Hello my fabulous friends!
I don't know about you, but I often get SO obsessed with a certain medium or style, that many of the other mediums and supplies in my studio get neglected... sometimes for a few years! But I tend to circle back to old favorites eventually.
I have been obsessed with watercolors for a few years now, and my Copics, dies, and patterned papers have been patiently waiting for me to come back to them... And I think I'm ready.
Now, for all of you who follow me for my watercolors, don't worry... I still LOVE watercolors!!!! I just want a little space for playing with papers and inks again too.
*Affiliate links have been used, this doesn't change the price you pay, but it does really help me continue bringing you exciting new content, so thank you!
This week I've been playing with some new Spellbinders dies from the Out and About collection along with dusting off my collection of patterned paper (and scraps).
Please note, while Spellbinders did send me product and asked me to create with them, my opinions remain my own.
First up we have the sweet
Dancin' in the Rain set. I wasn't quite sure how I felt about this set at first- My initial (and a bit rusty) first thought was to use bright solid colors for everything, and I just wasn't feeling it.
Then I started digging into my patterned papers and everything changed!
The soft rainbow paper in the background is Tracey Hey
Rainbow Stripes (isn't it dreamy?) and it shifted my color scheme to softer and more muted tones with some visual texture..
Next I found a scrap of polkadot paper for the umbrella...
And suddenly things started coming together and I was excited about it! It's amazing how changing the colors or textures can completely change how you feel about something!
I left the person in solids, for contrast, but kept the colors muted and light.
Because all the colors in both the image and the background are relatively equal in value (not a lot of contrast), the image kind of got lost against the background. To fix this, I ran a dark grey Copic marker around the edges of all of the die cuts. It is subtle, but it defines the shapes nicely.
Other than the C7 Copic marker, I didn't do any coloring...GASP!
I thought about adding in shadows, but I liked the simplicity without, and the puddle serves to ground the image so I just left it.
The sentiment is from
Mini Everyday Sentiments- which has lots of small type sentiments for the Glimmer machine, and includes a few banner dies as well.
Creating this sweet little garden scene got off to another rough start.
The background was an easy choice (Tracey Hey
Meadow Days paper), but I was struggling with the mushroom- I think because I knew how I would paint it if it was a stamp, but that vision wasn't matching what the dies could do. So I decided to reach for another old friend-
Texture Paste.
(to be honest, I'm surprised it wasn't all dried out!)
I didn't put on the top layer of the mushroom, and instead used texture paste for the white spots..Once I had actual texture for the spots, I was much happier with my little mushroom!
Note: there is nothing wrong with using the die as it was designed (using the die cut to create the spots), it just wasn't right for me on this day, and honestly, dies should be tools to help you create your vision, not something you can only use in one specific way!
The bird was another challenge.. I tried many different variations.... including using markers to color him, but nothing looked right. I finally used some patterned paper scraps, and suddenly he was the cutest little bird!
I'm learning that as I'm circling back to using more dies, I'm keeping some of my watercolor preferences, that I'm liking subtle visual texture (like the splatters and script on the papers used for the bird) and muted colors. I'll have to explore that more...
This card got finished off with another sentiment from Mini Everyday Sentiments, and a doodled border (another little something pulled from my watercolor cards).
Have you moved away from certain mediums or techniques and then eventually circled back to them?
Or am I the only one? LOL
Comments
Post a Comment