Standing Ducks

Introducing ‘standing ducks‘, a lovely digital stamp set from Echidna Studios. The weather has turned much warmer round here so there are puddles instead of snow to be seen; the type of weather where you might see ducks standing or swimming around. It is too early for ducklings but in the past we have had to slow down and stop for duck families on the busy road behind our house.

I printed both ducks from the set on hot pressed watercolour paper then painted them with Sennelier watercolour paints. I added some finishing touches with coloured pencils. I also printed the left facing duck on some pastel paper as I received a set of pastel pencils for my birthday and have started learning how to use them. As you can imagine pastel is very soft so it is fun to blend but easy to smudge. When I have done a little more learning and practicing I hope to share some pastel pencil colouring.

This card is another ‘larger than usual card’ measuring just over 5″ x 7″. The piece of watercolour paper I printed on had one deckled edge so I tore the other three edges to keep a deckled look round the whole panel.

Tulips & more tulips

Posted: February 21, 2024 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Echidna Studios, sennelier watercolours, tulip background, tulip set, Watercolour | Tags: digital stamps, Echidna Studios, Faber-Castell Albrecht Durer Watercolour pencils, Faber-Castell Polychromos Colour Pencil, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, sennelier watercolours | 11 Comments

If there are tulips already blooming where you live you must let me know in the comments! It will be another two or three months before they bloom around here. All the more reason to have some blooming here on the blog. The group you see on the card above are part of a new digital stamp called ‘tulip background‘ from Echidna Studios. The whole image is a landscape oriented design and I printed it on hot pressed watercolour paper to be 8½” wide which gave me plenty of choice when deciding which part to use on a portrait oriented card.

I used Sennelier watercolours to paint the design using various mixes of four different reds and pinky red paints. I also used one of the reds to give the green paint a more muted realistic tone. Once I had painted all the tulips and stems I used polychromos pencils to add extra shading and shadow. This is a technique I learnt from Kathy Racoosin and it always adds to the finished panel. I ruled a narrow black line around the panel to frame it.

The flowers below are from a co-ordinating digital set simply called ‘tulip set‘ also from Echidna Studios. The set includes three individual tulips. I didn’t paint this one, my daughter did, using watercolour pencils. She also fussy cut each of the three tulips to create a pretty layered arrangement. This post includes an affiliate link to The Foiled Fox, if you use it I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.

Like a box of chocolates

Posted: January 17, 2024 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Echidna Studios, valentines chocolates | Tags: Echidna Studios, Faber-Castell Polychromos Colour Pencil, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, sennelier watercolours | 6 Comments

We have been enjoying a rather nice selection of chocolates at our place; the Christmas stash is lasting well! Not long after Christmas my husband and I celebrated our anniversary and it is only a month before our February birthdays so we’ve never really been big on celebrating valentines day. That being said, I loved painting this box of chocolates. It wasn’t better than eating chocolate but it was very satisfying all the same. The digital image is from the Valentines Chocolate stamp set which includes two images; the other one has chocolate coated strawberries. And yes they are from Echidna Studios, more of my daughter’s art work.

I printed the image on hot pressed watercolour paper and painted with a limited palette of browns, paynes grey, pink and yellow. I used a white gel pen to add some details and did extra shading with coloured pencils after all the painting was completed.

It’s not very obvious but you might just be able to see the texture of an embossing folder on the card base. I used a large cuttlebug folder with curly patterns, subtle but cute. Thanks for dropping by. May your chocolate stash be ever enough! Today’s post features affiliate links to The Foiled Fox. If you buy through these links I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.

Holly Leaves – framed

Posted: December 12, 2023 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Echidna Studios, holly leaves, Karin brushmarkers | Tags: Echidna Studios, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, Karin brushmarkers, Penny Black stamps, sennelier watercolours | 1 Comment

This is my second pair of cards featuring the new ‘holly leaves‘ digital stamp set from Echidna Studios. In an earlier post I shared the foiled cards which were overfoiled by accident but came out looking very shimmery and still accepted watercolour. For today’s cards I printed the holly images larger and didn’t foil them. I once again used Fabriano hot pressed watercolour paper and Sennelier watercolours to paint the two images.

If you remember the foiled post you might notice I made the same colour choices, an unrealistic blue-green and a more realistic green-green! A little hint if you are painting berries, it is always nice to have a darker and a lighter side to suggest dimension but even without that a little black or white dot can make them immediately more realistic.

I chose to mat these panels and found a suitable blue green but ended up blending mowed lawn distress ink over a piece of light green cardstock to create a matching green for the card above. Blending ink to create matching mats is something Ardyth does all them time. She is full of clever strategies. I chose to add a shadowy background around the blue-green leaves using a grey Karin marker and water to dilute and spread the ink. The sentiments are from PB ‘jolly snippets‘ and ‘light of Christmas‘ sets.

Today’s post features affiliate links to The Foiled Fox. If you buy through these links I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.

Holly Leaves – foiled

Posted: December 7, 2023 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Echidna Studios, holly leaves, Taylored Expressions | Tags: Echidna Studios, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, sennelier watercolours, Taylored Expressions | 5 Comments

The foiling on these cards didn’t work properly yet here they are on display on my blog. I decided the foiling error was pretty enough to use anyway, I just can’t tell you for sure how to achieve this accidental look! The images are new digital stamps from Echidna Studios, called ‘Holly Leaves‘. I printed both images on hot pressed watercolour in my laser printer then foiled with gold foil. Whether it was a smudgy print or a different type of foil I’m not sure but foil attached to the background as well as the outline image.

As you can see, I was still able to watercolour the images using Sennelier watercolour paints. Even though the camera didn’t capture it, the whole outline image is foiled plus some speckling in the background.

I’m not sure that holly comes in the blue green colour I chose for the card above but I like a bluey green so I keep choosing it on my projects. The green shown below might be more realistic.

I added some gold metallic thread then finished both cards with Taylored Expressions sentiment strips.

I have also painted these holly images without foiling but I think this post is long enough so I will share those cards another day. I’ve noticed lately that when my posts are quite long an ad appears before the end of the post. Sadly I have no control over that. If I don’t want ads I have to pay extra to not have them. Just think of my posts like a magazine page, ads do pop up here and there.

I don’t make money from the ads but I do make a small commission if you click one of my links from Foiled Fox or Scrap’N’Stamp. When you buy a digital stamp or cutting file from Echidna Studios both my daughter and I get very excited and congratulate each other! You might have heard the line, ‘When you buy from a small business, an actual person does a little happy dance.’ We dance!

Bethlehem Skyline

Posted: November 30, 2023 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Bethlehem skyline, cricut, Echidna Studios, Penny Black, Silent Night | Tags: cricut, Echidna Studios, Minc, Penny Black stamps, sennelier watercolours | 9 Comments

Today’s post is another long one full of photos. I hope you enjoy seeing the different styles and techniques applied to the new Echidna Studios digital set ‘Bethlehem Skyline‘. I requested this image and I think my daughter did a beautiful job with her design. The set includes a black silhouette and an outline image featured further down this blog post.

To create these first two cards I printed the silhouette image on white cardstock then foiled over the top with black foil. Using blending brushes I blended first scattered straw distress ink then broken china, and finally uncharted mariner for the deep blue sky. I wanted the colours to blend into each other but I didn’t want too much green where the blue and yellow met so I went carefully in that area.

The sky was dark but I wanted a bit darker so blended just a bit of black soot ink around the edges and top of the panel. You might have noticed the image is the same but a different size in each card; that’s the beauty of a scalable digital image. To add stars to the blended sky I spritzed a fine spray of water on the panel and then dabbed it dry with a paper towel. The stars are subtle but they are there. The words Hope and Peace are once again from the PB ‘holiday snippets’ set.

The next style of card features a cut out of the Bethlehem skyline once again using the digital svg file but cut from black cardstock with the cricut. After cutting the silhouette a couple of times we realised the trees were too small for a card sized cut out so added a tree-less image to the set.

I painted a blue and yellow sky with Sennelier watercolour paints then, once dry splattered white acrylic ink over the blue area. When that was dry I attached the black silhouette and embossed a sentiment from the PB set, ‘silent night’.

When cutting the silhouette from black cardstock I also cut a larger one which I have wrapped around cylindrical glass vase. I put a candle inside the vase and lit it but I am not sure whether the candle is bright enough. I am going to keep experimenting and if I can get a good photo I will share it here on the blog. I think the image would look great cut from vinyl and attached to a wooden panel as a nativity sign. Oh the possibilities!

The final card features the other image in the set, an outline of the Bethlehem skyline. I printed it on hot pressed watercolour paper then painted over the buildings with liquid frisket to mask them. The masking made it possible to paint the sky with wet watercolour layers of blue, pink and yellow while preserving the town to paint after the sky dried. To get the soft bleed of pink and yellow into blue I set the panel upside down on the top edge to dry so gravity helped me get the glowing light effect.

I used a mustard yellow to paint the foreground but it was too bright so I added some of the same blue from the sky to give it some shadow. With both the sky and ground completed I removed the liquid frisket(masking fluid) and painted the buildings with Payne’s grey.

I finished the card with a mat of white then a mat of mustard brown and a little PB sentiment in versafine clair ‘morning mist‘ ink. Thanks for reading this far. I hope you enjoyed my different techniques with this lovely image. I think you’ll be seeing it again; its a new fave!

Today’s post features affiliate links to the following companies. If you buy through these links I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. The Foiled Fox & Scrap’n’Stamp

Cape Wickham Lighthouse

Posted: October 13, 2023 | Author: Heather | Filed under: cape wickham lighthouse, Echidna Studios, Stamped Landscapes | Tags: Echidna Studios, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, sennelier watercolours | 10 Comments

Recently I posted a card featuring a bridge in Oregon and asked if anyone knew or had visited the bridge. It was lovely to hear from people who lived in Oregon or had visited. One person lived very near the bridge. I would love to hear from people who have seen today’s lighthouse, it is quite remote. This image is another Echidna Studios digital stamp and is special to me for several reasons.

The lighthouse is called the Cape Wickham Lighthouse and it is on King Island in Australia. My daughter created the digital design from a photo but it wasn’t one of her photos; she’s never been there. The reference photo is from a slide my dad took in 1963 when our family lived on King Island. I was born there and at age 2 had my photo taken in front of the lighthouse. So you see there is input from three generations of my family in this card!

I printed the digital image on hot pressed watercolour paper, masked the lighthouse with a few strips of painter’s tape then splattered masking fluid over the sky. I painted the sky with Sennelier watercolours and while it was still damp painted removed paint with a damp brush to create the beams of light. Once the sky was dry I removed the tape so I could add some shadow to the lighthouse and paint the grass and hut. I removed the masking fluid to reveal the stars once everything was dry. (now I’m not sure that the Cape Wickham light shines out both ways like that but I used artistic license).

Let me know if you have seen or heard of the Cape Wickham lighthouse; it is the tallest in the Southern Hemisphere!

Happy Thanksgiving

Posted: October 9, 2023 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Echidna Studios, Mooneys Trees | Tags: digital stamps, Echidna Studios, sennelier watercolours | 3 Comments

Happy Thanksgiving to all my Canadian readers. Hope you’re having a relaxing weekend maybe enjoying some autumn colour.

These trees are a digital image based on trees in a park not far from our home. What a treat to have such a personal image to paint. I used the simplified cut-out image in Friday’s blog post; this is the sketch version of Mooneys trees from Echidna Studios.

To see these trees beautifully painted with bister watercolour powders pop over here.

Butterflies

Posted: October 3, 2023 | Author: Heather | Filed under: butterflies, Echidna Studios | Tags: Echidna Studios, Finetec artist mica watercolour paint, sennelier watercolours | 2 Comments

The two butterfly images featured on today’s cards are part of a digital set called ‘butterflies‘ from Echidna Studios. If you look closely at the butterfly above you can see a hint of shimmer in that centre blue section. Most of the paint is actually shimmery in real life I just couldn’t capture it on camera.

To get the shimmery look on the wings I painted with traditional watercolours first then painted over the top with finetec pearlescent watercolours.

The stamp above has a line on it which suggests an edge to ground the butterfly; it’s clearly not in flight. I painted the area under the line with a pale grey paint then added water to spread and dilute the colour. You can see I added water to a dryer area; that’s why I got the cauliflower effect. I could have smoothed out the whole area but I occasionally like those kind of watermarks; they add interest. I completed the card with a teeny sentiment which balances the black outlines of the printed butterfly.

The second butterfly is in flight so I have nothing in the scene other than background colour. I printed the digital image with the laser printer on hot pressed watercolour paper then, before painting the butterfly I picked up some smooshed and diluted ink from my glass mat.

I feel like I have described my smoosh, spritz and swipe method many times but if you haven’t heard me mention it before here’s how it goes. I smoosh(press down) a distress ink pad on my glass mat to leave ink. In this case I used tumbled glass, scattered straw and weathered wood. I spritz the ink so it spreads and sometimes blends then I swipe my panel of watercolour paper through the ink. You never know what you’ll get. Sometimes I re-swipe to pick up a bit more ink.

After the abstract background was dry I used Sennelier watercolours to paint the butterfly. Painting a butterfly is trickier than I thought. In my mind the wings are full of blended colour but actually they are full of intricate patterns that don’t blend together. All that to say this is definitely not a botanically correct painting!

Today’s post features affiliate links to the The Foiled Fox. If you buy through these links I receive a small commission at no extra cost to you.

A Portland Bridge

Posted: September 29, 2023 | Author: Heather | Filed under: Echidna Studios, portland bridge | Tags: Echidna Studios, Fabriano Watercolour Paper, sennelier watercolours | 13 Comments

You might recognise the style of this image; it’s a new digital landscape stamp called Portland Bridge from Echidna Studios etsy store. My daughter and I both have designs in her store but this style is one of her strengths, drawn from photos she has taken herself. She was thrilled to compete in Oregon earlier this year and while there took beautiful photos of the surrounding scenery. This bridge is called Lake Oswego Railroad Bridge. I know I’ve had a few readers from Oregon over the years; do you know this bridge?

Echidna Studios includes digital images for printing, cutting or both. (read to the end of this post to learn about a giveaway) I printed this one on Fabriano hot pressed watercolour paper manually fed through my laser printer. I painted the scene with Sennelier watercolour paints starting with a diluted blue sky and the same blue but deeper for the river. After that dried I mixed some green in with the same blue to paint the background trees and added more green for the second and third layer of trees. I used a mix of brown and blue for the rocks. When those areas dried I mixed some light greens, yellows and oranges to paint all the trees clustered around the river and houses. I left the bridge and houses until last, using a white gel pen where necessary to bring back white lines to the bridge. I thought this scene would take me much longer to paint but by working in sections as described above it probably took a bit over an hour.

Pop over to the Echidna Studios store and take a look at the wide variety of images and stencil cutting files available. To be entered in a draw for a free digital image head over to Instagram, follow Echidna Studios and comment on one of their posts. We are wanting to spread the word about these fabulous designs. There are now over 50 designs with new ones being added each week.

The screen shot above shows the settings used to print successfully on watercolour paper. I included it in case you haven’t tried. I open the digital image in Inkscape but you could use other apps. When the printer dialog pops up on the screen I go to preferences so I can select paper quality as heavyweight and paper source as manual. I imagine the dialog box is different depending on your printer but this information might be helpful for you. Being able to print on watercolour paper and not have it brush off or smudge has been wonderful for digital images.

Have a wonderful day.