snowy embossing--PGP Winter Wonderland hat box

A little winter scene with stuff from Paper Garden Projects...



It's on a hat box top:

(speedy way to wrap a gift?)

1...Getting limitless Copic pastel colours or
new colours (unique to you) without buying a single coloured marker.
2...make three types of snowy embossing: Background stamp, Souffle pen & e mbop. and sprinkled e.p.
3...finishing touches

-1-

Get limitless Copic pastel colours or
new colours (unique to you) without buying a single coloured marker.

Granted, this is nothing revolutionary--lots of Copic artistes use the scribble & pick up the colour technique--but trying it out feels AWEsome, because it lets you invent new colours (not to mention the fact that it can save ya a fortune, dagnab it!) ;o)

No Copic markers? You could do still the pastel (or custom colour mixing) thing by mixing water-based markers (or ink refills), and applying with any blender pen (or paint brush) and some blender pen solution (or water.) Again, it's nothing new, but it sure saves moulah!

• Stamp (This image is by Eat Cake Graphics from Paper Garden Projects Winter Wonderland Rubber Cling set)
• Cardstock (River Rock)

The Copic supplies

• Any Copic Markers that you have
• A colourless blender pen
• Colourless blender refill
• A plastic lid or glass plate (or an acrylic block or what have you)
• Scrap paper

The main aim for this card was to make pastel shades with my dark Copics but you can also mix shades to create a new hue altogether.



Step 1) Emboss the image--this is an eat cake stamp (Winter Wonderland from Paper Garden Projects)-- embossed in white pigment ink with white embossing powder.



Step 2) Scribble Copic colours onto something that will act as your palette: plastic or glass... an acrylic block or whatever you have (a white paper underneath helps you see your colours)



Step 3) Add a little bit of colourless blender as you work (it will evaporate fairly quickly.)

The solution works like the water in painting, of course. It just thins out the deep colours to make lighter shades. Less blender solution gives a medium shade (depending on the marker colour you start with, obviously.) Lots of blender solution can give you pastels as pale as you want to go!

To prevent some of the evaporation, you can add Copic colourless blender solution directly to the tip of your colourless blender & save blender solution that way. (Though I do find one of those refill bottles last a very LONG time.)



Step 4) Mix Copic colourless blender soloution into your palette of scribbled ink colours with a Colourless blender pen. (I have a spare blender pen for this-it dirties it a fair bit) Mixing colours is SO fun! It's like playing with paints and gives you unlimted colours.



Step 5) Test your custom colours on a scrap of paper. If you think it needs it, you can add more blender solution to lighten (or another scribble of marker colour(s) to deepen or change the shade) and get it exactly how you like it.



Step 6) Colour away! The shade will soften as it dries & the blender evaporates, but of course you can layer to make it more intense and shade and do all you would with normal copics



Step 7) Since the pastel shades are light, you can add the dark marker (that you used to make your new pastel colours in the first place) to add shading in more intense, but monochromatic or matching colours shades. Or add patterns...dots, stripes...whatever you like.

-2-

...make three types of snowy embossing:

The snow on this image is a combination of:

A) Plain old background stamp embossing (to get the pattern)

B) Drawing with a Souffle pen & pouring embossing powder on.

C) Sprinkling embossing powder randomly all over the place
(to get the teeny tiny flakes of snow.)

the snowy ground:
(Plain old background stamp embossing-to get the pattern)



Step 1) Add a base of white (if you're using darker cardstock) by colouring the snow with a white prisma colour pencil crayon.



Step 2) emboss snow with PGP cover-a-card Tapestry 1 background stamp (white pigment ink & white embossing powder)

This Tapestry stamp is my new favourite background stamp ever
It's nice & BIG & comes on Ez mount (love that)
(I use my Cuttlebug plate as a block to put it on)

puffy snow:
(Drawing with a Sakura Souffle pen & pouring embossing powder on.)

To get snowflake dots and a snowy horizon:

Step 1) Gather embossing powder & heat gun, so you can work fairly quickly.

Step 2) Colour Souffle pen on wherever you want snow.



Step 3) White the Souffle pen is still wet, pour white embossing powder on it.

Step 4) Heat set the embossing powder with a heat gun (some bubbling is normal, but a light-ish touch will prevent scorching.) :o)

There are two options for this, texture-wise: Heat the way you usually would heat embossing powder to more to get shine... OR heat it ever so gently to keep some of the snowy texture:

the snowy sky:
(Sprinkling embossing powder randomly all over the place--to get the teeny tiny flakes of snow.)



Step 1) Sprinkle on embossing powder all over in a fine sprinkle (like snow)



Step 2) Heat the sprinkled embossing powder from underneath your paper (The only trick is not to spill all the embossing powder.) :o) Working in batches is handy for avoiding that.



Step 3) Make the image pop. If you want your image to stand out more, you can go around the outside with any marker. The white embossed outline resists ink (even with copics--for the most part-so it's a fast step to add a lot of contrast.) This is a dark cool grey Copic marker.



Step 4) Add it to a Razzleberry prism cardstock circle (as a mat) & pierce it (if you'd like to add stitches and/or beads)

...finish it up...

Emboss & colour the back of a vellum circle for a mat I used two Copics to get the colour of the Winter Wonder land kidlets in the scene



Emboss a round cardstock base. This is the Cover-a-card Tapestry #1 background (again) :o)



Punch Martha edge punch (for the wee snowflakes)...

and...Stick the snowflakes on the purple mat & the ultra teeny ones on the sky
(I put mine with the marker side down so it was a softer colour):





I've also pierced & added knots to the wee snowflakes, sewn beads around the image, and stitched around the edge of the mat & added Gold Ice Stickles around the edge of the white stitching as well as on the itsy bitsy punched snowflakes in the sky

...and finally, stuck it on a hat box with ribbon:

Miscellaneous

Heavy weight vellum
Razzleberry Prism cardstock
Martha Snowflake edge punch
White ribbon from the "I want it White" kit
Swarovski gems
Paper piercer, Needle, thread & seed beads
Tombow monomulti
White Souffle pen
White embossing powder, White Pigment ink & heat gun

Gold Ice Stickles

Thanks so much for stopping by!
Hope this was useful to You somehow,


P.S. Haven't entered your name for the PGP blogiversary candy?
Please click here to visit the blog candy post.