GD: Clare Lloyd #2 Altered Canvas

"Hi everyone, Clare here back with my second project of the week. I Hope you are all ready as I will be making a scene! Talk about diva tendencies…LOL"!

It all started with a 6” x 4” box canvas which I painted with a thin coat of Snowflake as the base {this acts as the perfect primer before applying subsequent layers to any porus surface}. I wanted a good coverage before I applied a layer of Mermaid.

A rummage through my extensive stencil collection produces this Mini Kaleidoscope Stencil. Out came the Grunge Paste and a palette knife, I then applied a layer across 2 thirds of my canvas front. 

Now to cover the paste using a layer of transparent Beach Hut so is doesn’t cover my base colour completely. Stipple colour around Grunge Paste pattern and then brush smooth strokes all over the canvas to tie the colours in.

It's quite nice if you can get it so the coverage of both colours is a bit streaky, it adds some interest and variation.

Next some stamping with Black Archival Ink and the lovely mini flourish from the Squiggly Ink Collection Tops and Tails (Plate 1)  around the edge of the canvas

and then down the remaining third of the canvas front using Squiggly Mini stamp 8. 

You have to bear in mind on a deep box canvas the edges are well supported by the wood frame, so you will get sharp stamped image easily there, but on the middle the canvas is not so well supported, so its harder to get a perfect image. However, as this is a background, and I have things to go on top, its not a crucial detail in this situation.

I decided the edges might be interesting with another layer, so playing with the coverage levels of the Fresco Paints I went in with some Lake Wanaka, making my own ink/paint palette by spreading a thin layer of paint on scrap paper and then tapping Squiggly Mini15 into it to 'ink up' your stamp so to speak!

And I repeated this idea on the front panel too.

So that is the background done. Next I needed to make the 'scene'.

I decide to stamp this sentiment from Tops and Tails Plate 2 and chop it up to go on my canvas.

The stamping of lots of small elements from Squigly Ink: Flora and Fauna (Plate 2),

Squiggly Ink: Flora and Fauna (Plate 3)

and Squiggly Ink: Flora and Fauna (Plate 6) 

plus the frame stamp Squiggly Mini16 

all stamped onto PaperArtsy's Heavy Weight White Stamping Card. 

They all get coloured in the same way. I painted a super thin layer (add some water) as base colour for the image using Tango, Lake Wanaka, Beach Hut and Mermaid and then added shading/dimension using a few pencil crayons. 

My bird houses need something to sit on so I used some PaperArtsy Lace and painted it using Little Black Dress.

And placed it on the canvas

It all comes together on my canvas stuck down using hot glue as this gives some more dimension as well.

The addition of a few more embellishments; flowers, bird etc from the various stamp plates fill the gaps, link it all together and make nice finishing touches.

The next day I looked at my canvas again and decide to add some sketching to frame the sentiment boxes and also a touch of Glossy Accents to make the embellishments pop. Sometimes you see things better when you walk away and come back to them, and you just know what's needed.

Thanks for joining me today, and for your comments yesterday I'll see you again tomorrow with my final project, and it's another Squiggly idea.

Clare

Leandra Says: There's nothing better to cheer up this awful weather with something bright and cheery in the colour combo! It's nioce to see the Squiggly Ink stamps, the Flora and Fauna series are a particular fave of mine. Thanks Clare

Gillian Says: Another fab project Clare using the Squiggly Ink collection, great colour combo to suit the quirkyness of the images.

If you would like to join in this week's challenge and play along with Clare's techniques, then do link up your creativity here, and go in the draw to win some PA stamps of your choice! You need to link your entry by 17:00, Sunday January 12th 2014.

Welcome New GD: Clare Lloyd #1 Altered Wooden Spool

"Hi everyone, Clare here with my first project for PaperArtsy. This week I am using some Squiggly Ink stamps in a variety of ways, I hope you find these projects might trigger your muse to adapt the ideas into something you could do too.

There are a lot of little elements that all go together to make my finished project so lets start with the wooden spool base.

To begin with I painted the wooden spool with some Snowflake which would act as a base coat. Once dry I painted both ends with Little Black Dress.

Next, the decorative panel that will wrap around the spool. I measured and cut some card to size with a bit extra to overlap. 

and then stamped with Squiggly Ink: Tops and Tails (Plate 3) 

Next I painted the panel with a watery layer of Inky Pool. It's a translucent, but by watering it down further you can control how much pigment goes onto the cardstock.

The flower detail is painted with Tango, Inky Pool and Tinned Peas.

Tips: If you want the orange to contrast more, then put a little bit of snowflake under the orange flowers first, or don't wash the inky pool over the actual flower heads. And if you find painting small areas like this tricky, then dip the hard end of your paint brush handle into the paint and dab spots of paint onto the flowers.

I decided to add little extra stamp detail to the top and bottom of the panel using a flourish from the Squiggly Ink Collection: Tops and Tails (Plate 2).

Once everything is dry wrap it around and glue it down.

Now, I wanted to create a little altered 'character' to add to the top of the spool. I chose 2  images from the Squiggly Ink Collection: Tops and Tails (Plate1) 

and thought it might be fun to use the centre bird house from Squiggly Ink:Flora and Fauna (Plate 3), as the character's body.

 They were stamped using Black Archival Ink,and then base coats painted using blush...

and my already selected colour scheme of Tango, Inky Pool and Tinned Peas

Next I added a little extra depth and shading using some complementary pencils.

I then cut them all out and used some twisted black wire to build my little altered character.

wrapping the wire doubled up around a pencil to get the spring for the neck

You can adjust the spring/ neck quite easily, this can be a neat way to give her some personality by cocking the head to the side too.

I decided to add some additional layers to my base spool using Prima Finnabair VintageTrinkets. These were painted black with Fresco Acrylic Paint.

I buffed on some Indigo Treasure Gold 

and added a little flourish stamp from Tops and Tails 2.

Okay so now it is time to put it all together so you can see the inner workings of my mind!

The Prima Finnabair Vintage Trinkets were glued on the top and bottom of the spool; then my character on the wire was threaded through and the wire folded to one side under the base.

To fasten everything securely, I squeezed a large blob of hot glue onto my craft mat,

pressed my altered spool firmly into the hot glue and peeled it off the mat when cooled. This gives the spool the stabilty it needs, as the wire would leave a bit of a lump.

As luck would have it, this embellishment has a slight recess for the wire to sit in too

The finished altered spool.

Hope you enjoyed this project, I'll see you all again tomorrow night.

Clare

Leandra Says: Hi Clare, great to have you here! Awesome job with those Squigglies! I love how easily the pencils add depth to the painted base, and the Prima Bellies make a great addition to the detail of the spool base. Fabulous and welcome!

Gillian Says: Welcome Clare, lovely to have you kick start the GD adventures for 2014 with such a fun/quirky project. The Squiggly Ink images are perfect for such a project. Love it.

If you would like to join in this week's challenge and play along with Clare's techniques, then do link up your creativity here, and go in the draw to win some PA stamps of your choice! You need to link your entry by 17:00, Sunday January 12th 2014.

Challenge Winners and New Beginnings for 2014

Last week we had some amazing videos from Leandra. Don't forget to subscribe to the PaperArtsy YouTube channel so you get automatic notifications as soon as a new video goes up. Leandra's focus in the last series of 4 was using Grunge Paste in all kinds of ways with stencils, tinted GP, Treasure Gold and more. 

Thanks to everyone who joined in and made projects alongside Leandra. You are the very lucky ones, as your prizes are brand new, not yet released PaperArtsy products! None of these will be available until Late Jan/ early Feb so you are being well-rewarded for joining in the fun!

1. And the winners are...

Video 1. Sanded foundations : Margriet

Video 2. Abstract Canvas Prep: Hazel

Video 3. Painted Clusters: Jamie

Winners please get in touch with Darcy (darcydotneedles@hotmail.com) with your full  name and  address.  

2. The year ahead...
2014 Guest Designers

As you know we have a new bunch of Guest Designers for 2014 waiting in the wings. Each designer is appointed for a semester which runs for 4 months. Each designer is allocated a week of the month to post, either week 1, 2, 3 or 4, and they post Sunday thru Tuesday in depth, technique based ideas to show how they use PaperArtsy products in their preferred style. These posts will be supported with plenty of step by step pictures of how they got from A to B and the issues and happy accidents they encountered along the way.

The designer gets introduced at 7pm on Sunday night, and we put a link-share facility on that 7pm post so that during the week you can join in with the ideas they develop and play along. Shortly after at 7:15 the first post of the week is published. We encourage you to participate as much as you can. Learning new skills, colour combinations and enjoying being creative is not only a great way to relax, but it is also a wonderful way to add to your repertoire of crafty skills, and the designers love it when you have a go at their ideas. They are often available on twitter to answer questions around the time the blog post goes live.

For 2014 we have deliberately appointed a wide variety of styles, and some of them are shaking in their boots, and others are well seasoned at this kind of thing. We love what every single one of them has to offer us all this year, and I hope you will welcome them warmly to their new home.

2013 Guest Designers

We couldn't bring ourselves to chuck our fabulous 2013 contributors out of the PaperArtsy nest after all the amazing art they created last year, and I don't think they want to go either! So we have asked them to continue to participate this year at the latter part of each week with shorter posts that might inspire you to find an hour to do a quick weekend make. They will also be joined by some other one-off guests, again, you might know some of them, and others will be new to you. And of course, you can use the Sunday night inLinkz link-tool to show how you are inspired all week long by the returning guests.

Hello to our shops

This year we are also doing a regular feature introducing you to some of the shops that we supply all over the world. They will be telling you about where they are, what types of classes they teach in store, and which PaperArtsy products they and their customers love. Some of these guys have been with us since we started up 10 years ago, so it will be nice for us to have a peek into their lives.

Signature designers

Darcy will be kicking off a feature of her own in 2014, I shall leave that to her to explain in due course. We also have regular posts scheduled with Jo Firth-Young and Lin Brown will be dropping in too once she recovers from her recent surgery. Plus, our own Gillian, admin guru will be sharing more often this year too. Leandra will keep up the videos of new products and techniques throughout the year.

Shows
As you know, we attend several events during the year, a full listing of the events for 2014 is on the side bar of the retail shops, and here on the blog too. Our first event in 2014 is:  
February 9th (Sunday):10-4pm, Stamperama 
Stevenage Arts and Leisure Centre, Stevenage
Leandra and Jo Firth-Young demoing with our newest 2014 PaperArtsy Product releases.

3. The week ahead...
Tonight we welcome our first guest of 2014, Clare Lloyd. Clare has all kinds of talents. 

I think her style will resonate really well with the vast majority of PaperArtsy creatives. She paints, she stamps, and she does lots of stuff with other stuff! Exactly what we like to do too.

She loves to journal in a very mixed media style

Often she adds hand drawn faces and elements to her work.... I hope she shares her face drawing skills and technique, she's really good!

She does other dimensional stuff too like this cute guy, and cards too.

I particularly love the way Clare uses paint and she layers shades magnificently. I'm sure her varied skills will have wide appeal with you guys. Currently she's on a bit of a journalling kick, so I think this could be the focus of a lot of what we see from here, but don't be too quick to put her in a box just yet because this week she's exploring the Squiggly Ink stamp collection. 

But first, a few words from Clare herself:

Hi everyone, my name is Clare Lloyd and I have been crafting since I was tiny, as my Mum was always sewing and my Grandma always knitting. 

My real journey with crafting began when I was diagnosed with breast cancer at the age of 32. I’m one of the lucky ones however and 8 years on I have the all clear. Crafting got me through some very dark days and I vowed not to let it disappear again because of my teaching job. 

My crafting style has changed greatly over this time but in the past couple of years I have discovered art journaling/altered art which allows me to become really creative and express myself. At my craft table, I can make as much mess as I like and it doesn't matter; it helps me escape my everyday worries and relax. 

I’m very much a mixed media artist/crafter, who loves stamping so my new links with the team at PaperArtsy are a dream come true and I can’t wait to see what this semester has in store!

My blog: miscanthuscrafts.blogspot.com

My Instagram: http://instagram.com/misscraftmad

My Vimeo channel: https://vimeo.com/user12340518

Clare's first project will be up soon, so get ready... but first, don't forget about....

4. PA Weekly Challenge....{Clare Lloyd and other guests}

I do hope that you will find time to join in with our new GD Clare Lloyd this week. But here's something new, Clare will be joined in the latter part of the week with other surprise guests, and of course, if you are inspired by any item you see on the blog this week, then please share what you get up to, and link your creativity here. 

Your challenge entry can link to your own blog, Pinterest or Flickr pages, or any webpage that shows us what you have made in response to the posts on the blog this week. Just make sure you come back to this post, and use the linking tool below to show us your entry. We have extended the challenge entry deadline to 5pm on Sunday evenings.

Make sure on Sunday 12th January  by 17:00 (5pm London time) you need to have your link entered below, and you will go into one of 2 draws to win new stuff.

Draw guidelines
The first draw is for every single entry listed, so if you have multiple entries, you get entered multiple times. 

The second draw is only for one entry per name, and the winner of Draw 1 is not included in this second draw. Having 2 draws makes it fair for everyone, no matter how many times you can join in during the week.

As this challenge is to show how you have been inspired to action by this week's designer, make sure in your blog post you explain what prompted you to create.

Please don't feel you need to copy a designer's work exactly, it may be one small aspect or idea that you want to explore that sends you into the creative zone. You are also welcome to use any stamps/ products / substrates you have to hand, we do not expect you to exclusively use PA products - but of course it is lovely when you do!

The winners are announced Sunday evenings in the 7pm blog post (as above). It is your responsibility to check back and see if you have won. If you are a winner, email Darcy darcydotneedles@hotmail.com with the name of the stamp you would like, and your snail address. We do not chase people for unclaimed prizes.

If we are away at an event, then the winners post would generally be updated by Monday evening with draw details.

Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic Paint Video {a reference tool}

Hello Everyone, Leandra here,

This is one of those informational posts you should bookmark if Frescos float your boat! With a video at the foot

We have a new paint 'tick' chart.
This is a collectors 'tick' postcard so you can check off the paints as you collect them. It is not an exact indication of true colour, but it is a ballpark indicator. Matching printed shades to real life paint is impossible over a broad range of shades like this.

DIY Paint colour record
Darcy also created the chart below where you can paint the colours you have already got out to create a real record of what you already own.

Download your copy here:  http://www.paperartsy.co.uk/pdfs/FrescoFinish72.pdf

Fresco Colour Mixing Methods
For a fantastic explanation of how to mix bespoke colours of Fresco, you should check out this post from Liz Borer. Liz explains it perfectly, and shows you how to use paints to create all kinds of new colours, and how to make them tone in with each other for a specific project. Its really useful stuff and will open up a world of options for you.

http://blog.paperartsy.co.uk/2013/11/welcome-back-elizabeth-borer-1.html


Information video: Fresco Chalk Acrylics
We wanted to put together a video to show you all the 64 Fresco paint colours and how they relate to each other in one summary video. 

This will help you see first hand the differences between the colour families, and help you choose paint. In addition to those shown on the video, we also have Gold, Silver, and 6 glazes.

Remember every computer monitor will show colour differently depending on how your screen is configured. If you compare a real life paint to the screen, you will get a sense of how true your screen displays. 

Don't forget to subscribe to the PaperArtsy You Tube Channel so you can see all the new videos as soon as they are released. There are plenty of Fresco technique videos there with lots of tips and information that are very handy if you are new to using acrylic paints.

Here is the video below






Thanks for watching!

Leandra

2013 Christmas Cracker Video #3 {Painted Clusters}

Hello Everyone, Leandra here, for another Christmas Cracker of an idea

2013 Christmas Cracker Video #3 : Painted Clusters

There are so many embellishment items out there that can be added to your projects to add dimension and textural interest.
For example:

• metal charms
• embellishments (Prima Mechanicals, Finnabair Vintage Trinkets, Ideaology)
• paper and Fabric flowers
• resin cast frames, icons, birds and dimensional beads
• Buttons
• wooden die cut figures, tokens
• Vintage keys

We often use these items to add interest to photo or mirror frames, scrapbook layouts, assemblage-mixed-media 3D constructions,  journal pages, etc. Using such items doesn't have to be complicated, how about using dimensional things for a little birthday gift card or a gift-tag to accompany a bottle of wine. Or what about making a wearable item, like a brooch or vintage style hair piece for a special event.

If you go to the Prima website (they make the most striking embellishments which, of course, crafters love) you will see loads of examples from their assorted designers using lots of these kinds of embellishments. Generally it involves a lot of flowers, and gorgeous colour combinations.  

I particularly love Finnabair's take on this trend of clustering, in fact, if you go waaaay back on her blog she would use lego, wire coils, spark plugs and all manner of found objects.  Anna is certainly a cluster queen; she manages to arrange an assortment of objects so beautifully, and typically she will spray on top with dye sprays, or paint with metallic paints.

Inspired by Finn the week before Christmas I made (and blogged) a simple white heart for the wall of hearts we have in the kitchen. I thought it would be nice to show you another twist on this idea in a video. This time I'm using shades of dark pink and purple frescos (yes really!) which will be accented with Treasure Gold.

 

First I applied the tinted Grunge Paste (Spanish Mulberry) to the canvas heart that I had cut from the canvas board in the last blog post. And used a palette knife to create texture, and then used  a heavy gel to secure the embellishments while the GP was wet.

Fresco paints grab perfectly to metal, no need for gesso first like you would for most other brands of acrylic. Just apply the fresco opaques directly to the metal, glass, acrylic etc With projects like this you need to use a strong gel, leave to set for 24 hrs, then start layering the paint in and around all the nooks and crannies.

It's always interesting to see the transformation that takes place when you add fresco paint and treasure gold to dimensional objects. We have done many versions of this type of projects in recent years, many of our ArtsyCrafts projects were created using this concept. 

So check out the video to see how I use the paints to transform this heart. Don't forget, if you want to join in and try out this technique, the details are at the foot of this post.

Cracker Ingredients:
Craft Tools: Soft paint brushes for paint and Treasure Gold
Prima: Mechanicals and other embellishments
Fresco Chalk Acrylics:  Spanish Mulberry, London Night, Squid Ink, Claret, 

Cracker Method:
In today's video we are arranging some items in a simple cluster, and exploring how PaperArtsy Chalky Fresco Paints with Treasure Gold dusted over can create a soft and delicate effect.

As you know, Frescos are designed to cling to any surface, and so they are easy to apply to metal, plastic, resin, wood and even glass. The natural tooth the chalky paint has allows the Treasure Gold to easily cling to the surface, and as Treasure Gold is permanent on any surface, it will not rub off. This technique is suitable for many crafting applications, so what are you waiting for?





Play Along:
Link how you have been inspired by this technique below. Play along and you will go in the draw to win a set of Limited edition paints and a brand new 2014 PaperArtsy A5 stamp set.

Link closes 17:00 Sunday Jan 5th 2014.

Winner for Christmas Cracker Video #3 will be announced 19:00 Sunday January 5th 2014.