Greeting Card Designer: Art Licensing Tip: Create a greeting card from a square pattern.

(Article is an excerpt from 20 Steps to Art Licensing on how to license art for greeting cards and gifts.)

Here is an example of how I converted a 7 x 7 inch piece of art into a 5 x 7 card, which was eventually licensed and published. If your art is a square pattern, select an element to be the central focus, and remove remaining details. Here is the art I started with. It is a textured background with poppy style flowers.

Then I cropped it to 5x7 and removed many of the flowers, and added a large open space for text.

I thought the white space needed to be framed, so I added a border.

I stepped back and evaluated the mood of the card. I thought it might be appropriate for a sympathy card, so I added text to express that sentiment.

Some companies don't request text because they want to write their own. But I tend to offer text anyway to help them visualize a possible message that might go with the image. Sometimes it is good to create a version of your card that is “ready to go” just in case they don't have time to write the text but need an extra card to add to a catalog.

I also tend to include optional inside text, and perhaps additional imagery, such as the following example.

Here is what the card looked like after the company published it.

They changed my font, edited the text, and adjusted the design. I think these were all great improvements. Their font feels more comforting than my playful bubbly font. Mine font would be more appropriate for birthdays or celebratory messages. Many companies evaluate cards all day, so I trust their keen sense of skill in deciding what a card should communicate before they print it.

New Greeting Card Business Resources

20 Steps to Art Licensing
Get Royalties for Designs
2nd edition 2017, 150 pages, Paperback