Birches

Posted: October 18, 2018 | Author: Heather | Filed under: birches, peaceful winter | Tags: Penny Black stamps, Ranger Distress inks | 11 Comments

Oh look another tree stamp! I created a wintry scene with the new ‘birches’ stamp and older ‘peaceful winter’ set from Penny Black. I began by stamping the birches stamp in black and embossing it in clear powder. I die cut a circle from frisket film to mask the moon and pressed it down firmly in the top right corner then splattered masking fluid over the panel. Frisket film and masking fluid (sometimes called liquid frisket) are used to mask areas when watercolouring; the film is plastic with an adhesive back and the fluid is gummy when it dries. You should be able to remove them easily after all your painting is dry.

I placed some masking tape across the birch trunks then stamped the distant trees stamp from the ‘peaceful winter’ set in nocturne ink. The distant trees gave me a horizon line above which I painted my distress ink sky. I pressed both wilted violet and blueprint sketch inks onto my glass mat, added a little water and painted the sky. By letting the ink dry slightly between applications I was able to get some darker ‘dried’ lines in the sky. Once the sky dried I removed the moon mask.

I decided to add some shadow to the birch trunks by painting diluted black soot ink here and there. I used the same colours but more diluted to add some shadow in the foreground snow. Once the ink dried I removed the masking fluid, added a sentiment from the ‘smile all season’ set and immediately thought of someone who would like this colour scheme.

Supplies:

Stamps: birches, peaceful winter, smile all season (all PB)

Inks: nocturne versafine clair, wilted violet, blueprint sketch, black soot distress inks

Paper: hot pressed watercolour paper

Also: glass mat, clear embossing powder, masking fluid, frisket film

Winter sky

Posted: January 12, 2018 | Author: Heather | Filed under: dressed in snow, peaceful winter, snowy village, Stamped Landscapes | Tags: Brusho, Penny Black stamps, Ranger Distress inks, Tsukineko Memento inks | 8 Comments

It’s taking me a while to get back into gear here on the blog but I have been busy planning my next class. Living as I do surrounded by winter beauty I often look a the sky or the landscape and wonder how I can turn it into a card. This is one such attempt. I looked at the sky one afternoon, because the sun sets in the afternoon around here, there is no waiting for evening! There was a pale pink glow above the horizon, a little blue then grey reaching up. I was managing to create some subtlety with this scene right up until the brusho shook out of the bottle rather more generously than intended! No matter, a lot of water and paper towel calmed things down again.

I started with a panel of hot pressed watercolour paper splattered with masking fluid. I painted some water across the panel where the horizon would be then sprinkled a little ost. red brusho above and blended it in with a paintbrush. Next I added grey brusho and blended that to fill the sky and finally some ost. blue brusho for some blue tones. I kept adding, blending and diluting until I was happy with the soft gradation of colour. While the sky was still damp I pressed just the small tree part of a landscape stamp out of the PB peaceful winter set repeatedly across the horizon inked with memento London fog ink.

I used the stamping platform to stamp and restamp the trees on the right from the PB snowy village set in black soot distress ink. As distress ink is water soluble I was able to paint over the stamping with water to make the image bolder and darker. I added a little blue brusho as I painted to give the tree some light and shadow. I dried the panel before painting another line of water, this time across the panel in line with the base of the tree trunk. Again I added the same brusho colours but got a bit more blue than I’d bargained for.

After drying that section I stamped just the left hand trees from the PB dressed in snow stamp again in black soot ink. I used a paintbrush to darken the stamped image and extend the trees a little more on the right. To finish I rubbed off the masking fluid and mounted the panel onto a white card base. All the supplies are linked below. I hope you have had a great week.

Supplies

Stamps:

Inks: black soot distress, London fog memento

Paint: brusho

Paper: hot pressed watercolour, neenah solar white

Also: masking fluid

Peaceful Winter

Posted: December 5, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: peaceful winter | Tags: Penny Black stamps, Tsukineko Memento inks | 6 Comments

This week I am sharing some winter landscapes here and on the Penny Black blog. I created this wintry scene by combining two stamps from the ‘peaceful winter’ transparent set. I made use of my stamp positioning tool as I wanted to stamp in colour then over the top with versamark. (Jill has created several videos demonstrating this technique. You can find them on the Penny Black youtube channel)

I began by stamping the trees on the left hand side of a piece of watercolour paper in memento northern pine and London fog ink. I spritzed some water over the stamping which made the colours separate into brown, blue and green. I dried the stamping then stamped over the whole image in versamark before embossing it in clear powder to make it waterproof. Next I used the smaller landscape stamp from the same set to add the background trees and used the same technique and inks to stamp a coloured image then emboss it to make it waterproof.

With all the scenic stamping done and embossed I moved on to the watercolouring. I cut a circle of frisket film (clear adhesive film for masking) and stuck it firmly over the top of the left hand trees. I then painted water over the section of sky above the horizon. I pressed both my northern pine ink pad and a memento nautical blue ink pad onto an acrylic block to create a palette of two inks. I built up the sky colour by painting first with nautical blue then creating cloud effects with more blue or northern pine ink. Once the sky dried I removed the moon mask.

I used some diluted northern pine ink to give the foreground snow a bit of colour and shadow then dried the panel. I finished off the card with a sentiment from the ‘love & peace’ set stamped in versafine olympia green and a dark green mat before attaching the panel to a natural white card base.

Thanks for dropping by; I’ll be back tomorrow with another chilly scene.

Supplies

Stamps: love & peace, peaceful winter

Inks: memento northern pine & london fog, nautical blue inks, versamark

Paper: Neenah solar white cardstock, hot pressed watercolour paper

Also: stamping platform, frisket film, WOW clear gloss superfine embossing powder

Bright night

Posted: November 4, 2017 | Author: Heather | Filed under: peaceful winter, snowy village | 11 Comments

Would you believe some new tree stamps join my collection? You can never have too many! These two artistic silhouettes are not two halves of the same tree as you might first think but two separate stamps by Penny Black which come in a set of three, Snowy Village, including a little village stamp that would look cute in the distance between the two trees. My scene leans a little more to the whimsical side of things with a multicoloured starlit landscape.

I started by splattering masking fluid over a piece of hot pressed watercolour paper. When it was dry I used a stamp positioning tool to stamp the two large trees on either side of the panel. The stamp positioner made it possible to stamp several times with versafine onyx black ink so I had completely black images. Once the ink dried I began painting with a range of Ken Oliver’s colorburst powders. I tapped a tiny bit out of a bunch of bottles into a palette then added a drop of water when I was ready to use that colour. I began by painting a section of water in the middle of the panel which stayed fairly light as I added colour above and below. I used mainly blues and pinks above the horizon with a spot of yellow here and there. Below the horizon I added more green and painted some hard edges to suggest gullies and rises. I let the panel dry a bit but not completely before I stamped a strip of distant trees in memento northern pine ink. The strip of trees is from another new PB set, Peaceful winter. As the panel was still damp the background trees softened and bled into the surrounding area.

To finish the scene I splattered water then soaked it up again with a paper towel to get some ghostly dots then splattered a bit of black over the base area. It was tricky deciding whether to mat or not but I ended up popping it up over a white card base.