with each guide on a separate layer. I did that so I could clip some of the cards to the printing guides—necessary for the cards that are not regulation size. Some may want to print the over/under sized Dexxies at their shipped size and will not care if their Dexxie cards are not perfectly aligned in the Rolodex holder but I have gone to EXTREME measures to make mine align and it was worth it as far as I am concerned because my holder rocks!!!
7. In order to punch in the middle of the Dexxie, I taped a blank Rolodex card onto a cutting mat and taped my Dexxie punch on top of that. That let me align the Dexxie I was punching on either side of the punch. Worked very well. The way the punch is constructed, the card you are punching is hovering in mid air so it is nice to have guides.
1
8. I did round all four corners of my Dexxies and it gives the cards a very neat finish and does help them slide back and forth in the Rolodex holder. The tip of the year for corner punching is to hold your corner punch upside down, fit the tip of your card precisely in the “v” slot of the punch and ignore all other guides. You may have to remove the bottom of your punch to see the “v” slot. I have not had a mis-punch since MizAmigo pointed me in this direction.