Friday, December 29, 2006

Wonderful Christmas Presents & more atc's





I was lucky enough to receive one of the absolutely wonderful Artgirl pendants from the "uber-talented" Jenny Crossley (hey Crozza!!!).....isn't it just fantastic!









I also received through the post another of Sulea's creations.....thankyou Sulea.....true to form - another masterpiece! Here it is....





Lucky me.....I got stamps for Christmas!!!!! Two of the beautiful clear plates from Michelle Ward (greenpepperpress). I've mentioned her stamps before, just love 'em. Just so I wouldn't get too comfortable thinking about doing canvases only for the time being, I thought I'd better do some atc's. So I used some of the background paper that I made at my last atc class (Tim's very technical "smoosh" technique) using two of my favourite colours in the distress range - peeled paint and weathered wood - I created these ones with my new stamps.


Here are another couple of atc's that I made after reading a very inspirational new book by Bernie Berlin called Artist Trading Card Workshop (I bought mine through Amazon.com).


The one with the spooky eyes & great red Artchix wing is insulation tape background, stamped with a gate image, then embossed with a stylus to define the image....rubbed over the whole thing with black paint then wiped off straight away leaving the paint residue in the depressions. Looks really good in real life...much shinier than you see here.

The second one is a magazine image, dry-brushed with gesso, out-lined with fine point sharpie pen, coloured with Twinkling H2O's. Took a bit of time this one...probably not something I'd do often but I like to try things at least once....well, most things anyway! lol

Both these techniques are in Bernie's book along with about a million others (so I'm prone to exaggerating!), absolutely love this book - buy it - save the animals! To understand this statement, here's Bernie's blog link, http://aplacetobark.blogspot.com/ - it'll explain all. Here's the link to the book on Amazon - http://tinyurl.com/yj7mmt).



Okay, an update on my next class at Scraptivate on the 6th of January '07. We're doing watercolour crayon & watercolour tube paint techniques. I've had a play with a new Mona stamp using one of these techniques...kinda wanted to see how it'd look in different colour combinations...what do you think? My favourite is #2 - the red and blue one with the wire across her face.



Had enough sitting at the computer.....books to read.....tea to cook......it's "wine-time"!!!

4 comments:

kelsey said...

I'll bring the book for you to have a look at Natalie, the styles in it are right up my alley - nice & distressed & grungey!

The Mona atc's were really quick and easy, this is the easier of the two techniques I'll be teaching. Not everyone will get the hang of the other technique first off - takes a bit of practice but this one is quite simple!

Natalie B said...

Kelsey, I'm jealous!! No time for me to play at the moment. Going through my craft room now and sorting/organizing, getting rid of stuff. Can I ask did you get the clearly impressed range of the GPP stamps?? are they better than the rubber? if so where did you get them from? Stampington direct?? So many questions. I love all your ATC's. If Natalie get's the book in, can you put me down for a copy?? Pretty please. Or if you get a bulk order going, can you put my name down??

I love the red Mona. Groovy stamp

Cheers
Nat

kelsey said...

If I place another order for the books I'll keep a copy for you Nat. I've found the clear stamps to be fine though am reluctant to use my Stazon on them as you're not supposed to use solvent cleaners on them - baby wipes only and I don't want to stain them yet....we'll see how long that lasts! Mona's a great stamp!

Julie van Oosten said...

Hi Kelsey, Jen Jones is here at my place and we are admiring your Green Pepper Press ATC, um can we put in an oder for 2 sets please?

Love ya work girlie, see you at club next week SAJ's