Working on Embellishments

I figured I share with you some embellishment making for my next mixed media canvas I'm going to be working on.

I have some laser cut wood pieces from Michael's, a chandelier and a chair.  I also have a Tattered Angels frame that I want to turn into a mirror.

I start off by gessoing everything with a white gesso.  Then I paint on some Liquitex titan white paint to brighten it up.  After that I paint on some Liquitex black acrylic paint to the chandelier where the metal look will and the piece for the mirror.  Because I want to give them an aged metal look the base needs to be dark.  I paint on a coat of Golden titan buff fluid acrylic on the chair to give it a softer look. Once the black base coat for the metal is dry I dry brush on some Blick acrylic silver and copper paints. I put those aside to dry.

While the chandelier and the mirror are drying I decide to work more on the chair. I cut out a piece of pattern paper for the cushion, making sure there are tabs so that I can make it pop out.  At Michael's I found this pink ruffle ribbon that I want to use for the ruffle on the chair.  To age the ribbon I use some Tim Holtz walnut distress stain and lots of water.  This dulls down the pink so it's not so vibrant and new looking.  I also brushed a little of the stain on the chair to give it a little bit of a worn look.

Going back to the chandelier I wanted to make it look like the strands of beads are pearls and the hanging parts are pink crystals so I grabbed my Pebeo 3D pink crystal paint and some white liquid pearls.  Carefully I apply a dot of liquid pearls to each of the round sections of the strands and the 3d paint to where the crystals would be.

Everything dried over night and I assembled the chair eventually adding some liquid pearl trim where the paper and the fabric meet to give it a more finished look.  I'm not quite sure if I'm happy with the metal chandelier or mirror frame.  We'll just have to wait and see what I decided when I put the canvas together.

Mixed Media Canvas - Inspire

It's been so long since I've posted.  It's just been crazy around here between the conventions, followed by the holidays, and then the crazy winter we've been having. The kids being home from school for what seems like forever due to snow days has not helped out the craziness.  It feels so good to be able to sit and write for few. 

My latest completed project is a mixed media canvas titled "Inspire."  I got inspired to do this piece from a sort of kit I picked up at my local scrapbook shops tag sale.  The kit contained a lot of sewing items including a smaller version of the dress from that appears on the canvas.  The dress form really got me thinking about an altered Barbie doll I had planned on making but never got very far with.  I figured I'd take what I had planned for the doll, minus the face and ear details, and put it on a canvas.

The fair wings I had made so long ago when first planning this doll. They are fabric backed, color wire formed and slightly pose-able when heated.  I add a little matching glitter to them to give them the shine I wanted. 

The dress that you see is pretty close to the dress I had planed for the doll as well.  It is made from all the fabric I had original picked up to use.  The only difference is that the black outline on the top is a 3 dimensional paint from Pebeo and not trim. 

The canvas is a brown linen canvas from Michael's that I applied clear gesso to and then layered on some Recollections Signature printed tissue paper and Prima Marketing paper Madeline Collection "Beautima" #842383.  I went ahead and grabbed my modeling paste and my Ronda Palazzari Designs "Texturized" stencil and added some texture. Once the paste dried I sprayed on some Plain Jane Baseboard "Gravel" mist and Tattered Angels Glimmer Mists in "Latte" and "Cork." 

I made the stain glass looking window from a dollie that was a kit I picked up.  I cut the center of the dollie out and sprayed it with some Heidi Swapp Color Shine Sprays in teal and chartreuse.  Then I drew on the design in the black Pebeo 3 dimensional paint. 

Finally I glued on all the embellishments which included Prima Marketing flowers and pearls, Tattered Angels chips, wood word Inspire, the dollie and the dress. Viola finished canvas.

Want to see how it was created or the list of products used, check out my YouTube video:

From Trash to Treasure

From Trash to Treasure...I found a broken journal at one of my local Michael's and couldn't resist buying it.  I had to see what I could do.  Looking at it the only thing wrong was that the elastic closure was pulled out from where it should have been tucked into the book. That's a slightly easy fix if things go the way they should. 

I brought the journal home, repaired the elastic (thankfully everything did go the way it should,) and got to work on painting. I painted and painted and painstakingly painted with the tiniest brush I had. 

All in all it took me about four to five days of painting on and off.  The intricacy and the tiny details made my eyes go buggy.  I had to do it in sections and at intervals to give my eyes a break. 
Looking at the brown and the gold I immediately thought that this book was screaming to be a steampunk book. I set off to find a digital steampunk stamp that would be a perfect fit for this book.

I came across that stamp on StitchyBearStamps by a creator known as BB Kakes.

Steampunk - 3 pc set

I purchased it, read the TOU to make sure it I was within the right to use it for this project, and printed it out a few time on some Copic marker friendly paper.

Why a few times you might, well it's so I can use one test colors and play with, one to lay out my colors, figure out shading and how I'm going to finish it, and the last one to do my final colors on.

Here's my second one with my colors listed so I know which markers to use where on the final.

And here is the final all colored and fussy cut out.

 On the final image I used Tim Holtz's Distress Stains and Paints for the gears and metal. I used some Ranger Glossy Accents on the glasses and the face of the pocket watch after shading in the gray color to give them the glass look.

Then it was off to the book....

I used some Prima Marketing Engraver Collection "Cesello" (845315) paper as the back ground.  Glued my stamp just off center.  I placed the "Jouranl" sticker from Prima's Engraver collection (563479) so that the end of the sticker lined up with the edge of her shoulder.
I used some Prima flowers for embellishment (Black rose -552619, Small maroon roses - 553302.)  On one of the small roses I pulled out the center of the rose and added a button (550776.) The key paper clip (564681) I cut the clip part off of to make it look like just a key.  I then added miscellaneous mechanicals, gears from Tim Holtz and Bead Landing along with some clock hands and key hole from Bead Landing.

Here's the journal all finished:

 


 

Recollections Washi Crafting Tape - Review

I have to say right off the bat that this is one product I am seriously disappointed in.  I found a couple of the tapes that I liked and had some wonderful ideas for them but now they just sit all sad on my craft table.

Those are the two tapes I bought.  I had some really great ideas of ways to use them.  The back of the package say that the tapes are "repositionable" and "ink-friendly."  This is unfortunately not true.  The butterfly one was going to be inked and used on the edges of a book.  However this did not go as planed.

 Below is the corner of the book that I had to scrap because as you can see the tape is not re-positionable.  It peeled away a layer of the colored cardstock when I went to go move it.

Thinking that maybe it was just the cardstock paper - mind you it was a double sided piece, so it was not a cheap piece of paper to loose out on - I decided to test a different piece of paper.  This is just a scrap piece of paper I had laying on my desk.  I laid the small piece of tape on it, gave it a gently run over with my finger and then tried to gently peal it off.   As you can see that did not succeed with out peeling off some of the paper.  So this tape is far from re-positionable.

Okay so it's not re-positionable. You say you can live with that as long as you are careful when you place it.  Inking it still gives you plenty of options.

So lets try inking this tape.  I laid down a small piece of tape on a piece of scrap paper.  Brought out my Tim Holtz Distress Stains and multiple ink pads.  The results are the same no matter what you use, the ink beads up and none to very very little color is absorbed.  "Ink-friendly" it is not.

I am very disappointed in these tapes. I really liked the designs on these tapes and had such hopes for them, but they let me down.  They advertise to be re-positionable and ink-friendly neither of which is true. I kind of feel like I wasted my money. :( Here's to hoping I'll find a use for these the way they are.