Crackle Technique & a Canvas

Several years ago I posted about a "poppet" style canvas (a la Claudine Hellmuth style) I had made for a friend's daughter who had lost her Dad to cancer when she was only 4. Her baby sister was born only a couple of weeks after Steve died so she has no memories of her Dad. Little Ava is now 5 so it's time that she had her own canvas with her Dad and her in it. Aisha, her big sister is probably going to be more excited about this when she sees it as it's the same picture of her Dad that I used in her canvas. Here's a link to the previous one for Aisha. These are both 8" x 10" canvases. Not my usual dark & gloomy style but I'm a Gemini and I can chop and change at whim. ;-)

This fortnight's round of classes at Scraptivate is Crackle Technique. We sell several types of crackle including the brand new Rock Candy Distress Crackle. This first atc is the Helmar Crackle which is a 2 step crackle...a base coat, let dry for 20 minutes, then the top coat. As you can see it's a clear crackle so over pictures it's great as you can add some paint when it's dry and wipe it off and the paint settles in the cracks.

"Fragment"...

"Betroth"...this is also using the Helmar Crackle.

Ranger also make the Distress Crackle in 24 colours + some metallic colours.

"Rock and Roll"... (Black Soot Distress Crackle. Yep, yummy Ville Valo, lead singer for HIM....my favourite band!)

"Live it"...also using Distress Crackle in Old Paper colour.

"Angel's Art"... Milled Lavender Distress Crackle.

"Temptation"... Aged Mahogany Distress Crackle.

"Icon"...this is the new Rock Candy Crackle from Ranger. I've put some red paint over the top part of it and used Fired Brick Distress Ink rubbed onto the bottom part. You can see the difference that the paint makes...much more seeps into the cracks. Probably would've been better with a less detailed picture underneath. Live and learn.

"The first rule"... This is the Ranger Crackle Accents. It comes in a bottle like Glossy Accents or Dimensional Magic and goes on the same way... through a small tip that you just squeeze on and spread it around. Very easy!

Guess I'll have some more when I do some samples for the classes over the next week.

.....and the winner is!!!!!!......and crackle atc's

I used a random number generator to pick a winner for my free art give-away in the previous post......

#4.....Tammy

hi new to your blog-what a beautiful trip to alaska you had!!i love both your pieces of work i am just learning tips and techniques and having a great time :)and would love to have my name dropped into your hat!!enjoy your daymany thanks tammy(tabby) tjo196@aol.com www.crookedheartart.blogspot.com

Congrats Tammy! If you send me an email with your snail mail addy, I'll get your canvas posted off to you. You have to pick first which one you want, the green one or the orange/gold one.

Then, just because I can.....the following person can have the other remaining canvas, sorry if it's not your first colour choice but remember, these things always look much better in real life than on the flat computer screen and I hope you will still like it! So the 2nd person's number drawn is.........

#43.....Sandy

well here I am comment number 43 .... maybe no one will want them WHAT women your work is gorgeous ... would love to be a winner of your piece of work. Sandy dangling by a thread skmarcoux@gmail.com

I'll be in contact with both of you to get your snail mail addy's and after Tammy has chosen first, I'll send the other one over to you Sandy.

Stay tuned, in a couple of days I'll have more atc's to post from my next atc class - "Embossing Resist" as well as some other ones using different techniques that I've finished.

Okay, so here's a couple of atc's already, just doesn't seem right to just type without putting in a picture...or two...... These were all half-made in the crackle class I taught recently, then I finished them off at a "girls-night-in" recently at Scraptivate. Can't have half-finished atc's floating around, can we!!! Do you like the little play on words with the bottom one? I stumbled across the word in the dictionary and thought it was very apt! I even had some little ants to add to it.

My Technique Book #1 class went really well yesterday at Scraptivate too! This was a marathon effort of teaching five different techniques in 4 hours and binding them into a book as well, including instructions! The girls were really pushed to get the book put together but I was happy enough for them to get the techniques done and will modify some of the mega painting effort in the Technique Book #2! So yes, there will be a #2...... The techniques included in the first book were Sheer Heaven Transfers, Credit Card Technique, Using Alcohol Inks, Peeled Paper and lastly, Faux Leather. I'll take my camera to work with me tomorrow so I can post the pics on my blog shortly. This way, you girls who didn't manage to get your book put together can do so in the comfort of your own home, in front of the computer! See how I look after you!!! lol

Crackle Technique, Canvas class & The Trip

Last weekend I had another one of my canvas classes. I taught different canvases, all basically using the same technique but the girls had a choice of several different styles. They were all surprised at how quickly it comes together, the class is 2-1/2 hours but after you've done a few of them you should be able to get that down to around 1 to 1-1/2 hours. The hardest thing is to make your decisions about images, colours, quotes, embellishments....isn't that always the way though!

Here are a few of the canvases that some of the girls made, yes, I remembered my camera this time! First up are Debra & Lorraine...

then Karen & Donna...

....then Jane M & Jane W...

....Sheryl & Marie....

lastly Nicky & Caryl...

There were another 6 girls in the class but I didn't manage to get photo's of them all, but at least you can see the different styles represented here.

After the canvas class was an atc class on crackle techniques. We used Ranger Crackle Paint for backgrounds, Ranger Crackle Accents on images and also a 2 step crackle using Helmar 2 step crackle which will create a cracked effect over an image. Below are some atc samples using the 3 different techniques, some of them you may have seen before in earlier posts.

The Ranger Crackle Paint works best for me on chipboard rather than paper-weight and what you would consider is a thick coat is actually a medium coat. Generally if people can't get this stuff to work, it's because they've laid it on too thin. Just slap it down, it is self-levelling and let it dry. Once it has started to crack you can use a hair-dryer to force dry the rest of it. The act class is 2 hours and these backgrounds were all dried and made into atc's in that time period. Here's the raffle atc for this class using the Ranger Crackle Paint. (Weathered Wood colour)

and another... (antique linen colour)

Crackle Accents is applied just like a dimensional medium (Glossy Accents, Dimensional Magic etc) over an image, let dry - this takes hours - and your image has a crackle finish to it. This stuff doesn't work on non-porous surfaces though, only paper/cardboard type substrates. This is a sample of Crackle Accents - the man is crackled.

The Helmar 2 step crackle is a little more complicated. Once you have painted Step 1 onto your image, not too thick a coat, just a normal sort of coat, you have to let it dry to the tacky stage. On the jar it recommends 10 to 20 minutes though it depends on your climate and how thick or thin you have applied it. You have to wait for all the creaminess to go away and your image to become clear before you can go onto the next step.

There are a couple of main points to remember with the second coat of the Helmar 2 step.

You must make sure that you totally cover all of your step 1 coat, if you leave any edges uncoated then these will stay tacky as the base coat dries to a tacky finish and stays tacky! I did Step 1 in the class to show the thickness and took it home. The next morning I applied the 2nd coat and it worked perfectly fine so the 10 to 20 minute rule is just to make sure that you don't try to apply step 2 too early!

Secondly, don't go back over where you've already painted with the 2nd coat. I start at the top of the image and using a soft brush, start to paint the 2nd coat on, going down the image and across. Very hard to explain, but I'll try. I start at the left top of the image and go across the image to the right side and then move down a bit and go across back to the left. Making sure that you've not left any bits uncoated. I use a sort of cross-hatch motion as well. This needs to be a trial and error thing but once you've done it a couple of times and it has cracked, then you'll know how much to use and the direction of your 2nd coat can affect which way the cracks appear.

After the second coat has dried (it needs a fair bit of time - can be force dried with a hairdryer to finish the cracking off - just don't overheat the paint), you can apply some acrylic paint in a contrasting colour and wipe it off immediately so you don't let it dry on the image. When you wipe it off you should have some of the acrylic colour seep into the cracks to highlight them. You may need to use a baby wipe very lightly to wipe off the extra colour from the image, just don't over wipe as you'll soften the crackle.

After all of this, if you find that you've got some tacky bits as you haven't done the edges too well, then I use a bit of Treasure Gold in a colour that's relevant (silver, copper, gold etc) and rub it onto the edges of the image lightly. This will cover the tackiness and solve the problem.

These are some samples of this Helmar 2 step crackle technique.

I don't do much personal info on my blog but you may have noticed my ticker counter on the right hand side counting down to a holiday! Only 4 weeks to go now before we go on 2 back-to-back cruises. Firstly a 15 day cruise to Columbia, the Panama Canal, Costa Rica, 3 stops in Mexico and finishing at San Francisco. Then later that same day after arriving in San Francisco, we leave on the same ship for a 15 day trip up to Alaska visiting Astoria, Seattle, Ketchikan, Juneau, Hubbard Glacier, Skagway, Sitka, Inside Passage, Vancouver, Victoria and then back to San Francisco!

Going on this wonderful trip of a lifetime is my hubby and myself, my Auntie and Uncle (who are only about 5 years older than us) and my Mum and Dad. Well, that was the plan anyway....we've had some bad news from Dad's doctor and he's unable to make the 13 hour plane flight from Sydney to San Francisco. Too tough on his heart and lungs, he has asbestosis from working in Wittenoom and has some heart disease as well. So he is staying home, BUT showing what a truly wonderful man he is, he's asked my best friend if she would like to go in his place!!!! All the trip is paid for her, including her air-fares, all she needs is some spending money.

So this all happened within the last few days and now she only has to wait 4 weeks to go on a fabulous once in a lifetime trip! Joan and I have been best friends since we were 12 and she has had her fair share of personal tragedies in her lifetime and has come through with such a wonderfully positive attitude. Dad is really, REALLY, happy to be giving her this gift and I for one am really thankful to have a great Dad.....Mum's pretty cool too!!! lol She's sharing her cabin with Joan and she is virtually like a second daughter to my parents. We'll be sad to not be sharing the memories with Dad, but if it gives him some more time with us, then yay to that!