Some of our customers have written in to ask about envelopes for use with 4"x6" photos.  Although standard #10 business size envelopes will work (9.5" x 4.125"), we prefer smaller A6 envelopes (also called #6 invitation envelopes) which are 4.75" x 6.5". There are also some envelopes specifically designed for 4"x6" photos. The mailable photo frame from photojojo.com is also a fun alternative. Below are links to some envelopes. If you find other types of envelopes, feel free to email a link to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it  

HappyHolidays! photo cards can utilize Background Images and Tiled Textures, as well as a Background Color.  These adjustments can be made in the Card Layout settings:

Changing the Background Color is simple.  Just click on the color well to bring up the Color Picker.  Selecting a color will immediately change the background of your photo card.

To use a Background Image or to tile a Texture Image, click on the "More" button next to the color well.  Drag any image into the image well and select a background image option.  "Fill card" will take your image and fill the background while maintaining the background image's aspect ratio by clipping either the sides or top/bottom of your background image. "Stretch to fill card" will resize the background image to fill your card without regard to maintaining the aspect ratio.  "Tile" will repeat your image across and down the entire card creating a tiled effect.  "Center" will center the card over the background image without resizing the background image.  Background Images are drawn over the Background Color so in most cases, the background color will be obscured unless you use a background image which has transparency.

The "Fill", "Stretch", and "Center" options tend to work better with larger background images.  The "Tile" option works better with small images.

There are many sources for great FREE background images and texture tiles.  Simply search the Internet with keywords like "Background Images" or "Texture Images" or "Wallpaper Images".  Many of the larger high-resolution images can also be used for the photo portion of your card.  You can also find fee-based royalty-free artwork at sites like istockphoto.com.

Some websites we used for our included Templates and sample files:

http://www.allfreebackgrounds.com
http://www.fg-a.com
http://www.hubblesite.org/gallery/wallpaper/
http://www.imageafter.com
http://www.mayang.com/textures
http://www.snap-shot.com
http://www.texturewarehouse.com
http://www.wallpapervault.com

Another place to get background images is already on your Mac!  Open your hard disk in the Finder and navigate to the Library folder and then open the Desktop Pictures folder.

Here are some samples using Background Colors and Background Images:

Here's a tutorial on using HappyHolidays! to create a new photo card from a template, and then how to customize it. Templates determine the basic structure of a photo card. They also contain sample photos, text, fonts, and colors to give you a quick starting point for your new photo card. Choosing a template that you like will minimize the amount of work you have to do to create your own unique photo card. In our tutorial we change almost every aspect of the template we chose to illustrate many of the features of HappyHolidays! When you create your own photo card, choose a template to minimize the number of steps you have to perform.

1. Launch HappyHolidays! and the Template Picker will appear. Click on a category in the category list to narrow down the number of templates that are viewed in a specific category

2. Choose a template with the layout and style that you want your photo card to have. You will easily be able to change the image and the text of your new photo card once you create it. Click once on the template you want to start with to select it, then hit the Choose button.

3. A new copy of the template you chose will be displayed in a document window. Controls to change the appearance of the card are on the left side of the window. A preview of the card is shown on the right side of the window. You can expose more controls on the left by clicking on different areas of the Card Preview. Click on the Text Area to view text editing controls. Click on the Image Area to view image editing controls. You can also zoom the Card Preview in and out by clicking on the appropriate buttons in the toolbar or using the View menu.

4. Drag and drop your own photo from the Finder or from iPhoto into the Image Area in the Card Preview portion of the document window.

5. After dropping your new photo into the Image Area, the photo will be centered and auto sized to fill the Image Area. In this case there is clipping of the photo on the right and left sides.

6. Click on the Image Area to select it. The Image Properties controls will become visible to the left of the Card Preview Area. Use the Image Properties controls to rotate and scale the photo. It's easy to flip images 90-degrees, or use the rotation knob for free-form rotation. You can also type in your desired rotation and scaling factors. In this case we zoomed the image in, and rotated it slightly counter clockwise.

7. To move your photo around within the Image Area, first click on the Image Area to select it. Then move the mouse over the Image Area photo to enable the hand-grabber. Use the hand-grabber to move the photo around inside of the Image Area of the Card Preview. Here we moved the image slightly to the left.

8. Use the Images popup menu to choose how many images you want in the Image Area. We left this setting alone because we want this card to only have 1 photo in the Image Area.

9. To alter the border style around the Image Area, use the controls in the Image Area box on the left side of the window to change the border style around the Image Area. There are currently only two choices for border style, None and Single. Single will draw a single line around the Image Area. You can change the width of the line by using the popup below the border style. You can change the color of the border by clicking on the color well. This will bring up the standard Mac OS X color picker window. In this case we setup a Single 4 pixel border with a purple color.

10. Use the Margin popup menu to choose your desired margin around the whole card. In this case we wanted to enlarge the margin to 3/8".

11. The background of your card can be any color you choose. In addition, your card may have a background image. For a simple background without a background image, you can adjust the background color by clicking the color-well in the Card Layout section. The standard Mac OS X color picker will appear. For our card we did not change the background color because we have a background image already in our card. If you have a background image in your card it is drawn over the background color, and it will hide the background color (unless your image has transparent areas in it).

Tip: To select any color on your Mac's screen, click on the magnifying glass on the upper left part of the color picker window and then move the magnifying glass around the screen and click over the color you wish to capture.

12. To change the background image for your card, click on the More... button next to the background color well and the card settings window will be displayed.

13. With the card settings window open, you can change both the background color and backgound image for the card. To choose a background image either use the Choose... button or drag and drop an image file right into the background image view. Our card already has an background image named 05bgc.gif which is 100 pixels wide by 100 pixels high. Use the background image mode popup to change how the background image is displayed. To remove a background image click on the clear button. In this case we did not alter the background image. Click the Done button to close the card settings window. Click here for more info on Backgrounds and Textures.

14. To change the Text Area, click on the Text Area in the Card Preview to select it. The Text Area and Text Properties controls will become visible on the left side of the window.

15. Use the Text Area controls to set a background color for just the Text Area. Here we have turned off the Fill Background text box so that the Text Area does not have a background color.

16. Edit the actual text that is displayed on your card by editing the text in the text view. Here we have selected just the name of the baby and changed it to "Baby Jane Doe". Use this text view to edit text much like you would a text editor.

17. To change the font of some of your text, select the text in the text view, then click on the Fonts button below the text area. This will bring up the standard Mac OS X Font panel where you can change the font, font size, and other font characteristics. Here you can see that selected text is displayed using the Marker Felt font with a size of 20 and a typeface of Wide. Changing the font characteristics in the Font panel will change the appearance of the selected text.

18. To change the font color of some of your text, select the text in the text view, then click on the Colors button below the text area. This will bring up the standard Mac OS X color picker panel. Changing the color in the color picker will change the color of the selected text.

19. Use the other Text Properties controls to change the text, rotate the text in 90-degree increments, choose the desired alignment, and access and special characters. The Shrink To Fit mode will take care of sizing the text to fit in the text portion of the photo card.

20. Save your photo card using the menu File -> Save. All formatting changes will be saved. Here we saved the document as "Baby Jane Doe" in our documents folder.

21. The first option for printing your photo card is to export the photo card as a 300dpi JPEG file suitable for printing at any digital photo center. The JPEG file that HappyHolidays! creates is almost identical to JPEG files which your digital camera creates when you take digital photos. Printing your photo card at a digital photo center is just as easy as printing any photo from your digital camera. Click on 'Export to JPEG' and choose the file name for the JPEG file. Then upload via your photo center's web site, or save it on a storage media that your photo center supports to carry it into the photo center (CDR, Compact Flash Card, SD Card, USB Flash drive, etc...). Here we are exporting the card to a file named "Baby Jane Doe Export" in our Pictures folder.

22. The second option for printing your photo card is by printing it yourself on your own color printer by clicking on the Print button. You may select options to print a single card or multiple cards per page, and also control the printing of cutting guide lines. Choose HappyHolidays! -> Preferences... to view and change the printing options (not shown here). View a Preview before sending the page to your printer by selecting the Preview button in the Print dialog. If the Preview looks okay, then print the card. Previewing before printing can save you money by making sure the photo card looks the way you want before using up your costly photo paper and printer ink. HappyHolidays! will fit as many cards as it can on a single sheet of photo paper. Click here for more info on Envelopes for 4"x6" photos.

23. If you use Apple's Mail application to send email, you can email a copy of the photo card to friends and family. When you hit the 'Export to Mail' button, HappyHolidays! will convert your photo card into a 72dpi JPEG file and automatically add the JPEG file as an attachment to a new Mail message. Just fill in the recipients and hit Send.

We do not currently have metric unit support in our software.  Please refer to the following information for conversion to metric units.

Paper size of 4"x6" corresponds to 10.16cm x 15.24cm. 

Our margins correspond to approximately the following:

1/8" = .3175cm
1/4" = .635cm
3/8" = .9525cm

We may consider adding better metric support in a future release.

We currently do not support printing to any paper sizes other than 4"x6" or paper that is larger than the desired output size.

An interesting article about metric paper sizes can be found here:

http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/iso-paper.html

HappyHolidays! is designed to print 4"x6" format photo cards ONLY.  If you would like to print to a different size paper, you may be able to try the following work-around.   The basic principle is to export the image to JPEG format and then use Apple's Preview program to print to paper sizes of your choosing.  Apple's Preview software includes options to Center Image and Scale to Fit when printing. 

Apple's iPhoto software may also be used to print to a different paper size.

HappyHolidays! is designed to print cards onto paper which is the same size or larger than the intended card size.  To print 4"x6" cards onto 4"x6" photo paper, your printer must support full borderless printing so that the paper size reported back to the program from the print driver specifies that the size is large enough to accept a full 4"x6" image.  Be sure to use Page Setup to pick the correct 4x6 borderless page size.

When printing to paper which is the exact size as the desired output, please be sure to disable the printing of cutting guides by visiting the HappyHolidays! Preferences and turning off the "Print cutting guide lines" option.

We have had a report of a problem running HappyHolidays! on a computer which also has an old version of iPhoto Library Manager installed.  You may see warning messages such as the following in your Console output:

2006-09-25 20:16:16.173 HappyHolidays![1107] *** -[NSBundle load]: Error loading code /Users/username/Library/InputManagers/iPLM/iPLM.bundle/Contents/MacOS/iPLM for bundle /Users/username/Library/InputManagers/iPLM/iPLM.bundle, error code 2 (link edit error code 0, error number 0 ())

To correct this issue, please upgrade to the latest version of both HappyHolidays! and iPhoto Library Manager.   If a re-install does not help, try removing the Library/InpuManagers/iPLM folder in your Home Directory, and Log Out and Log In again.  We have tested HappyHolidays! here along with iPhoto Library Manager and have not had any problems.

For more information, please visit: http://www.iphotolibrarymanager.com/Documentation/iPLM/pgs/install.html

HappyHolidays! includes many templates to get you started with your photo card.  If you would like to start with a blank card, please choose the Blank Category from the Template Picker window.