Tuesday, March 29, 2016

THINK SUMMER! JOYFUL SUNFLOWER

Hi Everyone!
Long time no post!
 
I thought I would share with you how I created this Sunflower painting on Yupo.  This stencil is called Joyful Sunflower from The Crafter's workshop. I used Liquitex High Flow Acrylics and Liquitex Fluorescent Soft Body Acrylic paint.  All the stencil used are from The Crafter's Workshop.




When I start a new painting I really don't know where it's going.
I don't have a plan. I just paint and see what happens. So I may not remember some of the steps I took even with the pictures.
 
First I started using gray on the background and wiping some of it away.
 
 
Then I decided to add some blue and white and scratch in some swirly circles and it looks like a used a alpha stencil too.
 

 
I don't know what I was trying to do here LOL!


 
I didn't like it so white paint always saves the day!
 


Covering the white paint I used this stencil to add more texture to the background.


Plus a little silver too.

 
Here I used a Fineline bottle with a standard tip to add more swirls plus added this stamp with archival inks.
 
As you can tell, it doesn't look like sunflowers.


 
Here are the inks and paints I used for this painting.
 




I love using a brayer on Yupo.
Here I added some greens and blues.
 


Remember the step when I used the standard tip of the FineLine paint bottle (buy it empty and fill it) and made these swirls? Well, this is what it looks like up close. Cool, right?

 
I decided to use the brayer on top and it pulled some of the paint off. I love when that happens.


 
Then I started adding the sunflowers.
I used both the 6x6 and 12x12 sizes.


 
Love the fluorescent colors!


 
Here it is finished before I pulled off the tape.
 
 


I thought you would like to see some of the texture and color.









 
The finished painting.
Now to find a frame!
 
 
 
I hope you enjoyed my weird process.
Because I never know where my paintings are going, this one too about 7 hours to complete. I do take breaks to let parts of it dry before I add more. This is 11x14. I would love to do one much larger.
 
Thanks so much for stopping by!
 
 
The Crafter's Workshop provided me with stencils to create this project. The opinions I share are solely my own because I do love to use them.

Sunday, March 20, 2016

A Poppy Garden: An Art Journal Page

 Hi Everyone!
I have lots to post but no time to edit pictures.
My day job has taken up all my extra time and I took today off to get caught up.

I posted this art journal page on social media but I thought I would show you how I created it.



First, here are all the supplies I used and the links to where you can buy them:

The Crafter's Workshop Stencils (new 2016):
The Crafter's Workshop provided me with stencils to create this project. 
The opinions I share are solely my own because I do love to use them.


Crackle Paint-White (my fav!)
Fluid Acrylics: Titanium White, Carbon Black, Cadmium Orange Hue, Primary Yellow, Cerulean Blue, Primary Cyan
Misters (my fav!): Yellow Green, Orange, Yellow
Dazzling Metallics: Venetian Gold

First, I added the fluid acrylics to the background with a palette knife and then added black on the top. Why? I have no clue; I felt I needed to do it.  After it dried, I added the Chickadee Post stencil with white paint. I started trace the Poppy Garden stencil on the page and I was going to paint it on but I changed my mind.
 


I decided to add the Poppy Garden with crackle paint.


I love how the crackle paint dries to a beautiful crackle.


I'm I right, gorgeous crackle!


Once it dried I added color with the Misters by spraying it on my craft sheet and using my fingers.


I wanted the garden to stand out a little more so I used a sketch and wash pencil and outlined the flowers. I used a water brush to activate the pencil and use it as a watercolor around the garden.


Here are a few close ups.




I haven't worked in my art journals in a while so this was a lot of fun.


I hope you enjoyed my little tutorial.
Thank you for taking the time to stop by!











Sunday, March 13, 2016

Play time experiments

I love the colors of Ranger's Alcohol Inks and wanted to see if I can paint with them.

This is a piece of 5x7 Yupo.
With a brayer I added black India Ink

 

I placed the Trivet Remnant on the Yupo and took a baby wipe and took off the ink to see the stencil design.



Using a brush, I tried to paint on the alcohol inks but that didn't work. It dries fast to I can't get it to look nice. So I just dripped the inks on and let them dry.



It looks really cool. You can't tell from these pictures but the alcohol inks are glossy when dry. I'm not a glossy person so I'm not sure I like it. The India Inks aren't glossy but I do like using them with the India Inks and high flow acrylics.


As you play with supplies, you find out what you like and don't like. I do love using Yupo so there will be more experiments.



Thanks so much for stopping by!

The Crafter's Workshop provided me with stencils to create this project. The opinions I share are solely my own because I do love to use them.




Wednesday, March 9, 2016

One Fish, Two Fish, Pink and Orange Fish?!?!

Hi Everyone! 

I've always be fascinated with Koi.
I love looking into the water and see all the colors.

This piece was created on mixed media paper, acrylic inks, water, and Koi Pond stencil from The Crafter's Workshop.



The background was created by spraying the paper with water and dropping acrylic paint into the water and watching it spread. I just continued until I like how it looked. Drying the layers in between.

Anytime I'm putting a focal image from a stencil on a cool background, I start by adding it with white paint. I do that so the colors on top remain nice and bright.



Before painting the Koi, I added the lily pads.


I'm hooked on fluorescent colors (Liquitex Soft Body) and these are the colors I used for the Koi. 




These fish have about three layers of paint.
I kept changing the colors back and forth.
I finally settled on these colors.




You see more of the background in this picture.



This piece is 11" x 14". 
I still have a few more things to add before I can say it's complete.
I do love it.



Thank you so much for stopping by!


Tuesday, March 8, 2016

It's Time for Spring! Let's Make a Birds Nest!

On The Crafter's Workshop blog I have a post on how I created these two pieces.



Thanks so much for stopping by TCW Blog!
The Crafter's Workshop provided me with stencils to create this project. 
The opinions I share are solely my own because I do love to use them.


Saturday, March 5, 2016

Fancy Feathers and Yupo

Yes, I'm hooked on Yupo.

It started like this....



I started adding more India inks, high flow acrylics and feathers.....



It ended up looking like this.....


This would look great on a large piece of Yupo
but
it's only 5" x 7".

Stencil: TCW389 Fancy Feathers
The Crafter's Workshop provided me with stencils to create this project. 
The opinions I share are solely my own because I do love to use them.

Thanks so much for stopping by!