2023 Topic 12: Designer Focus: JoFY {by Autumn Clark}

Hi everyone it's Autumn Clark from SewPaperPaint here with you today.  I've been enjoying some creative time lately, focusing on creating cards and gifts. This designer focus on Jofy had me thinking about building a stash of handmade birthday gifts. So I decided to alter some small canvases with Jo's beautiful stamps.  I hope you'll enjoy this simple process and get inspired to create some gifts of your own.

I really enjoyed experimenting with a new background painting technique using PaperArtsy Fresco Chalk Acrylics and mixing that with watercolor, a favorite of mine.  I hope it inspires you too!

What I loved most about these canvases is that they were as easy to make as a greeting card, but pack a bigger punch and can be displayed on a small easel throughout the year, long after one's birthday celebrations have ended.  

For this project, I didn't have much of a plan in mind, other than wanting to use some beautiful florals and ended up choosing my favorite  set, PaperArtsy stamp set 114 by Jo Firth Young (JOFY114).

I had picked up a small two pack of 5x7" canvases at our Dollar Tree store in the States, which ended up being cheaper than two sheets of 12x12" cardstock!  Score!  I was looking forward to mixing things up with these as substrates.

I scoured my collection and chose two stamp sets that would work together nicely from each designer.  First up was PaperArtsy stamp set 114 by Jo Firth Young (JOFY114).  I really enjoy coloring, but am lazy and cheat a bit - ha ha!  Here I've used cheap brush markers to add a variety of colors to the petals, then I simply used a water brush to blend the colors out.  It's easier than working in layers, but the result is beautifully variegated.  

Here are all of my happy little petals, colored and cut out nicely.  I wanted to create two different compositions with the flowers.

My second choice of stamps was PaperArtsy Eclectica stamp set 32 by Scrapcosy (ESC32).  I knew these darling bees would work beautifully with my blossoms.  I stamped two images and colored, then cut away the body of the second bee.  I curled the wings of the second images and used mounting tape to create 3D critters.

I just love how these bees turned out and the dimension they added to the canvases.  

 

I waited until I had colored my focal images before deciding upon paint colors.  I was really getting excited at this point and could see the project coming to life. I landed upon a beautiful combination of PaperArtsy Fresco Chalk Acrylics to include Butternut, Peach Nectar, Peppermint and Sargasso.  

I started by painting blobs of Sargasso and Peppermint onto the canvases, as shown.  

Next, I added smaller amounts of Butternut and Peach Nectar.  Once my painted layers were dry, I stamped the honeycomb from ESC32 with embossing ink and embossed in white on the panels.  

I started this project back in October because I was going to be away for a month.  When I finally came home at the end of November and was ready to photograph my canvases, the watercolor had sun bleached from laying on my art table in the open sun.  The trees in my front that normally shade my window had lost their leaves and the sun had been beaming in.  You can see how the color is altered in the pic below verses the coloring sample above.  To fix my pieces, I simply added more watercolor.  I actually like the more faded flowers in the end, though I was initially distraught!  Though, I'm going to look deeper into the lightfastness of my inks going forward...  I wish I had photographed them then and could do a side by side comparison.  

I decided to add some encouraging words to my gift panels and picked a very favorite stamp set, PaperArtsy Ink & the Dog Words 2 stamp set (W2) to spell out my chosen text.  

I cut apart each word and dabbed a grey ink pad along the edges, then drew in some black outlines.  

 

 

I really like the pop of white against the colorful backgrounds.  

 

I think the canvases are quite cheery and the colors work together very well. I'm so happy I was able to salvage the faded flowers with a fresh coat of color!

I think I'll search for some simple white frames for the panels or perhaps add some wire and bead hangers for the next set.  I'm also thinking of creating some of these canvases with Jo's fabulously fun snowmen stamps and giving them as Christmas gifts this year.  The possibilities are endless!  I truly hope these projects have made you smile and encouraged you to get stamping.  

xx, Autumn

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2023 Topic 12: Designer Focus: JoFY {by Ellie Knol}

Hi everyone

Ellie Knol from PAPER-STAMPS-COLOR here with you today.

I want to concentrate on a 'wonky bits' style with JoFY stamps as people seem to enjoy that at the moment; I do for one! 

In JoFY's stamp sets are lots of versatile images that are easily fussy cut; I will use them as fodder. Do you know what fodder is? Read on and you will find out. 

The first theme this quarter was tags, and the overall theme typography. My aim is to add these in my project too. Follow the pictures and see where I've incorporated them. 

First things first: I need a book to store these fussy cut images! 

I found a book for photographs with sticky pages; I will recycle it for my purpose!! I need to make it pretty of course. I took it apart, and will adhere gelli printed papers (fodder from my stash) to the covers.

I chose to mainly use the beautiful Jo Firth-Young Stamp Set 127 (JOFY127), but will eventually add fussy cut images into the book from other stamps sets. More fodder! 

So what can be used as fodder?
Another word for it might be: 'stash' to be used later on, on a project. 
I made a list, I've used the first 6 on the front cover of the recycled book. 

- colorful (gelliprinted) papers 

- fussycut images 

- printed tissue paper like JoFY Printed Tissue PT03 

- dried leaves and flowers

- books to recycle

- words and quotes

wooden / paper / grey board alphabets

backgrounds

rub-ons

magazine text and pictures

diecuts, also from colored or text papers

found objects

ephemera

brads and other embellishments

threads and fabrics
Fabric lace and lacy/ structured papers
etc

I stamped the pictures that are fussy cut easily of all my JoFY stamp sets (twice) onto some sturdy paper with a black ink.

So the fussy cutting began.... 

An example of a fussy cut image used on an art journal page; yes it's featured on the page I used as inspiration for my previous post with EAB! 

I love how this has turned out. 

On this second art journal page I used the fussy cut flower from JOFY127, the stamp set featured in this post. I made this page a while ago, and it was the inspiration to create fodder for future use. 

I adhered a laser copy of this gelliprint to the covers of the book.

I am so happy I used a copy as I messed it up. Read on to find out what I did (wrong). 

 

The cover looks so pretty. 

I try getting a nice composition with a few fussy cut images....  

.. lots of possibilities!

 

 

... lots of images to choose from. 

 

While creating this project I suddenly had to be without contact lenses for 3 weeks, and I had to pause this as I couldn't see much. JUST before that situation,  as a final touch, I added a layer of watered down gold mica creative paint. When it dried I knew I made a mistake; it was yellowish all over, and the paint was not as transparent as I'd hoped. 

So, 3 weeks later, with eyesight back, the project needed a twist!
I adhered another copy of the gelliprint and covered it with two layers of PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Satin Glaze, otherwise the paper might absorb too much moisture in the steps to come, and also it acted as a better base for the crackle I want to apply in a future step.  

When dry I applied PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Crackle Glaze through PaperArtsy Stencil by JoFY (PS396) with a palette knife.

I air dried the crackle paint, then lined the stencil back up, and applied a mix of 50/50 PaperArtsy Grunge Paste and Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic (Snowflake, FF15) with a palette knife.   

 

Then the magic happened. There's not as many cracks as I hoped for, but I kind of expected this to be the case. Grunge paste , being so thick, is logically going to be more complicated to crack than a thinner product like paint, so potentially not as 'crackable' as Fresco Paints, and the surface area of the stencil pattern was not that big. But the mix of the 2 produced this result, what do you think?

 

LOVE this PaperArtsy Stencil by JoFY (PS396)!

This, adding finishing touches, is always my most favorite part of a project.

I try to balance dark and light to create depth and interest.

It needs a bit more color.. I sponged Worn Lipstick Distress Ink -  to areas and sprayed it with water. 

No.. it needs Infusions!
Infusions - Royal Blood; dried with a heat tool:

and Blackcurrant...

.. and also a little Rusty Car and Sleight Blue! 

All of them in a row : Infusions Dye Stain - 
Blackcurrent, Rusty Car, Sleight Blue and Royal Blood.

Back to the fodder: here you see JoFY Printed Tissue PT03 adhered to some edges.
I am not sure whether I will use all of these fussy cut images, though. The dried fern leaf has been adhered and covered with watered down bookbinding glue. 

LOTS going on.. I know, but I like it!
White splatters... extra color added to the images, white border around the dried fern leaf and around the gelli print as a frame.. also 3 small tags.. 

Where's the typography?
.. the word 'timeless', stamped script in the background, and of course the script from the Printed Tissue!

 ... and the flower head needed more yellow as a final touch! 

 

I have some useful fodder! For future projects! 

 

I'm sure you've noticed that I kept going, not sure whether it would work, messing up a background and continuing with a new idea. Sometimes a project has to go through an ugly phase, to end up being a very unique project, prettier as envisioned in the first place, and very personal.

Creating or collecting fodder is timeless.. I find inspiration in them, and sometimes use them years later. Just imagine a creative space without fodder..  it would be a quite boring space. 
Keep saving and creating fodder! Look at the list (above in the post) and save it all!
A start could be creating a book with just stamped and fussy cut images; as shown in this post.
Find the background and project for these fodder images later, maybe years later. Easy.. 
Have fun!

Ellie Knol

Blog: http://elliecreahoekje.blogspot.nl/
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