This morning just before I left for work I decided to see how the Dina Wakley Media Journal "watercolour" pages took ink - my thoughts were that it would not move and would soak right in, so it would be easy to keep distinct areas of colour from merging too much - but I did realise that if this was the case, it would take a fair bit of ink! This evening when I came back to all beautiful and dry, I decided to keep it simple and just stamp a quote on it and the colours of the background made me think of dreaming for some reason, so I googled quotes about dreaming. I found the perfect quote by Lupita Nyong'o - it struck a chord with me as I'm from very, very poor beginnings and in theory should be working in a factory or a coal mine - those were the career prospects when I was a kid - and not a university academic and a pretty senior one at that, let alone one of the world experts in my area.
So here it is - it's impromptu and pretty quick to make beautiful vivid backgrounds in this way. The "watercolour" stock in the Dina Wakley Media Journal - dare I say it - will give you a far more vibrant and intense, even colour that even the Dylusions stock, but the colours won't blend - they will soak in right where they land and will look beautiful, BUT very intense and you could not make a soft, blended look this way. It did go through to the back of the righthand page but only because I put too much ink on it in the first place. I'd learned that when I inked up the lefthand one and it did not go through at all.
WHAT I USED:
Ranger Dina Wakley Media Journal (BUY NOW: USA, UK)
(other stocks may work for such vivid looks but honestly I think the "watercolour" pages in this journal are perfect for such vibrant and intense looks).
Ranger Dylusions Ink Sprays in:
After Midnight (BUY NOW: USA, UK)
Crushed Grape (BUY NOW: USA, UK)
Ranger Dylusions Mica Spray in:
Crushed Grape
(this is only available as part of a 3-pack with Bubblegum Pink and Vibrant Turquoise - BUY NOW: USA, UK)
Ranger Dylusions "Dy's Alphabet" stamp set (BUY NOW: USA, UK)
Ranger Dylusions Paint Pens in:
Black and White Set (BUY NOW: USA, UK)
(or you could use a stylus or similar and some of the ink used in the stamping steps)
Tsukineko Brilliance pigment ink:
BD-80 Moonlight White (BUY NOW - fullsize: USA, UK; dewdrop mini ink pad: USA, UK)
(any white pigment ink will do but I like Brilliance because it's fast drying - most pigment inks are not - and it won't suck-up the colour from the ink sprays quite as much as Distress Picket Fence does. I could have stamped this ink Tsukineko VersaMark Ink (BUY NOW: USA, UK) and gone over it with Ranger White Embossing Powder (BUY NOW: USA, UK) for a more intense and clean look, or used Tsukineko VersaMark Dazzle in Frost (BUY NOW: USA, UK) and not used embossing powder, which would have given me gossamer-like blue mica letters that only show up from the right angle - that would have looked awesome!)
Plaid FolkArt Distressed Stars Stencil (I can't find this online in the UK, but this Tim Holtz Stars stencil is similar)
Tim Holtz Idea-ology "Emporium" Ephemera Pack (BUY NOW: USA, UK)
(from this pack, I used a small envelope and a small card that would fit therein - and I have pictured them below, if you want to copy them - but you could use any small envelope and card, or even omit them completely as I was only using it to hide a mistake really, but I thought the idea was cute and kept it in the explanation!)
Prima Finnabair Art Basics Clear Gesso (BUY NOW: USA, UK)
(you could also use Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Collage Medium (Matte, BUY NOW: USA, UK), which would have been my first choice and to be entirely honest - it was out of my reach and the gesso was right in front of me so I used that!)
3/4" Golden Taklon paintbrush suitable for acrylic paint
(they are very inexpensive and have soft bristles, are made by a lot of companies and come in backs of 10-40 different brushes for very low prices and they last years if looked after)
Acrylic stamping block
Cosmetic Sponge Wedge
WHAT I DID:
STEP 1: First I sprayed each page, separately, with the two Dylusions ink sprays - as you cannot press the pages together and transfer the ink, you will have to use a lot more ink than normal and it won't puddle or spread out but the results are amazing. I recommend you don't work on the back of any other work when doing this, and protect adjacent pages with acetate sheets or cut-flush folders. This will need 6h or so to dry in a relatively humid, cool environment like the UK - it needs longer than you'd expect and you must leave it much longer than when it feels dry as the interior of the paper is still drenched.
STEP 2: I like to stamp not more than 5 letters at a time, and I love this alphabet set because the letters are all different heights so it doesn't matter if you don't stamp perfectly. The quote I used was "It doesn't matter where you're from, your dreams are valid" - this stamp set doesn't have punctuation but it's easy to add that back later. Unfortunately, I got ahead of myself and went to re-stamp the first "you're" without the "e" to make "your" and forgot, so I ended up with an "e" I had to get rid of - but that ended up giving me a cool idea! Don't forget to wash the stamps immediately, and by the time you've done that, the white text will be nice and dry so you can carry on!
STEP 3: To hide the "e" I took a little envelope and card from the ephemera pack, and used a cosmetic sponge to apply After Midnight ink spray to it, so it would match the page better. I sprayed it with Crushed Grape Mica Spray, so it would have some shimmer and then match both the colours of the background. I stuck it into place over the "e" using the gesso, but you could use collage medium.
STEP 4: I then used the white paint pen to add in the apostrophes, and an arrow pointing from the word "dreams" to the little envelope. I googled images of Dyan's arrow stencils and tried to get roughly the same kind of look, and hatched it rather than colouring it in, so it would be in-keeping with the letters. I finally wrote Lupita Nyong'o's name and the year she said it (2014) at the bottom of the page.
STEP 5: To bring things together a bit, I used the star stencil and the Brilliance ink pad to directly apply some white stars around the page. That's pretty much it. Even though Brilliance dries fast, I would not close the journal until the next day, just to be safe - pigment inks do stay sticky for longer. As for the little envelope? I'm going to write down some dreams/thoughts and put them in it so that I can look at it in a year and see how I'm getting on.
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