2019 #15 Coral: Blushing Coral Butterflies with LPC {by Alison Bomber}

2019 Topic 15: Coral

It's always exciting making new discoveries and Alison's use of corals for skin tones is a tip I'll be using. Her gorgeous paint washed seam binding and ombre sentiment makes for an intricate and soft tag showing off some classy painted ladies!

Hi everyone, it's Alison here from Words and Pictures.  I bet you never thought I would be turning up in the Coral fortnight!  It's definitely not a colour I'm used to playing with.  I have made occasional forays into the worlds of pink and/or orange, but you could probably count them on one (and a bit) hands.

But there was one stamp collection I could absolutely envisage me wanting to use Coral with, and it had to be Lynne Perrella's new butterflies. The faces of Lynne's women are one of the places I do reach for a warm blush of pink - and the latest Coral Fresco Finish Chalk Paint colours looked as though they could become my new favourites for that purpose.  And who doesn't love a colourful butterfly?  Time to find out!

I worked on a jumbo tag, which leaves lots of space around that intricately adorned head, so that the exquisite details aren't overcrowded.  Both she and the tiny hanging tag at the top are from LPC043.

I had a lovely time juggling with paint colours which would complement the beautifully warm blush tones of the new Corals.  Here's what I came up with... some aquas, some blues and some greens.  These are colours I'm much more at home with, of course.

The background is very simply painted in Snowflake with some Cloud 9 to warm it up, and then I sponged Seaglass, Glacier Ice and a couple of hints of Granny Smith around the edges for a soft border.

 

I used a stamping platform so that I would be able to re-stamp the details after painting.  First a light stamping in Watering Can Archival...

Then some fun applying all my paint colours and blending and contrasting...

(I usually put small dots of each paint colour that I want to use straight onto my craft mat as a palette, and then use a water brush to paint with. You don't have to put much water through, so sometimes the paint is going on almost undiluted, but you can easily add water to soften a wash if you need to.)

And then the re-stamping..and if you're thinking that it now looks a bit too dark and grey, I agree...

... but the joy of opaque Fresco paints is that you can reapply colour over the top again if you feel the need.

I have to just show you a couple of close-ups of Lynne's amazing butterflies...

... so intricate and delicate, and you get such clarity with PaperArtsy rubber, even on images as detailed as these.

I didn't really register until I was painting it that the woman's garment around her shoulders is also a butterfly's wing.  That's the thing with a Lynne Perrella image - you're always finding beautiful, unexpected extras!

And I was right about loving the Corals to create skin tones and blushing cheeks, by the way.  Let's have a look at the woman on the tiny cut-out tag...

I'll show you the underpainting before the second stamping.  The base skin tone is very watery Peachy Keen (the lightest of the new shades), the first layer of blush is Peach Nectar, and then there's a touch of Coral for that extra flush of heat or pleasure!  Her lips have a smear of Scottish Salmon.

Oh, and then I added a bit of the Scottish Salmon to some Chocolate Pudding (yuck, don't make me eat that combination!) to create a rich auburn for her hair which would echo the coral tones elsewhere because it has some coral mixed into it.

The stamped ribbons are a combination of the same coral paints.  Sorry I didn't fussy-cut out all the bits in between the swirls of ribbon when I cut out the tag... I thought I'd probably mess it up.

The dragonfly wings (another brilliant Perrella touch - I love how they echo the opulent bow around her neck) are done in the aqua tones of Seaglass, Waterfall, Calypso; blue tones of Glacier Ice, Lake Wanaka and Space Cadet; and the green tones of Teresa Green, Granny Smith and Lawn. 

At this point I decided I was really cheating a bit too much... I was basically playing with my favourite blues, turquoises and greens with only the tiniest accents of coral.

Time to up the coral game with my sentiment.  (Hands up who also spotted that I changed the swirling ribbons on the tiny tag from green to coral in the end!) . The quote comes from one of my newest sets, EAB14 The Happiness Edition (see the launch post here if you missed it).

I created a soft ombre background with my coral paints and then stamped in Watering Can Archival again before adding some Wow Vanilla White embossing powder.

I find it's best to stamp with Archival ink when I'm embossing my quotes.  An embossing ink usually gives a slightly stickier, slightly splodgier impression which means you don't get quite such a crisp finish once you've melted the embossing powder.  When you're working with words, that can make all the difference between being able to read them or not!

I added some more script floating off into the background to echo the words around the women's heads.  It's a PaperArtsy stamp, but it's one I got as a little freebie with an order, so I'm not sure what set you might find it in.  It's become a favourite of mine, so if anyone knows...

Ooh, I almost forgot the actual ribbons.  With that full-on coral panel at the foot of the tag, I needed to balance it with some more coral up top.  I spritzed the ivory seam binding with water and smooshed one strand in some watery Peachy Keen in places, another couple in some dots of watered-down Coral, and left the last one off-white.  I love them...

I do think it's amazing how those extra coral touches really make the corals pop throughout the tag...

... even though they are mainly just tiny flecks within those intricate butterfly wings.

So it turns out that this coral business could definitely convert me into a more frequent user of pinks!  I really loved the youthful blush it gave to my butterfly women.  And as a contrasting accent against my much-loved blues, greens and turquoises, it makes them look even more beautiful and jewel-like too.  It was a voyage of discovery, but I'm happy with where I landed.  I hope you'll be inspired to explore the coral reefs too!

Thanks so much for stopping by today.  It's always lovely to hear what you think... especially when I'm out of my comfort zone and playing with being pretty in pink!
Alison x

Blog: Words and Pictures
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