Butterfly Tile - one layer faux encaustic

I have been really enjoying my faux encaustic technique and using it on different projects and in slightly different ways. If you didn't see my post a week ago Friday with a sea/fish themed media board, you can find it here.
The main constituent and product for creating this milky, textured finish is the DecoArt clear modeling paste. The steps on this tile gives a really simple, easy way to use it plus I had a fab playtime experimenting with different types of 'tissue' paper.

Greyboard sealed with a layer of gesso applied with a palette knife kept flat to the surface.

When dry second generation crackle stamp using watering can.

Spritz substrate blend in colours , spritz again, drip and let them move around and dry. Repeat until you are happy with the colour layers.

I went on to play with substrates for stamping on. Each image was stamped in black archival ink and I painted the colours on the reverse using DecoArt fluid media acrylics - See the topside below in #1.

1. American deli  paper - a good strong substrate for stamping in archival ink with no bleed through and great for painting on too, it took the watery paint well and remained a tough substrate.

2. Tim Holtz collage paper - this is more like the ordinary tissue paper. The black archival ink bled right the way through it leaving an imprinted image on my craft mat. It buckled when I painted it but I thought that added to the distress look.

3. Colourcraft abaca tissue paper is apparently like teabag paper and it does have that fabric feel to it. The ink didn't bleed but it didn't give such a crisp dark image either and watery paint was absorbed by the fabric like material very quickly and bled through onto the craft mat. It also bled over the image making it harder to see the design, however it performed differently using neat paint where it just sat in the space painted and left the image outline untouched on the other side.

I came back to the tile and created a few steps to get a composition and design I was happy with. 

Stamp with a small text image using black archival ink. 

Cut out the butterfly printed and painted on the deli paper and adhere it slightly to one side of the substrate. 

Find some words stamped, bought or computer generated (my preference), ink the edges and also glue down. Give them a light coat of decoupage glue to seal them.

Sand and distress the edges of the board blending in brown distress ink on the edges and on the sides of the tile. Spritz the edges with water to further distress the ink and heat dry.

Splatter a little watered down brown distress ink.

Now cover the board completely with the clear modeling paste and leave it overnight to dry. (See my original DecoArt post for this technique here and an under the sea media board here).

This photo shows the difference between the tile without the modeling paste and with. You will see that the distress ink moved because it reacts with water so the distressed edges changed and the splatters disappeared but I still love the effects it created. I'll just remember to splatter with paint next time lol.

You'll be seeing a few more of these tiles and similar technique layers over the next few weeks/months. Some of them, including this one, are being made into handbound sketch books / journals / notebooks

Hope you like this technique and please let me know if you try it and tell me where I can go see it.

See you again soon.

hugs Brenda xxx

Tag Friday for AVJ

It's Tag Friday over at A Vintage Journey where we have a fifth Friday in the month and fill it with tags of our choosing. No themes, no constraints just free time to play and experiment with whatever we choose.

At the last Ministry of Mixology I did a 'Make and Take' using a media board that Di at Tando Creative cut for me and this tag started it's life there. I didn't get any further than the first few layers of the background and so I have cut it down into a tag to use as a base for today's Tag Friday sample. You can see the M&T design on my blog post here.

Having stamped with Andy's Tech Traumer set onto greaseproof paper, I adhered it to the greyboard, added some tissue tape and then a random watery wash of cerulean blue and prussian blue.

Texture white gesso using the flat of a palette knife.

Add some black gesso stencilling.

Spray Amsterdam acrylics - burnt umber and greyish blue.

Collect collage elements together.

Distress numbers (they come in the kit), distress central label (see below), paint chipboard pieces with black acrylic and assemble the dial.

Adhere pieces onto the tag and distress the edges to finish.

I hope you can pop over to see the fabulous designs from the Creative Guides and go visit their blogs too.

Thanks for stopping by.

Enjoy your designing and creating.

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Thank you.

Experimenting with faux encaustics - DecoArt mediums

This was the panel board I made for the DecoArt Mixed Media blog and it went live in May - see it here. I have since been using this technique a lot and created a number of projects experimenting with different layers and inclusions.

Wanting to find out more about faux encaustics I read a number of articles and watched several videos. I'd really love to try the real thing but it needs space and equipment and I just don't have the room for it, but I love the effects it gives. So I thought I would give the faux method a try and experiment with some of the DecoArt mediums I have. Apparently pouring medium is good but, at the time of writing this I didn't have any. I just love the way the different layers have created real depth you have to hold it in your hands to get the feel of the texture and almost waxy finish.

I took a piece of painty card from my bits box and brushed on thickish layers of DecoArt media matte medium, heavy gel medium and clear modeling paste.

Now as my hubby would say I'm a 'want it yesterday' type of person. Now that's not to say I don't have any patience, because I do but when I'm in the moment I don't want to wait several days for things to dry thoroughly, so me - I get the heat gun out, but even with a little help it still needed to sit awhile so I got on with the project that I was inspired by. This is by Laly Mille and can be found here.

I followed her steps for encaustic inspired layering to see what I could produce, beginning with a media board sealed with gesso and some asemic writing done with a sharpie pen.

Then a grid created with a sketch and wash pencil and rubbed through with some matte medium. Don't forget I'm not exactly sure what Laly uses as she doesn't give a complete list, nor does she explain her techniques - so let's just run with it.

I left the project at this point and came back to it the next morning. The first thing I did was look at my tester sheet of the mediums. You can see from the photo below that the matte medium probably wasn't laid on thick enough and dried perfectly clear. The heavy gel medium dried shiny and doesn't have the look of wax (you can just see the reflection of the flash showing up white) whereas the clear modelling paste has that milky look which might work well for the waxy layer.

The next layer Laly used 'pastel and gel medium' so I interpreted that with my sakura chalk pastels rubbing the colours on in random areas and then 'painted' over them with the matte medium. I am in love with this 'new to me' technique for applying colour. By painting with the matte medium this should now give me a permanent layer.

Next out came the white gesso and I used a brush and my finger to apply this. The aim was to cover up some of the background and leave some exposed.

For the next layer I added some collage text papers with matte medium and sealed the whole board with it. I heat dried it and then tried a bit of an experiment of my own - I added some asemic writing using a white posca pen, blended a little gesso over the collaged areas and gave it a splattering of white gesso. I also blended ground espresso distress inks round the edges.

My intention was to next give it a coat of the clear modeling paste but before doing that I experimented again by trialling a thin coat of clear modelling paste tinted very slightly with titan buff media acrylic on a spare painty piece of card. Again I left this to dry overnight. I'm glad I did this as I think you can see from the photo the finish looks much too creamy and of course I thought afterwards the titan buff is opaque so really I need a translucent colour. (The top left hand corner didn't have any paste added to it).

So I continued with the thin clear coat on my board.

Wet.

Dry. Oh my gosh I'm in love.

You can't see immediately the differences the modeling paste has made but I think you will see the subtle changes on this next photo. The board on the right has that soft tone to it as if a misty mask has been placed over it. It looks and feels amazing in real life.

I went back to Laly's steps but I'm tweaking them slightly because I am going to add a second coat of paste so I added some tissue paper in the form of an old sewing pattern, some more white asemic writing, a key word and some carving, although that didn't work too well with the circle and crosses I thought I could add some more on top of the next layer. I also highlighted some of the white areas with a little more gesso rubbed over with my finger and more ground espresso distress inks along the edges.

Finally I finished with another quite thick layer of clear modeling paste and left it overnight to fully dry. Oh my gosh I was so pleased with the results.

 I can see the depth this medium has created ......

.... it doesn't have that real waxy feel to it but it didn't self level so it has a rippled textured surface and satin feel in keeping with a wax project.

I hope you like the experiment and what was achieved.

My thanks to Laly Malle for the inspiration and thank you for stopping by.

Faux encaustic for Country View Crafts

I have been playing with the DecoArt clear modeling paste again and have created a media board with this lovely milky effect. It is over on the CVC project blog and I have added the process steps and more photos if you would like to take a look.

But do you ever come back to a project later and decide it isn't finished? I did that with this one and went a few steps further.

The stamped sentiment seemed far too dark for the rest of the background and I didn't like tie Fig III being so dark either. I took a white pen to fix that bit and also added some watery gesso over the middle of the design and dried it. Now it isn't quite so prominent but I added Andy's fish as well - not sure about that step but we'll see.

I also decided to seal it all again with another coat of the clear modeling paste and before I did so I rubbed a little ground espresso distress ink over the Fig III. I then put it to one side for the rest of the day to dry.

Thanks for popping in, if you want to see the original post I did on this technique for DecoArt you can find it here.

hugs Brenda xxx

Faux Fabric for Tando

I have one of Di's fabulous 6 x 6 binders on display today over on the Tando blog. It's Faux Fabric week and I chose to do a linen effect paint technique to start the background for my embellishments. There are more photos and some process steps over there for you to peruse if you have a moment.

I hope you are finding some creative time this week.

hugs Brenda xxx

Using Tim's collage paper

I have a post over at Country View Crafts today sharing four cards, yes four!!!! I used Tim's fabulous collage paper in the floral design on each of them and they all turned out differently.

The process steps and additional photos are over on the CVC project blog if you'd like more information on them.

Thanks for stopping by.

hugs Brenda xxx

Anything Goes at Tando Creative - Star media board

I am sharing the Make and take I taught at Ministry of Mixology last weekend over on the Tando blog

I used a special paper over gesso which gives a lovely translucent look to create the background and then used media acrylics for the colouring up before I stamped and used a stencil with black modeling paste.

I also used some tissue tape and the gorgeous stars Di cut specially for me.

As always Mixology was an amazing weekend with 70 fabulous crafters and two amazing tutors. It really is the place to be when these events are happening.

If you want to know the paper I used for the background then please pop over to the Tando blog to find out.

Thanks for stopping by. Have a great week and I hope you find some creative time for yourself.

 xxx

Updated from Tando blog

We used media boards that Di cuts specially for me - they are 12 1/2 x 18 cms and a lovely size to work on.

I had 10 lovely ladies join me and we sat and used ordinary kitchen greaseproof paper for the background. 

Because it repels water when spritzed it pools and if you then add tiny amounts of the media fluid acrylics it looks brilliantly distressed.

With some stamping using Andy Skinner Tech Trauma stamps and one of his stencils with decoart black modeling paste plus some tissue tape the background started to come alive.

We finished by painting some fabulous stars that Di also cut especially for this project although I believe she will be adding some to the shop, so keep your eyes peeled.