Creative Watercolor Media Cards

Good Evening Folks,
Today I am sharing my assignments for the Altenew  Creative Watercolor Media Class.  I used my Altenew Crisp Dye Ink cubes to color both cards.  I love, love, love water colouring.  I did an A2 size birthday card and a 4 x 4" any occasion note card.   After I finished the birthday card, I sealed the water coloring with some Tim Holtz Micro Glaze.  If something is spilled on the card the colors will not run.  For information on

For the Birthday card, I started with Arches Cold Pressed Water Colour (WC)  card #140, cut to A2 size.  I dusted the WC card stock with my anti-static pouch first.  I used my Altenew Peony Bouquet stamp set and Versa Mark ink pad to stamp the outlined images in random places on the card front.   The Peony Bouquet Stamp is a 6x8* layering set.  There are nine images and each has it own layer or set of layers.  Including the layers you get 24 total images.  This is a excellent stamp if you want to practice layering.   I used Gold embossing powder and my heating tool to set the images on the card front.   The Gold embossing not only adds to the dimension of the image when water colouring but, it also acts as a barrier to keep the water colours from mixing and causing an uncontrolled muddy appearance.   I coloured the images and background with the following Altenew Crisp Dye ink cubes: Citrus Burst, Maple Yellow, Honey Drizzle, Pink Pearl, Coral Bliss, Heart Beat, Frayed Leaf, Forest Glades, Eastern Sky, and Ultramarine.  After I finished with the images,  I did the background in small sections at a time by adding a little water to the WC and washing the background in colour.   This card took a little while as I was trying to get some detail in the flowers in the leaves. 

For Altenew classes and educator program click HERE.

Altenew Products used in this card:
Peony Bouquet Stamp Set
Summer After Mini Cube Set
Tea Party Mini Cube Set
Lapis Lazuli Mini Cube Set
Green Fields Mini Cube Set

The Blessings card is a 4x4" not card (blank inside).  I followed the same process as above for the colouring with WC.  I used Ruby Red, Coral Bliss, Heart Beat, Paper Bag, Espresso, and Sweet Leaf. I got the majority of the color choices from Yoonsun Hur from Rejoicing Crafts.  The sentiment is from Hero Arts DC212 Blessing Stamp & Cup.  I cut the image twice with white card stock, once with Gold card stock and glued all 3 pieces together to give the sentiment some depth.

Altenew products:
Peony Bouquet Stamp Set
Tea Party Mini Cube Set
Coffee Break Mini Cube Set
Green Meadows Mini Cube Set

Well, that is it for now, until next time...

Joyce

Irresistible Inking Techniques

Hello Everyone, 

Today I am posting my card for my last class in the level I courses for the Altenew Educator Certification Program (AECP)-Irresistible Inking Techniques.   I used ombre water colouring and direct to card stock dry inking to create my card.  My inspiration came from a photo I saw on the Altenew.com website.  It was a photo using the Altenew A Study in Watercolor cutting dies and a dotted background (I think they used a cover plate).   I love the images available for inspiration on the die description.   The A Study in Watercolor dies set comes with 8 cutting dies total consisting of silhouette floral, foliage, and floral with foliage attached images.

When I started the card, I really didn’t have an idea of where I was going, I just knew I wanted to use the stamp set and or the dies for my project.  It turned out to be a little more challenging than I thought but I was determined to make it happen and I love how the card turned out. 

 

I started with some Strathmore Watercolor cardstock (CS) 140#.   I wet the CS with a good amount of water.  I have found that in water colouring if you have a good water colour CS with a lot of tooth, giving it lots of hydration will give you a smoother colour appearance when it dries back (Heavy weight Strathmore and Arches Cold Press VS. Bristol Smooth-Joyce’s opinion only).  I wanted an Ombre affect without using many inks colours. Using less colours gives less of a chance of getting a muddy appearance or harsh demarcation lines when the CS dries.   I used Altenew’s Ruby Red ink cube to lay on some colour to the wet CS.  I concentrated the colour toward one end of my CS and added more (clean) water as I worked my way toward the opposite end.  On a second piece of the water coloured CS I followed the same technique but this time I used the Forest Glade ink cube.  Once I achieved the colour gradients I was looking for, I used my Tim Holtz Heating tool to dry the CS pieces.   When the pieces were dry, I chose two dies from the die set.  One which reminded me of an open flower, this one I used the pink water coloured CS and another that looked like a small branch of leaves I used the green water coloured CS.   After I cut the images out of the water coloured CS, I arranged the images the way I wanted.  I put the pink flower on top of the foliage die cut so that a small portion of the foliage stem was sticking out of the bottom of the pink flower die cut.  This gives the idea that the flower was snipped from a branch of foliage.  I took a picture with my phone to help me remember the arrangement.   When I placed the die cuts on the paper, they just looked too flat.  I took a white Gelly Roll Pen (something I remembered from the Seasonal Scene Building class) and added a few white dots on the foliage die cuts.  I thought the die cuts needed a bit more shading, so I used Altenew inks Coral Berry and Frayed Leaf and the Tim Holtz Distress Blending Brushes to deepen the colours of the flowers and the foliage.  That helped some but it was still too flat once I placed the images on the plain white CS background (see photo below).  I pulled out my Altenew Dainty Swiss Dot background stamp to create a 4” x 5 ¼ “dotted background.  This is a great background stamp.  It comes with 10 total images, 8 sentiments, 1 punctuation, and a 5 ½ x 5 ½ large dotted stamp.   After I re-arranged the flowers on the background it was like a totally different card!  Love, love, lovin’ the card now!  And the way the die cut images are arranged helped create its own dimension (no foam tape required). I added a small amount of the white Gelly Roll Pen on the pink flowers, to give them some animation.  Because of the bold colours, I needed a sentiment that did not overwhelm the card.  I used Altenew’s Label Love- “Happy Birthday” which I stamped with the Jet Black ink cube.  I cut the sentiment down without a border and popped it up on some 3M foam tape to finish the card.  Instead of using a standard A2 sized card based (4 ¼” x 5 ½ “), I cut the based flush with the card front to 4” x 5 ¼”.  I love this card!!! (I think I said that about the last one as well…lol).  For more card making and scrapbooking inspiration as well as information about the Altenew Educator Certification Program be sure to visit Altenew.com 

Next up…Level I challenge, can’t wait too excited

Here is a close up of the detail added to the foliage and you can see a smooth transition in colour from dark to light

Here you can see even with the detail on the foliage it was still pretty flat looking.

Altenew Products

A Study in Watercolor Die Set 

Dainty Swiss Dots Stamp Set 

Label Love Stamp Set 

Red Cosmos Mini Cube Set 

Green Fields Mini Cube Set 

 Joyce