Taylored Expressions August Studio Challenge

JENhappycamperAUG3

StudioChallenge

The question for August is:

The Sky’s the Limit! There are so many ways to create sky backgrounds for our cards and projects.  Often times, our blog readers are left staring at a beautiful sky and asking “How’d she do that?”

Show us one of your favorite ways to create a pretty sky background and make sure we know how to re-create it!

For my background of choice I decided to use Distress Markers to watercolor a background. This is a really quick and easy way to make a super successful background that I think has lots of WOW. 🙂

You’ll need the following supplies:

  • Distress Markers (or equivalent watercolor markers) in sunrise/sunset colors (think colors of the rainbow)
  • watercolor cardstock (I used Choice Watercolor Cardstock)
  • Water mister or Ink Potion No. 9
  • Perfect Pearls or Iridescent Liquid Watercolors (optional) added to your water mister
  • paper towels
  • heat gun or blow dryer

To start you want to cut a piece of Choice Watercolor Cardstock to the size you need, I cut mine to 4 1/8″ by 5 3/8″.

sunset1

As the picture above says, you want to use your Distress Markers using the brush tip to loosely color in a sunset/sunrise. The colors should graduate in a natural color blend, though the change from bold yellow to blue should be fairly quick. Don’t be afraid to add a few dark streaks of violet as well. When you fill in DO NOT leave as much white space as I did. Mine turned out a bit more pastel then I wanted it to be because of the white space.

Test your colors and decide which ones you like best. I used a mixture of old and new Distress Markers colors.

sunset2The next step is to mist your paper with water or Ink Potion No. 9. I added a bit of iridescent liquid watercolor to mine, but you could also add Perfect Pearls.

sunset3Mist your paper liberally. It will curl up. That is okay and should be expected. It will uncurl when you use the heat gun to dry the paper. Let it sit for 5 minutes before drying so the colors will spread naturally. Once it’s dry use it on a card. I used mine behind the Birch Tree Cutting Plate cut from a dark brown cardstock to create a silhouette effect.

JENhappycamperAUG4One of the things I love most about this technique is it’s so easy to mix up the colors, you could use blues and greys for more serene sky, I’ve used more purples for a spooky night sky – it’s really so easy to mix it up! And it’s perfect for layering with dies!

Alright! It’s time to go check out what the rest of the FABULOUS Baker’s Dozen has in store for you!!

Charmaine Ikach
Jen Shults
Joan Ervin
Kerri Michaud
Sankari Wegman
Shannon White
Shelly Mercado
Stephanie Kraft
Tammie Edgerton
Taylor VanBruggen
Wanda Guess

Card Supplies

 



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