The first piece that you need is the Scrapboss. Measuring 12 inches by 12 inches, it's big enough for full-size scrapbook pages. Templates are fastened to it by repositionable pegs. Underneath, there's a storage tray to store templates and paper. It comes with 2 styluses, some stencils, and a project book. The Scrapboss can use any stencils and templates that Fiskars makes.
There's a smaller cousin, the Shapeboss. It fits stencils and templates that are 9 inches by 11 inches and smaller. It comes with a stylus and some stencils. It does not have the storage tray. For the smallest sizes, try the Cardboss or Mini ShapeBoss Set The stencils listed on those pages both work on the Scrapboss and Shapeboss.
Embossing and Stenciling
Embossing and stenciling are very easy with this system. The laser-cut stencils come in two parts. First you lay the bottom piece on the Scrapboss, then the top piece. The top piece has grid lines and is marked, "top." Next I usually put a couple pegs in the corners to hold it securely in place. I position the paper, cardstock, or thin metal in between the two pieces and, start embossing. The styluses comes with different size tips. Smaller tips are better for detailed areas, while large areas can be finished quickly with the bigger tips.
The stencils come in a large variety, from abstract lines and letters, good for lots of pages, to holiday and baby themes. If you click on the small pictures on this page and this page, you can see the details of each one.
Sometimes I emboss right on a 12x12" scrapbook page and create borders and frames. I also make embellishments by embossing smaller pieces or copper pieces. I usually emboss before cutting them out. It's easier.
Another set that I use alot to make photo mats and embellishments for scrapbooking and cards are the Texture Plates. They're made of hard plastic with holes at the top for the pegs. Each is two-sided, with a different texture on each side. The assortment pack is a great value and contains 6 double sided plates (12 designs) including hearts/ stars, lines/waves, bubbles/dots, squares/fabric, stones/bricks and wood/leaves.
I use the Texture Plates with the Shape Templates that I'll talk about later to create my own textured die-cuts. For example, I put the heart shape template on the Scrapboss with a hearts texture plate beneath it. I slide my paper in-between. I emboss inside the heart shape, creating a hearts texture. Then I cut out the heart shape. It's very cute! I also like to create titles this way, using the letter and number shape templates and the other texture plates.
Cutting
The Fiskars templates for cutting are designed for the ShapeCutter. It's a very safe and accurate way to cut out clean shapes and letters. The cutting mat and shape templates fit the Scrapboss or Shapeboss and have holes to secure them with the pegs. Using the ShapeCutter is very simple. Hold the base of the ShapeCutter inside the template and follow around the edge. To cut a freehand design, I just look down at the blade and follow my traced line. The blade is adjusted by a knob on top for different paper thicknesses.
The ShapeTemplates are sturdy plastic with grid lines, and can be stored in a binder. They have several shapes on each one, and some have border designs along the sides. They come in many varieties and letters and numbers. There's also a set of Super Size ShapeTemplates. On these, you can use the inside and outside of each shape, That's great for cropping a photo and creating a matching shape mat.
Overall, I use the Scrapboss alot in my paper-crafting. It's very versatile, and I can create many different looks, cards, and layouts.
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I love making my own greeting cards!! This adds a new dimension to my creations and it's fun and easy to use. There is storage on the inside for full scrapbook sized sheets of paper as well as more stencil sets and the embossing tools and pegs. The only drawback to this, for me, is the size. It's really designed for scrap bookers so it's quite large, about 16 inches square, so I wish I had gotten a smaller version for myself. If you don't scrapbook and mainly work on smaller items then you might want to get one of Fiskars smaller versions of this. Either way, they're all pretty much the same. Easy to use, with excellent results (keep a scrap from a white candle handy and rub the tip of your embossing tool on it, it really helps the tool glide across the paper) I highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys papercrafts all all sorts.
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