Club Scrap Team Challenge: Weather Florals

Time for Team Challenge at Club Scrap. You should have arrived from:  Hetty or if you are lost, you can start at the begging by clicking  

This month we used the stamp set: Weathered Florals

What is there not to love about Florals.  Using these wonderful stamps I set out to explore different ways to color them.  There is a 4th card that was made with this set, and it is in the previous Blog post.  It was made for the "Can You Case It" Challenge.  Really should be included here as it is goes along with this exercise.  But scroll down and have a peak.  

Card 1: Color Pencils with Glaze Pen embellishments

This is the simplest of the cards.  I stamped in Versfine Onyx Black having intended to use heat embossing and then coloring with copics.  But I had a new ink pad, Amazing what a difference the new pad made, and just loved the boldness and crispness of the image.

I lightly colored with my Prisma Pencils and then tried various methods to blend.  I had stamped on Neenah solar White, so I had a slick surface with little tooth.  First try was a blending tool made for markers, not much happened.  Then tried the Dove blender with little improvement over the other tool.  Thought about using vaseline as I have heard it works well, but there was not one tube or jar of vaseline in my house that had not been used on dog or horse and I was not going to go to the store.  Then I remembered Gamsol.  Not sure why I have that but I think I was needing mineral spirits for something and that was what HobbyLobby had.  So with a blending stump and Gambol, I blended and shaded.  Love the outcome but it lacked pizzaz.  So I grabbed by Glaze Pen in Black and highlighted the centers of the flowers and the swirls.  Still too flat, so out comes my Wink of Stella, Perfect.  This is a card that needs very little else, Beautiful finished and says it all.

A2 card, Kraft Card Base, Purple Mat from Kit.  Nothing else.

Card 2:

Water Color and flowers go together like Peanut and Jelly, you can do without one or the other, both together magic.  I struggle to get that truly watercolored effect with stamps.  I took a water color class (2 actually) through On line Cards.  Dawn from Wplus 9 is a beautiful watercolorist and I have enjoy watching her videos.  So she empowered us to cut lose and go Impressionistic.  Well here is my rendering.

It does not look anything like the stamp, I think Hibiscus when I look at this and thus the foliage reflects that impression.  When you are painting florals and are lose with your paint, the entire process has it's own mind set.  It is very hard to force it to become.  This is a wet on wet technique with layering of color.  It took me several days to get it just right.  When I thought I was done, I would leave it to dry and then fiddle a bit more.  Finally I just walked away.  There are things I would change, but in whole it is fine and while not true to the stamp is a card I would gladly send, only thing needed was a sentiment, I put that inside, I just could not bear to risk messing it up with stamping.  

I used third generation stamping with a grey archival ink and then wet the paper, dropping color onto the wet areas and let it flow.  I allowed it to start to dry before adding any additional colors.  The foliage was created using brush strokes and a double loaded brush (2 colors on different sides of brush).  

I used Arches Cold press paper for this card.  I think for cards this is not the best choice as it is very thick and hard to have a single layer card.  My Canson paper is easier to use for card fronts, but this technique uses a lot of water and a good paper was essential.  I used  a layer of fun foam and placed it under a book for a little while and it was smooth and no buckling noted.    I also used Scor-tape to adhere.  This is a A2 card, mounted on White paper and Matted with red from the kit.  A few sequins add a bit os sparkle.  

There is not much more I can say about this card.  There are many water color techniques and many ways to achieve results.  Time and patience plus practice is needed.  I am not as comfortable with watercoloring as I like control, but it is a good exercise to explore color and how different paints and paper can be used to get different results.

Card 3, back to our comfort level, well Sort of!!

I wanted a card that truly reflected the stamp.  I lost that in my watercolor card and decided the ink needed to be part of the process.  In the first one, I used the faint outline of the stamp to guide me in my initial color placement, but with movement of the paint on the paper, the lines were quickly obliterated.  So I pulled out my distress inks!!

Peeled Paint, Crushed Olive, Picked Raspberry, and Chipped Saphire a stamp and water, all set!

 I used several stamps in the kit and stamped the images onto Ranger Watercolor Paper.  

Using a craft mat, I applied ink to the mat.  

I first wet the area to be colored with clear water to get the ink activated.  Then using a water brush dropped more color onto the petals.  Made sure that the area to be colored had a dry border.  So I moved around the flower, allowing each section to dry before adding water to an adjoining area.  When the flowers was finished and dry, I activated the green foliage stamping to blur those edges.

I also dropped additional colored blobs to represent flowers in the background.  This is to help balance and get the focus on the flower that is now clearly in the forefront.  Looks ok, but while I like the background, the flower seems wrong.  So after drying, I get out my distress markers.

The markers are used to add the detail back into the painting.  This is similar in water coloring, where there is a primary layer and then you add more pigment with less and less water to create details and definition.  I did try this with distress, but it is wetter or wetter, no real pigment change and the ink migrates readily.  The distress markers give that color concentration and if too harsh can be softened with water.

Here is after using the markers.  The final step, was to use a black micron marker (copic .3mm to add additional detail.)

The more obvious area for this last step is the center and the background flowers and stems.  This too is an A2, matted on Purple and the card base is Kraft.  Wonder why everything is purple.  I was trying to get a card that was truly purple looking for the Challenge at "Can you Case It".  Purple is very hard to photograph and have it read purple.  This flower is more purple than it appears here and the Matt is a beautiful purple.  Pink just steals the show!!

Well that is it for this challenge from me, but continue on to your next stop :  Debbie at Deb Duz Scrappin.

Until next time,

Happy Crafting

Josette

Links:  Weathered floral Stamp

Crewel & Unusual Club Scrap Deluxe Kit

Distress inks: Picked Raspberry, Crushed Olive, Peeled Paint, and Chipped Saphire

Cotman tube watercolors

Arches Cold Press watercolor paper

Ranger Watercolor paper