Makeover Monday: Candy Cane Kisses

Today's volunteer for Makeover Monday is Elle Rush. Not Elle herself, of course, who is beautiful already, but her teasers. In fact, she enthusiastically offered me several teasers to fix up, but I chose her Christmas book. I know it's too early for Christmas. I'm not one to plan ahead, in fact I don't think about the holidays until December. Bah humbug.

This is a nice image which communicates the tone of the book, a sweet Christmas romance. However, the fonts! I know Elle won't be offended because she freely admits that graphics are not her strength, so this font is too neon and reminds me of an engineering prof writing on a whiteboard.

Okay, into Canva with you, little X-mas teaser. As usual, I cut down the quote. Either sentence would do, because the visual (a kiss) shows what is happening in the scene. I added a filter to the photo called, appropriately enough, Festive, which brightened up the photo. Although I usually don't like fancy fonts, this one communicated both sweet and holiday to me, so I used it. When the photo is busy like this, you can either blur the photo or add a text background.

To add a text background, just go to Elements in your left-hand sidebar. Choose Shapes. You can type in what you want, I tried a heart (for romance) and a Christmas tree (for Easter naturally.) You can change the colour of the shape and most importantly, if you go to the checkered square on the top toolbar, you can increase the transparency. What you want is a nice balance between seeing the text and seeing the photo below. I also wanted to emphasize the kiss, which the heart did nicely.

While I was in Shapes, I found candy canes! So I added them as well, just to echo the title. I fooled around with colour, trying green as well as red, but settled on keeping the colour palette a simple red, white, and black. Also, I make each line of text separate so that that I can move them around exactly where I want them.

And there you have it. Simple tweaks for a new look. Merry Christmas! #tooearly

Any other thoughts, comment away! This marks the last of my completed Makeover Mondays, so if you have a teaser you hate, please submit it.
Next week: Mel gets a new job. Payment is involved. Woot. We're eating food tonight!