...and yet another canvas

This will have to be my last canvas for a while....I now have 4 on display in the shop which I think is going to be enough for people to work out whether they want to do it as a class or not.

The skeleton leaves down the right hand side look more obvious in this scan than they do in real life, they're a little more subtle in the flesh.

When I first started making atc's a couple of years ago, I also made 4 canvases for my youngest brother as a birthday present, the other "You Go Girl" canvas that was in a previous post was also one of them. As you can see from these other 2 that I made for him, I am going more textural and intricate with my layering on canvases these days. These previous ones are much more like just big atc's - fairly flat without much dimension.....well....maybe my early atc's, not my later ones. (These are 4" x 6")

Now for a little tip or two...I'm sure most of you have at least 1 or 2 (or maybe 24!) of the Ranger Distress Pads. You can use these wonderfully versatile ink pads to colour up your white gloss card so you have a variety of gloss card to work on. The below atc has "Pine Needles" Distress Pad applied to white gloss card with a little sponge. Don't just blob the sponge up and down on the card, you have to rub it vigorously all over the card backwards & forwards completely covering in one motion so you don't have extra colour in certain spots.

If you know what Pine Needles looks like on normal matte card stock, this is a spectacular colour difference compared to the matte card stock. The stamping in the background is my favourite copper - Brilliance Cosmic Copper - best thing about the Brilliance pads is they will dry on vellum & on gloss card! Black Stazon is used to do the main image stamping (Lina Cavalieri from Stampington). Etal metal are the little corner pieces under the brads and the wording is copper card stock that I've cut into a thin strip and run it through my dymo hand punch with a little black ink rubbed over the top and some aqua coloured paint wiped on the edges.

I'm off to Newcastle tomorrow night so won't be posting for a week....I'll certainly miss my emails and the back & forth of the Internet chatter but it'll be good to catch up with some girls over East who I've only conversed with on-line, plus I get to teach a workshop! Woo-hoo!!!

Rinse Aid Resist on Canvas Paper...and Anthophobia!!!

If you're a fan of Claudine Hellmuth (as I am), then you'll know she does absolutely wonderful techniques which are outlined in both of her books and on both of her dvd's. When I first got into this collage/mixed media caper a couple of years ago, she was a huge inspiration to me to try out as many different techniques as I could glean from books, dvd's and the internet. One of my favourites is the Rinse Aid Resist technique which is going to be my atc class this Saturday. Below are two samples of the canvas paper using this particular technique.

This next one is not an atc, but is about 5-1/2" x 4-1/2" with a lovely man who makes eyeliner look absolutely fabulous on a male!!! The wonderful rinse-aid resist forms the background for this piece...

Now an atc with rinse-aid resist technique for the background....

For those of you who love the German Scrap that I use on a lot of my work, it is now available on-line through the store where I work, Scraptivate, click here to go straight to the on-line shop where you can purchase this fantastic paper embellishment. More will be uploaded as it comes into the store....yes, there is still more to come!!!

I'm off on a short trip next weekend (29th) to visit my son over East (Newcastle, NSW) so I expect posting on my blog will be a little haphazard for a bit. I have to be super-organised for my next atc class on the 6th of October as I arrive back on Friday the 5th and teach my next atc class the next day so I've been doing a little pre-preparation for that one. Here are a couple of samples to show you the technique I'll be doing.

I'm going to be teaching a workshop when I visit over East and hope to show the girls some of the things that they've been asking about on my blog.....hi girls ....see you soon!

ANTHOPHOBIA: An abnormal and persistent fear of flowers. Sufferers experience anxiety even though they realize they face no threat from flowers.

The new dare for our group on Aussie Dares is "Irrational Fears" (it'll be posted by Friday I think). I really have no irrational fears but I couldn't let a little technicality like THAT stop me.....so I think that my dislike of using flowers on my work, as all the girls at work and in my classes know, will qualify. Even though it's not a fear, more like an aversion. It's not that I don't like flowers, I actually do, hubby does a great job of giving them to me for all sorts of reasons, including no reason at all, which is the best reason! lol I just can't seem to use them on my work and I find that there is an overuse of flowers on all sorts of layouts....I suppose though it's like brads/eyelets....just another decorative element....just not for me! So here's the atc that I made called Anthophobia.

A canvas & a fold-out atc

Still in canvas mode....this one has been sent to my friend over on the East Coast of Australia, Barb. She's been warned not to check my blog until it arrives in the post so I can safely put it up here. Once again the wonderful texture paste was used as well as some Golden paints for their intense colours, some skeleton leaves for texture and a touch of mica and the beautiful Baroque German Scrap. The clear words on the pieces of mica read "a shimmering fragment embracing life". Deep huh! lol




Below is the fold-out atc that was for the raffle for Tuesday night's atc class. Quite devoid of colour but it worked out okay..... love the German Scrap Scroll embellishment on the left hand side! There is a word on the metal embellishment down the bottom, it says "tryst". First pic is the atc closed:

Second pic it is open:

We've had "dental issues" in our household this week. My 19yo son Cort had all 4 of his wisdom teeth pulled out last Saturday. I'm sure when I had mine done eons ago there wasn't all the rigmarole that was required for him: ice packs on the face - 20 mins on, 20 mins off, constantly, for 3 days! Saltwater mouth-rinses 8 times a day, 2 lots of antibiotics, 1 lot of anti-inflammatories, Savcol (antiseptic) mouth wash twice a day, syringing of the sockets 6 times a day!!! GAWD!!! But he's gone off to work happily this evening for the first time since he had the op and seems to be recovering.

The next atc class is Canvas Paper and I'm going to show the girls how to do a technique that I learnt from one of Claudine Hellmuth's wonderful books. The technique is Rinse Aid Resist, you use dishwashing rinse aid to create a resist on acrylic paint on canvas paper. Below are a couple of atc's that I've made in the past using this particular technique.

This next one, also using rinse-aid resist, is a 4" x 6" canvas I made for a gift for a family member. It seems kind of "bland" as it's one of the very first canvases I did, I think I would do more to it these days!

Retro canvas, crackle & Spotlight atc's

I made another canvas today in a retro style, a girl at work (Scraptivate) commented that she liked retro.....I do too - I've done quite a few retro atc's in the past as well as some retro canvases before. This one incorporated some new sequin waste that I had ordered which just arrived from the US, there was some with smaller holes than is available here as well as some with HUGE holes! Sequin waste works great with texture paste....this is what is up on the top left corner of this canvas. I also used the peeled paint technique as well. Poor girl ended up with a big blob of yellow ochre paint over her left eye, which is why she has this other eye over the top....all in the vein of "no such thing as a mistake"!

Also made today was a couple more Spotlight Technique atc's for the up-coming atc class next Saturday...one of these will become the raffle atc.

This one is made with an alcohol ink background on gloss card, the second stamped images are on plain white gloss card which have then been slightly coloured with Tombow markers. You can't really see this very well on the computer screen, the colouring is very subtle but can be seen better irl (in real life).

Next one is on plain copy paper, smoosh technique using Rangers Distress ink in Mustard Seed and Pine Needles. Second image is on plain white cardstock, colouring was done using the Ranger Cut 'n dry nibs on the Distress Ink Pads in various colours - Tattered Rose, Pine Needles, Broken China and Worn Lipstick. As well as the inimitable German Scrap coloured with Treasure Gold!

Coming up soon in my atc classes is a crackle class. There are several products out there that will do a crackle effect, not always exactly how you want them to though! This next atc I have used the Helmar 2 step crackle on the angel and after it was dry & cracked, I rubbed some Quinacridone Crimson (Golden) over the top to define the cracks...love crackle!!! Will be interesting to see how Tim Holtz's new crackle paint turns out. I believe this is a 1 step crackle with is always a bonus PLUS it's going to come in all the fabulous distress colours. Think I might put off the crackle class until this stuff arrives in our store!

Comments are always welcome, even if it's to say "you talk too much!" hahahaha

Peeled Paper & Spotlight Technique

Firstly, thank you to Nat B for nominating me for the Nice Matters Award...


One is supposed to nominate more people for this award but good ol' Nat has nominated the very people that I would....so I'm just going to say that all the people's blogs that I visit would easily qualify for this award....otherwise I wouldn't visit their blogs would I??? lol

Last night's atc class was the Peeled Paper technique (from the wonderful books of Claudine Hellmuth - one talented girl!!!). This first one is the raffle atc that Ana won....it took her a few seconds to understand the quote...I love these "sassy" quotes!

Next one is also a peeled paper background but this time done with plain copier paper...great texture! I also love "deep" quotes...lol There's a bit of mica attached to the top right hand corner, giving it a little darker appearance on the scanner and the image and words are outlined in a silver crayon...nice grungy effect.

The next upcoming atc class is a technique called "Spotlighting". Most stampers have heard of it and would recognise it when they saw it but the name is something that is not that well known. It basically means to stamp an image, stamp it again and cut out bits of the 2nd stamped image to colour and add over the top of the previous stamped image. Hence, Spotlighting! You can also do it the other way, add the colour to the main image and keep the Spotlighted bit in plain black and white....equally effective.

This next image is not an atc as this stamp is about 3" x 5", but it's perfect for spotlighting so I thought I'd do it up as a sample to show the girls (the stamp is called Paris Moments, just gorgeous!).

The next one has an alcohol ink background, stamped with the Leonardo da Vinci stamp, same image stamped onto a domino that has been coloured with the same colours of alcohol inks. Gold thread was wrapped around the card before being attached to the black mat board background, then some gold german scrap added down both sides (my gloss card was a little on the "slim" side so I needed to cover the edges for balance....no such thing as a mistake! lol). Please notice the pink colour.....see, I can do pink!

New Canvas

This is another canvas that I made, previous to the one in the post below. Basically following exactly the same technique....obviously in different colours though. I didn't really take much notice of which colours I used for this, something I will remedy in the future!

I must say that I learnt a lot about washes from Michael de Meng when I attended a workshop of his earlier this year. I had been using Golden paints previous to this as I had been a member of Claudine Hellmuth's yahoo group for quite some time and she loves her Golden's!!! I had the heavy body acrylics as well as the fluids, and mixed the Satin Glaze with them to get the wonderful washed-out look that I like..... but because of the very rich pigment of the Golden paints, they retain their strength of colour! It was Michael's suggestion of particular paint combinations though that really added a depth to my work that I liked.....thank you Michael ;-)

This weekend, more work on another couple of canvases, as I'm soon to teach a class in this technique at Scraptivate! Just need to wait for some product to arrive in store....speaking of product.....the white German Scrap has been really popular, both for scrapbookers as well as others that do more altered art/atc's etc. LOVE my German Scrap!!!

Busy weekend ahead... Friday night is our monthly catch-up with the ABC (Altered Book Club) girls, then my atc class on Saturday is on Transparent ATC's. All you need is acetate, alcohol inks, Collections Window Frames, Xyron 250, images & stamps...simple! I need to make the raffle atc so I'll post that on Saturday. Saturday night is a "girls-night-in" at Scraptivate, just a bunch of us who work and teach at the shop as well as a couple of other arty friends, playing 'til the cows come home! lol

Here's one of my previous transparent atc's...

Step-by-step canvas instructions

I've been asked a few times how I put together a canvas so I thought I'd take some pictures of one that I created for a pal of mine.....Barb....stop reading this right now!!! You'll ruin the surprise!!! lol The pictures follow the instructions in each step.

I started with a 5" x 7" canvas, then I did some texture paste through the waste piece of that lovely scroll die from the cuttlebug. Let it dry overnight. Paint on a wash of Quinacridone Nickel Azo Gold (I used Golden paints for all of this so I'll just say the colour).

I used this same colour to do a light wash of paint (paint mixed with water) over an image of Louise Brooks (actress - when they used to be called "actresses"!)

I then stamped onto the canvas using a decorative stamp (Green Pepper Press - Juliet sheet) and Timber Brown Stazon ink.

Next step was to glue down (with Golden soft gel medium matte) the image as well as a piece of Basic Grey scrapbook paper over the bottom for balance. I also gave the image & paper a coat of the gel medium as well for protection.

One thing I should mention at this point, at each step along the way I use my heat gun to dry the canvas. So dry after the Nickel Azo Gold, dry the image after painting, dry after stamping, dry after gluing images down, dry after coating images with gel medium. If you don't do this, the paints will mix together and that's not what you want.

Next was a light wash of Dioxazine Purple over the whole canvas which turns it this beautiful rusty sort of colour. I used a baby wipe to blot some of the purple off her face, rather her be looking a little orange/yellow than purple!

Using the gel medium again, I stuck down a little piece of white gauze (bandaging), just painted the gel medium onto the canvas and using the paint brush, smooshed the gauze into it and painted over the top of it as well.

The gauze was then painted with a wash of Quin Nickel Azo Gold, dried, Dioxazine purple, dried and then a light wash of Paynes Grey and dried again.

This is a piece of lovely white German Scrap that is sold at the store where I work (Scraptivate). We also have the white wings and another beautiful border that looks like a scallop (plus the standard gold, silver and black colours in borders & wings!).

The white German Scrap was painted with Quin Nickel Azo Gold and dried.

Next was a coat of the Dioxazine purple, then dried.

I attached the painted German Scrap to the canvas using Golden Extra Heavy gel matte and then coated it with the Golden soft gel medium.

I printed out a quote that I wanted to use from my computer and Epson printer (with Durabrite inks) and attached it to chipboard using double-sided adhesive.

This quote was then coloured using Ranger Distress inks on a little sponge, firstly Spiced Marmalade, then Dusty Concord (a purple colour). I edged the sides of the chipboard with a mustard coloured sharpie pen....have I mentioned I LOVE my sharpies??? lol

The next step was to use some Paynes Grey on my transdermal applicator (you know....the finger) to add some depth around the image and a little around the edges of the canvas so it's not just one colour right to the edges.

The top corners needed a little dressing up so I found two little metal embellishments (think they were meant for earrings?), added a little extra heavy gel medium to the back of them and for double insurance to make sure they stay put, I attached them with brads through the holes as well.

A close-up of these...

The final paint step is to dry-brush some Golden Interference Gold over sections of the canvas...this can't really be seen on the computer but when you tilt it to the light, that's when it shows up! I also rubbed some "White Diamond" Treasure Gold (a wax medium) over the texture paste scroll and the German Scrap and some of the edges.

The quote is added with a strong double-sided tape........and it's finished!