Bigz Pop Up die in action

Here are the details from when I used the Sizzix Bigz Pop Up die to make the card that I posted yesterday.


This is one of the XL dies and it requires the longer XL cutting plates--unless you've altered some, they're too wide to fit through the Cuttlebug. You can use a couple of the long decorative strip cutting plates with these dies instead, a work-around that I've described before. With this particular die you might be able to use the regular C'bug cutting plates since the cutting area is actually fairly small. I'll double check that. I use these XL Bigz dies with my Big Shot. I sandwich it between the two cutting plates with the cutting side up and the card stock on top of the cutting surface of the die.


This is how it looked after it was run through. It's not nearly as big as the die itself. I hope you can also make out the fold lines. I didn't use a crease pad. Turns out I didn't need one anyway.


The enclosed instructions said to fold along all of the creases, not worrying about which way to fold for now. Okay. I just folded any which way. Now it looks like it's writhing there.


The dot that you see on the inside of my card is a centering mark that I made. I also highlighted some of the folds with dotted lines so that you can see where the glue or tape needs to be placed. The two trangular areas with the check marks are where you place your glue. Also, take note of that cut out notch that's on the left hand side of the die cut. That's a good way to make sure that you have the die cut oriented properly.


Once the glue is in place, fold the die cut so that the glued areas are on the outside of the fold, as I did above.


In the above photo, I'm getting ready to line up the fold of the die cut with the fold of the card. I'll also line up the point of that triangle with the centering mark that I'd made earlier.


Place the die cut down and then burnish to affix the glue on one side. The arrows are indicating where the two folds are now overlapping.


Open it up and burnish the other side so that the glue will adhere nicely there as well.


Now it's time to make that pop up. Reaching underneath the die cut, press on the folds from the under side to make them into the mountain folds that I illustrated above. It helps to close the card a bit, too.


Here I've labeled the tab and the slot into which the tab will slide. There really is a slot there.


After folding the locking tabs back out of the way, pull those free ends toward each other.


Now slip the tab into the slot as I've indicated using the arrow.


This is the view from the other side. I'd unfolded the side tabs to lock the main tab in place. You can also reinforce this area with some tape so that nothing will come loose.


You now have a platform for whatever you'd like to have pop out of the inside of the card.


Place some glue on the platform, then place your object face down on the left hand side of your open card. My object was white, so I put some scrap card stock behind it to make it easier to see.


Close the card so that the object will be stuck to the platform.


And voila! There's a pop up flower when the card is opened.

The instructions for using this die and the die cut were included with the Sizzix die packaging. It takes much longer to describe and illustrate the steps than to actually do them, but I think you can see that it's not all that complicated. I think this die cut makes it very easy to make fun pop up cards. There are a number of steps involved, but overall it's a very straightforward and handy way of making a card with a little extra surprise inside it for the recipient.