The Hughes family Pages templates

Pages users often ask where to find downloadable templates other than those included with the iWork package.

The Hughes family from Fort Langley in British Columbia, Canada, sent me this link to their free templates web-site. There are several dozen templates for all family and seasons occasions: Christmas, Valentines, family albums, yard sales etc. - all made with delightful creativity, but simple to use for your own projects or as a basis for developing other original templates. They are free to download and reuse. I recommend this web-site to all Pages users.

What is especially useful with some of the Hughes' templates is that they actually show, step by step, how graphic design works in Pages. I downloaded a three page template called Pimpda Bird.

The first is a jigsaw-type image of a parrot with nature photos filling the pieces. Each piece is a media placeholder - just drag your own photos from iPhoto or a pictures folder and drop them onto the piece when it is highlighted with a blue line. The image at the top is the same parrot filled with my pictures of apples and flipped to face inside the page.




The second page shows shapes drawn with the Pages free draw tool. Click on a shape, pause and click again - red dots will appear showing how the shape was created.
So, import an image you want to make into a graphic template. Then, choose free draw tool from the Shapes drop-down menu and create a jigsaw piece by clicking continuosly to cover a part of the image.
The same method can be used to replace a part of the photo with a different image. For instance to place someone in front of a famous landmark, or change a grey day in the photo into a sunny one - by cutting out and replacing the sky.

The third page shows the original image of a stained glass bird.



Read more on this blog:
How to change background in photo
How to separate people in the photo from background
Curving lines and shapes - make them in Pages


And if you are stuck or about to have a break down just watch the Parrot Sketch - and feel all right.

Other templates links:
iWork community - iWork users Template Exchange. Free downloads
Stocklayouts.com - professionally designed templates for businesses, a large selection of free templates to try before you buy. Read a review on this blog here.
Jumsoft.com - a small Lithuanian company produces a dazzling array of iWork templates, clipart and applications (picture: a book cover template sample). All commercially distributed.