Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 3 – Part 5 – Lilac Acrylic Paint Splatters

It has been soooooo long since I did anything on my multimedia art journal and I left my third layout incomplete as I ran into a creative block of sorts. I purchased some new Tim Holtz stencils and so I wanted to give them I shot but I quickly found my gesso with stencils skills inadequate still. As I glared at my craft supplies in frustration, suddenly, a spark ignited and I grabbed the tiny lilac tub of acrylic paint. The tub was leftover from a completed paint-by-number kit. I used the light purple paint and the Tim Holtz Splatter stencil to create lovely paint splatters all over the layout. I absolutely love how this turned out and I feel invigorated again to complete this layout.

 

This is really why I love art. I came home feeling angry and annoyed and simply creating something pretty with a pleasant texture just clears all the stress away. And as this idea sparked more ideas started to flow. Look at that texture!

Birthday Card Making – Paper Smooches Nine Lives Cute Cat Stamp with Teresa Collins He Said/She Said Pattern Paper

I started this card with a warm-toned beige cardstock from the Simon Says Stamp March 2015 Card Kit which I cut to size and then used the Martha Stewart Scoring Board to score a line in the middle and fold the cardstock in half to create my card base.

Next I chose the pattern papers I would use on the card. I wanted to do something different from the norm and I had a bit more time to waste on this card having the night off work and no one was at home, so I took my time with it and had a lot of fun.

The papers are from a Teresa Collins 6×6 paper pad called ‘He Said She Said’ and I chose two coordinating pattern papers with orange. I was making this card as a birthday present for a friend who happens to be red-headed and happens to also really like the colour orange, so I tried to make the card as ‘ginger’ as possible.

I wanted to try a few new things with this card and I hadn’t used the new die cuts I had purchased from Simon Says Stamp that I really wanted. I purchased the Simon Says Dies and Stamps From Me To You Set FMY175 Better Together a while ago as the set has many elements that I think are very versatile.

If you like haul posts, you can check out the post I made for when I got Better Together Simon Says Stamp Die & Stamp set by clicking here. Unfortunately my Big Shot didn’t cut it out properly and I had already packed the Big Shot back away and didn’t want to get up again to run it back through…

…So I decided to just try and fussy cut the rest out to touch it up a bit. I think it has a nice, ‘hand-made’ look to it. Haha!

I have always loved this happy anime-style cat from the Paper Smooches Nine Lives stamp set. I stamped him out onto white card stock then I decided to colour him in using some orange Faber-Castell Gelatos.

I drew some gelatos around the edges in the lighter orange and rubbed it in using my finger and then added some value by repeating the process with the dark orange. I was really excited by how the cat was looking.

Next I used a darker orange Faber Castell Connector-Pen to make some darker values and to give the ginger cat some little tiger stripes. So cute!

After that I fussy cut him out and went around the edges using the Memento Tuxedo Black ink pen. I cut out a ribbon from some plain white cardstock and then coloured it using the same two Faber Castell Gelatos that I had used to colour in the cat.

I cut the pattern papers in two halves and aligned them on the card disjointed. I arranged the cat on the bottom to cover the bottom joint. I really liked this effect. I arranged the ‘wishing’ die cut on top of the ribbon and adhered it using a glue pen. Then I stamped ‘you happy birthday’ from the same stamp set underneath using Versafine black ink – it’s very crisp!

Because the pattern paper was a little bit dull in comparison to the orange of the gelatos on the cat and the ribbon, I decided to rub some gelatos down the thicker stripes of the right-hand side pattern paper and added a scratched line in the dark orange of the Faber Castell Connector Pen. I think this really finished the card off nicely and brought everything together.

I really love how this card turned out and I can’t wait to try this gelatos colouring idea again in the future. I would also like to make more cards using the Simon Says Stamp Better Together set.

Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 3 – Part 4 – Faber Castell Gesso with Tim Holtz Dot Fade Stencil

I just felt like the whole layout was a bit too bright and vibrant and I wanted to tone it down a little, especially if I’m going to have another sentiment or a quote on the page – which I’m still trying to brainstorm, but I didn’t know how I was going to desaturate the page. As it turned out when I was trying to add Tim Holtz Dot Fade stencil accents using gesso, I was continually mucking up the gesso, as I always seem to do when applying gesso, and when I mucked up, I just rubbed the gesso in a circle using a baby wipe and that’s what has created that cloudy effect that has really dulled down the colours in exactly the way I wanted. Such a beautiful mistake. I love the effect! As well as the smokey effect, as I had left some gesso dots on the page for a while before attempting to remove them with the baby wipe, I added a dimensional effect quite by accident. Really happy with how this multimedia art journal session turned out. But now I’m outta ideas!

Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 3 – Part 3 – Simon Says Stamp Love Heart Border Clear Stamp

For some reason I felt the need to put lines of love hearts all over the page using Memento Dew Drop Ink pads in hues Teal Zeal, Rose Bud and Lilac Posies, alternating between the three colours. It was kind of a cool idea I suppose, but it is a very vibrant and bright result. And still at this stage I do not have an end result in mind so I have no idea in which direction this decision is going to lead me. I do like the blending of the colours and I think it brings down the pink a little and is starting to lead it more towards the purple I was looking for. I used a love heart border stamp from a Simon Says Stamp exclusive stamp set called Sending and Wishing from the Better Together release.

 

 

Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 3 – Part 2 – Blue Gelatos Swirls

Because I had created a more magenta-pink colour for my background, when I was aiming for a purple, I decided to try adding some blue to try and trick the eyes into automatically mixing the colours together themselves. I didn’t really like the way the blue gelatos blended together with the colours already on the page, as it was quite strong, so I changed my tact once more and decided to do wispy swirls and accents all over the page.

Seriously, if you haven’t tried doing multimedia art journals yet, try it! It’s so relaxing, rewarding and motivating! Even when you make mistakes or things don’t go according to your initial plan, it is still incredibly enjoyable and you can just continuously evolve your vision.

Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 3 – Part 1 – Washi, Gesso, Ink and Gelatos

I’m sooooo excited to be starting another multimedia art journal layout. I seriously love creating these pages. As I was finishing up my second layout, which you can check out by clicking here, I already felt I needed to make the next page purple. So that’s how I started!

I put a strip of purple and white striped washi tape down the middle of the page along the binding to give it some strength as already with the other two layout pages the remaining pages were starting to stretch away from each other. After that, I did a gesso wash to give the page a nice surface to work on. From there I did a light wash using a baby wipe and the Tim Hotlz purple ink called Seedless Preserve. I then went around the edges with a pink Faber Castell Gelato and rubbed it in with my finger. I don’t own a purple gelato and using the pink brought out the red in the ink more making the whole page look more magenta then purple.

I had to solve this… as I definitely wanted the page to be more purple than pink.

Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Complete

This is my second multimedia art journal layout which, just like my first multimedia art journal layout that you can check out here, I’m very proud of and I had a lot of fun creating. If you’re interested in seeing the process of the creation of the art journal layout click the links below each picture to take you to the individual posts where I describe my actions for what was captured in each of the photos.

Please leave me a comment with what you think of these multimedia art journal layouts.

Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 1 – Gesso and Tim Holtz Distress Ink Background

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 2 – Faber Castell Gelatos

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 3 – Faber Castell Connector Pens

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 4 – Kaisercraft Weekday Schedule Acrylic Stamps

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 5 – Tim Holtz Layering Stencil Rays with Gesso

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 6 – Acrylic Paint Background

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 7 – Tim Holtz Layering Stencils Dot Fade

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Multi-Media Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 8 – Light Blue Acrylic Paint Dot Fade Stencil

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 9 – Hero Arts Flower Stamp Border & Gesso Rays

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 10 – Now What?

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 11 – Acrylic Painting Studio Calico Mistable Clouds

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 12 – Every Cloud Has A Silver Lining

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 13 – It’s A Very Blue Layout

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 14 – Finding Clock Pictures

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 15 – Distressing the Clock Pictures

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 16 – Making a HUGE Mess

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 17 – Adhering the Clocks

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 18 – Drafting the Quote

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 19 – Adhering the Quote & Clouds

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 20 – Connector Pens Make a Comeback

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Multimedia Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 21 – Memento Ink Tuxedo Black, White Gel Pen & Wink of Stella Glitter Pen Details

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Multi-Media Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 21 – Memento Ink Tuxedo Black, White Gel Pen & Wink of Stella Glitter Pen Details

After another long, hard night at work and then coming home and completing my daily chores, I eventually sat down as I really wanted to finish this multimedia art journal layout. As my younger brother, who is living with me at the moment, was cooking pancakes from scratch, I zoned out by going over the black lines of the antique clock faces with my Memento Tuxedo Black Ink Marker Pen.

The side of my little finger is covered in black ink because I kept touching it while it was still wet and smudged it in a couple places. I tried to fix it up as best I could. I was a bit confused where some of the lines were going on the smaller clocks so fudged my way through that as best I could as well. I decided to add a black border around the large clock in the middle and the smaller clocks. The other clock face to the left-hand side had the border already, I simply traced over it.

I thought it looked a lot better with just this detail. But then I was thinking I wanted to try and bring the clouds out a littler more. So I went around each of the clouds with a white gel pen creating some faux stitching. It didn’t really show up too well in the photo though.

While I still had the white gel pen in hand, I thought… why not add some white highlights to the clock faces? So I traced over pattern on the clock face that had become so faded that I could barely see it because of the printer ink, the Tim Holtz Distress Ink and then all the washes of acrylic paint. I loved how it came out though! I really think that it added that little something extra that I was looking for.

And then finally, on the middle clock face again, I went over the pattern with the silver Wink of Stella glitter pen. Because the pen has liquid and there’s ink and paint on the clock face the tip of my Wink of Stella pen turned blue. But I just did a couple strokes on a plain piece of paper and it removed the ink and returned to normal again – I was relieved.

I’m now calling this complete and I really love how this finally turned out!

…Oh and by the way if you were wondering, the pancakes my brother cooked were delicious!

Multi-Media Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 20 – Connector Pens Make a Comeback

I had left this alone for a while even though I felt it wasn’t quite finished. Finally I sat down for five minutes (probably a bit longer but it seemed like only five minutes) to do a little more work on this multimedia art journal layout. It wasn’t a lot; it really was a little.

I grabbed my blue Faber Castell Connector Pens again and re-scribbled the borders that had been covered up when the antique clock faces were adhered using Faber Castell Gel Medium. I used the same technique as last time where I would use my finger to rub and blend the Connector Pen’s ink and then do some more scribbles over the top; thus continuing the messy effect.

Because I had used my finger to rub the ink, the ink had transferred and stained my finger. It was kind of funny at the time because my younger brother was listening to a 90’s music playlist and that song, ‘I’m Blue Dabadee’ was playing.

Multi-Media Art Journal 1 – Layout 2 – Part 19 – Adhering the Quote & Clouds

I forgot to mention in the previous post that it took aaaages to pop all the darker orange letters out. I think it was quite serendipitous actually as I had splurged, quite naughtily and against my will (but not really), and purchased a whole bunch of letter sets and washi tape from Craft Online for one of their Super Saver Saturday Sales.

And I had ordered the clearance Basic Grey alphabet sets from the Green at Heart and Picadilly collections. Bargain Prices! I love it. The Green at Heart collection is the cardboard alphabet set that took quite a while to punch all the letters out and arrange on the page. And the light orange letters that are flat are from the Picadilly collection.

The order had arrived just before the idea came to me to do the quote in orange.

I laid the quote out in three different ways trying to figure out how I wanted it to look and where it would look best and I had to try and fit in the clouds and not cover up too much of the clocks. So that was probably the hardest and most time consuming task I had had so far… until…

…It came to adhering the letters. The glue on the back of the of the letters is just not enough when it comes to an art journal so I needed to use gel medium. Every. Single. Letter. I had to pick up, put gel medium, press the letter down. Pick up the next letter, put gel medium, press the letter down. Letter, letter, letter. Cloud! Just to mix things up a little. Haha, it was so tedious. I was glad I had a quiet night at work so I was able to adhere the whole lot with minimum interruptions from the phones.

I really, really love how it came out.

Again, I’m having thoughts of coming through again with some shadowing and using the Connector Pens to scribble the outline border.

Oh! And looking at the photo, I’ve just realized I haven’t adhered the dots for the three letter ‘i’s’. I’ll have to adhere those when I next get a chance. Although it took well over an hour to do, I still had a lot of fun with step and I’m so, so pleased with the result.

I can’t wait to continue this more and finally finish this second layout. Multimedia art journals are absolutely the best and I enjoy the process so much!