Wednesday’s Card: Easy Watercolor Technique!

Posted March 20, 2013 by (36 Comments)


Watercolor Technique

Hi All,

I’ve been trying to come up with a good way to use water with my Inktense Pencils for some time. If you are not familiar with these pencils, they have incredibly vibrant color, sharpen with ease, and also function as a watercolor pencil. I’ve really just used them direct to paper so far because the colors are so vibrant and beautiful. Every time I used them as a watercolor, the color would fade and I found it hard to get good dimension. In other words, the color would spread uniformly over whatever I was coloring.

A few weeks ago I saw a video by Jill Foster where she watercolored an image by not diving straight into the color. Of course, I thought! So, I broke down the coloring of these flowers into just a few simple steps. If you follow the instructions, you should be able to get the same look very easily.

Today marks the third time I have used this Secret Garden stamp set. There are three outlined flowers in the set – I used the other two flowers HERE and HERE. Oddly enough, although I didn’t plan it, I used the Inktense pencils on each of the cards! The Secret Garden stamp set is part of the Stampin’ Up! Spring Catalog, which is active until May 31st. Keep in mind that the big Sale-a-Bration ends FRIDAY! For each $50 you spend, you get a free product from the Sale-a-Bration catalog. And if you order from my sister’s store, she donates 20% of all sales to Foster Kids Charity.

A few more words about the Inktense Pencils… I have the 72 count set only because my husband went overboard at Christmas! If you are looking to purchase, I think the 24-count set is probably sufficient. By the way, Dick Blick has the 24-count for $38.99, compared to Simon Says Stamp for $59.99 (not sure why the big price difference — Copics are cheap at Dick Blick too!). One thing I noticed is that the color of the pencil may be completely different than how it comes out on the paper. So, I downloaded THIS CHART to display all the colors. On the left I colored them direct to paper. Then, I watercolored them out to the right of the box. You can see, especially in the purples, browns, and blacks, how different the watercolor is from the direct-to-paper color. I love these pencils more and more every day. :)

Inktense Color Chart

Anyway, enjoy the video and have a great week!

Darlene

Note: If you are reading this post in an email, you’ll need to click on the post title above (“Wednesday’s Card”) to go to my blog and play the video.

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Filed under: Card-Making Videos, Flowers, Tutorials, Watercolor Tagged with , ,
(36 Comments)

Wednesday’s Card: Flower Shadow

Posted March 13, 2013 by (21 Comments)

Black Shadow Flower
Black Shadow Flower (zoom)

Hi All!

When I go to my craft room to create a card, I usually have a pretty solid idea. However, the resulting card hardly EVER looks like what I had originally envisioned. All that extra time spent in the shower planning my cards for nothing, lol! I think it’s just my excuse to take a long shower. :)

Anyhoo, I thought it would be fun to show you how this card came about. It started when I saw Heather do this card. So pretty! I liked how she colored her stamp with a marker around the edges, so I figured I would try it out. My first version was yellow with a blue outline:
Black Shadow Flower Practice 1

Oh not good at all. I thought maybe I could color the flowers to improve it. As you can see, I tried, grays (warm and cold), yellows, browns, pinks, and even orange. Copics, colored pencils, watercolor. Forget it.

Next I thought I would try using a lighter ink (Antique Linen) and then outline in a dark blue (I used Not Quite Navy by Stampin’ Up!). Version #2:
Black Shadow Flower Practice 2

Um, ok. Better, but still not good. I thought, maybe pink flowers? Nope.

I liked the pink and the Antique Linen, but the blue was too blue and too much blue. I decided to go with outlining one flower in black. I used a Faber Castell Design Memory Craft Charcoal Big Brush Pen. The shadow was very subtle and I liked it a lot better, so I finished out the rest of the card elements. Here is the result:
Black Shadow Flower V1

For the video, I decided to use the Stampin’ Up! black marker instead. Wow, a lot more black! At first I liked the Faber Castell one slightly better, but the Stampin’ Up! one is starting to grow on me. Which one do you like better?

I left it sentiment-less for now. I plan to add the one that I need on the inside when the time comes.

So there you have it. I am a total work in progress every day of the week. Ha!

Darlene

Note: If you are reading this post in an email, you’ll need to click on the post title above (“Wednesday’s Card”) to go to my blog and play the video.

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Filed under: Card-Making Videos, Copic Markers, Flowers Tagged with , , ,
(21 Comments)

Wednesday’s Card: Beautiful Wings

Posted March 6, 2013 by (21 Comments)

Beautiful Wings Card

Beautiful Wings Card (zoom)

Hi All!

I have a pretty quick card this week. I try to alternate my posts between simple and complicated. Sometimes it’s nice to just crank one out, right?

I used a new distress ink called Picked Raspberry. It’s so pretty – kinda reminds me of Stampin’ Up!’s Melon Mambo. I spritzed the Full Bloom Hollyhocks stamp with water and stamped it onto the inked cardstock to get that reverse watercolor look. I’m sure there is a name for this technique but I don’t know it. :)

The butterflies are from my Beautiful Wings embosslit (I call it a Sizzlit in the video. Wrong.). I actually use this die a lot – it’s great for scrapbooking too. The butterflies are embossed and cut in one run through your Big Shot.

Enjoy and have a great week!

Darlene

Note: If you are reading this post in an email, you’ll need to click on the post title above (“Wednesday’s Card”) to go to my blog and play the video.

Supplies:

Stamps:

Paper:

Inks:

Embellishments:

  • Black embroidery thread

Tools/Punches/Dies:

Other:

Filed under: Butterflies, Card-Making Videos Tagged with , , , ,
(21 Comments)

Wednesday’s Card: Ice Cream Sundae!

Posted February 27, 2013 by (28 Comments)

Sundae Card
Sundae Card
Sundae Card

Hi All!

I have a few stamps from There She Goes. The quality is really good and the images are great. I especially love the sentiments that come with them – very unique. I have another set with some really funny sentiments… I’ll have to try and use it soon! I mention in the video that their sentiment stamps are teeny tiny letters. Yet, they still stamp very clear. Heck, I even heat embossed this sentiment and you can still read it clearly!! That’s pretty amazing. It may be hard for you to make it out in my photo – it says “Stressed spelled backwards is desserts”.

Anyway, I used Copics to color the ice cream. I had to be creative with the vanilla, since I didn’t want it to look all yellow. So, I used a little bit of brown in it. I used Glossy Accents on the syrup and the cherry – looks so yummy, right?

I get a lot of email questions about Copics. I know how overwhelming it can be to get started – there are so many!! If you are in that boat, here are a few posts that might help you:

Hope this helps!

Shout-out to Barb G, who sent me her extra set of Spellbinders scallop ovals, used on this card. :)

For those of you who have been following my blog for awhile, you know that my husband is addicted to Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. I refuse to purchase it (I have no self control when it’s in the house), so he takes it upon himself to buy his own. He works a lot, so it’s not often he gets free time. As a result, he buys in major bulk. He just bought about 20 more pints of it last week. Ugh!! All those flavors!! I’m trying not to eat it, so I’ve got ice cream on the brain, hence this card. By the way – he’s skinny as can be. Figures.

Enjoy and have a great week!

Note: If you are reading this post in an email, you’ll need to click on the post title above (“Wednesday’s Card”) to go to my blog and play the video.

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Filed under: Cake & Dessert, Card-Making Videos, Copic Markers Tagged with , , ,
(28 Comments)

Wednesday’s Post: Flower in a Vase

Posted February 20, 2013 by (26 Comments)

Colored Pencil Flower

Hi All!

Today I decided to use the same flower stamp set I used on this card. As with the other card, I colored this one with my Derwent Inktense Pencils also. I really like how these pencils blend. I used the Hero Arts Soft Granite Shadow Ink as a background again. It’s such a pretty shade.

I created the white border on my panel by using my Spellbinders die as a stencil. Be sure to emboss the panel after cutting it because otherwise it moves too much and you won’t get a crisp border. I made the vase, stem, and leaf using a few punches. One of the punches I got for free from the Stampin’ Up! Sale-a-bration catalog. The sale continues through March 22nd (get a free item for each $50 you spend). If you’ve seen the Sale-a-bration catalog, you might agree that the layout is a complete disaster!! I have a simple version you can look at – much easier on the eyes.

Anyway, enjoy the video and I’ll be back next week with a fun ice cream stamp by There She Goes!!

Darlene

Note: If you are reading this post in an email, you’ll need to click on the post title above (“Wednesday’s Card”) to go to my blog and play the video.

Supplies:

Stamps:

Paper:

Inks:

Embellishments:

  • Black Organza Ribbon

Tools/Punches/Dies:

Other:

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Filed under: Card-Making Videos, Colored Pencils, Flowers Tagged with , , , , ,
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