KC8AON's QRP PROJECTS

HOMEBREW QSL CARDS WITH YOUR PC

A COMPUTER GRAPHICS PROGRAM AND PRINTER IS ALL YOU NEED

PERSONALIZE YOUR QSL TO SUITE YOU

YOU CAN MAKE THEM WITH TEXT ONLY, OR WITH PICTURES

YOU CAN MAKE THEM COLOR OR BLACK AND WHITE

WITH A PC, GRAPHICS PROGRAM, AND A LITTLE PRACTICE, YOU CAN MAKE YOUR OWN UNIQUE QSL'S

NO NEED TO PAY HIGH PRINTING COSTS, AND MAKE THEM UP AS YOU NEED THEM

Here are a couple of QSL cards that I designed using nothing more than my PC and a graphics program. The program that I use came with my digital camera, so there is nothing really special about the program. I have even used the Windows Paintbrush program to create QSL cards in the past, but basically all programs are going to be a little different. So, you will need to experiment with whatever programs you may have, and there are probably some that you can download for free. The card above is a fairly plain card with no pictures included. The one below is an example of one with a photo inserted just to show how well the cards can look. You could even include a picture of yourself sitting at your operating position. Your imagination is your only limit ! What I did first, was to play around with the program to see what size the blank file would have to be to equal 3.5" x 5" when printed. With my PC, program, printer combo, this turned out to be a 480 x 292 size .jpg file. Once I had the proper size blank file, I started building the info box for the QSO information to fit the blank. All that's required after that is typing up your address, callsign and other info with the font style and size you want, and the placing it on the blank where you want it. After you have it all laid out, do a "save as" comand and give it a name and place to save it to. Once you have it saved to your hard drive, it's a simple matter to print them out as needed. If you don't want to use your own printer, you can even save it to a floppy disk and then take it to a print shop and have them print up any quanity you want. If you do decide to print them yourself, you can get either colored or white cardstock at Walmart fairly cheap, and if you can lay it out to fit 4 cards on a page, you can print them that way by setting your printer settings to print in landscape mode. A 5 dollar pack of white cardstock contains 100 sheets and will yield 400 cards - a lot better price than most print shops !

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