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