Voyage Beneath the Sea ATCs

I LOVE Graphic 45 for paper crafting.  Their images are the best for cutting things out and they are so detailed.  They also do a lot with Steampunk and some darker images.  Though they have plenty of flowers and pretties, they also have less pretty things which I appeal to me.  Though the world of paper crafts has given me new appreciation for flowers and pinks, I have never been much of a flowers and lace type.  I love companies that have a lot of variety while still keeping a sense of style.  Graphic 45 has that down.

I had to make some ATCs with their newer Voyage Beneath the Sea set.  The paper set is great, especially if you like Mermaids.  She is not in this art set, but they also have a fabulous image with a Octopus Lady, which I will have to put on something fantastic (not sure what yet).  You can see the entire set here: Graphic 45's Voyage Beneath The Sea

Without further ado:

Fish Man: not technically an ATC, but I loved this fish and needed to do something with him.  I glued him to some Silhouette chip board and fussy-cut him, chipboard and all.  I then cut out the Sea is Calling tag which came from the same paper as the fish man.  I used my Aqua Marine Chameleon Pen at full color to outline the words and make it stand out more.  The globe/button at the top of his head is from Tim Holtz and it was originally a little gear sticker brad.  I colored the sticker with a mx of Tim Holtz gold mixative and Lindy Stamp Gang's Magical tainted love teal pigment powder.  The paint is under the epoxy sticker that comes with his, "Custom brad," set.  I used the same mixture on the two gears and the brads that are holding them down.  I ended up going over the gears with multi medium matte since I was worried the alcohol ink wouldn't stick well.  When I did so it made the blue from the powdered pigment really pop out.  The gold wire is just simple jeweler's wire.  I put a few little dabs of mult medium matte mix and the gold/blue mix on the wire as well.  The wire is strung through the fish man's hands, though it does make it look as if he's holding it in a strange way.  I wanted something a bit more solid than the original paper though.  It is somewhat simple, but it took me an hour and 20 mins for the cutting, painting, wire, etc.  It was worth the time though.

_____________________________________________________________________________

Mermaid Travels ATC: This one is a traditional ATC.  I didn't do any fancy cutting with this one.  Originally I wanted the, "The Sea is Calling and I Must Go," phrase to show, but it didn't really work out well composition wise.  The three flowers are from Petaloo.  They are their original color, though they are made to be painted.  The embossed seahorse in the back is from Inkadoo.  I used Stampin up embossing powder which is fairly fine and nice for the more detailed images.  The teal hints on the background are from Faber-Castell's Metallic Mint Gelato.  I just smudged it around with my fingers after giving the edge some outline.  

________________________________________________________________________

I hope you enjoyed seeing these little guys.  If you like Graphic 45 as much as I do then stay tuned.  There will be plenty more in the future.

Amazing Little Cards

One of my favorite swaps on Scraps of Darkness/Elegance's Facebook is their Artist Trading Card swap.  ATC's are standard trading card size, in theory, at 2.5" x 3.5".  I have made a few ATCs at this point and they never stay neat and little.  Here are some of the ATCs I have created.  I love making them and if you would like one drop me a little Fiverr request.  I did start making some ATCs for a test sale at my garage sale this weekend.  If they don't sale then I will probably make an Epsy account and you can find already created ATCs there.  I do like custom making them to fit the receiver though.  I have tried to get more personal with them as I go.

In no particular order, here are some ATCs.

Once Upon a Story with Graphic 45.  I love fussy cutting and I really enjoyed making this one.  The wings on the butterfly have Reneaboquets Shattered Glass glitter.  It's a little hard to see in the picture, but the fairy wings have dots of brick colored embossing dots.  I loved how the wood grained scrapbook paper (I think it was from Michael's) adds to the rest of the ATC.  

Grandmother and Smiles.  I made these specifically for a crafter that I swapped with who was also a grandmother.  I wanted them to be somewhat matching, but also unique.  The papers were just scraps from my stash.  The Yellow flower came from a Quick Quotes kit that I took apart.  The black and gray flowers are from Michael's.  The butterflies are stickers that I added to cardstock and then cut out.  The black and white mini hearts were scraps from another project where I made a heart boarder.  I thought, "well, lets keep these, I cold put them on something."  I am very much a, "waste not," boarding on hoarder type crafter.  Sometimes it makes my craft room a pain to organize, other times it works out.

Graphic 45 Mime.  The original paper I got this from (Graphic 45) was all monochrome.  I wanted to play with my Chameleon Pens.  I colored all of the yellow and the red.  The little black flower was just something from my stash and the Admit One charm is from Tim Holtz.  I just used some jeweler's wire to make it a small necklace.  The little ticket is 7 Gypsies.  I was happy with how this came out and I hope to use my Chameleon Pens more in the future.  

This is a quick one I put together for a girl on a house cleaning and organization group I have tried to get going on Facebook.  I thought maybe a little incentive to get some participation.  The recipient put pictures of her kitchen in my group so I tried to match colors on a sign she had hanging up for decoration.  

Love and more Graphic 45.  I had some Valentines papers and was sending cards to a recipient who had recently gushed about how supportive her significant other was of her crafting.  So, I made her some grungy romance ATCs.  The butterfly and rose come from Michael's generic embellishments they sell in their discount area.  The background of the Love (only) card and the little clocks come from Tim Holtz.  

A peek-a-boo tree,  This one was experimental for me.  The tree is hand drawn on spray misted ATC canvas.  The tree was drawn with a Chameleon pen.  I did draw the tree in it's entirety before overlaying the simi-transparent paper.  You can see the tree behind the paper a little better in the actual piece.  I am still working on that art photography thing.  This probably would have worked better and more dramatically on a larger canvas.  Working with the wire in such a small setting was pretty challenging.  I am pretty happy with it, though I can't say it's a favorite of mine.  I will probably redo with more details on a larger canvas at some point.

My first ATC.  I really wanted to add some hand painted and slight surreal feel to it.  I added some bits from an ephemera pack I had bought and sent it along.  The recipient seemed pretty happy with it.  I want to add painted elements and more surrealism to ATCs in the future.  So, stay tuned.

Let me know what you thought.  Any input is always appreciated.  If you are a Fivver customer then please let me know if any of these styles suit you.  Also, stay tuned for more pages on ATCs.

Introduction and First Layout

Introduction and Halloween Mixed Media Layout.

Hello, my name is Tosha and I am a hobby scrapper who also likes to experiment.  After being asked rather or not I had a blog I decided to make one.  Feel free to scrap-lift, but please credit back.  when known I will give products used, I have a big stash of thing I've had for quite some time.  I will have some step by steps on newer things, but things I've already created will not have step by step photos.  The biggest thing here is that you get to see my experiments, both good and bad.   Not everything here will be pristine.  So, take what types you like and learn from my mistakes.

Without further ado, a recent and favorite layout of mine.  I did this from the October mood board offered by Scraps of Darkness/Elegance which you can see here: October Mood Board.  I am happy to say I even won the challenge last month and $20.00 from the store.  I am a fan of their kits and many items below came from various kits.  I will link the names as I recall them.

The inspiration for this was the lady with the umbrella and dark dress on the mood board.  I wore a costume with a dark dress (the photo) in which I tried to Cosplay the little girl below.  She was just a image I found randomly online years ago. If anyone knows who drew it I would be happy to give credit where it is due.  The term, "express yourself," is similar to being able to free yourself, but through costume.  I love to dress up and Cosplay, so it was very fitting for me.  The prim and proper lady (which I am not in real life) thinking of that time where she gets to be what she wants.  Hopefully she keeps her dark thoughts as a costume only ;)

Detail 1, The pretty Lady:

The pastel tentacles were stamped using chalking inks.  I used Quick Quotes Powder Puffs Caribbean Blue and Brandywine as well as Prima's Blossom Tree.  I stamped them onto some pale tan/manila looking cardstock that I had.  Even though the red and brown tentacle at the top looks like it has white dots (at least on my computer and a little bit on the layout in person) I actually put it on the same cardstock. 

I did take some time to pick out all of the extra little chipboard bits that were left in the chipboard from the cut the studio made.  I then gessoed (that is a word, right?) the Express Yourself lady from Blue Fern studios with white gesso.  I sprayed her with Simply Sheer Very Purple mist and Dragonfly glimmer mist from Tattered Angels.    I did the first layer of the Express Yourself letters the same way.


The flowers are from Prima's Aquarelle set.  Before sticking them on I shaped the green jeweler's wire and glued it down with some Beacon 3-in-One.  If you just run the wire across the glue bubble you can usually get a good enough coating without leaving globs of glue everywhere.

Detail Two: Express Yourself

To add the red to the Express Yourself, which I sprayed with the pretty lady, I used Ranger's Garnet Liquid Pearls.  I just squeezed it out of the tube onto the chipboard as well as on the edges of the butterfly.  Before doing the butterfly tips, however, I scuffed some red ink from a Color Box Petal Point Provence set.  Mostly the darker red color, but a few small smudges of the brown.  It doesn't show up much in the photos, but I also lightly touched up the lighter side of the butterfly's edges with the chalk inks I used on the tentacles.  You can kind of see hints of the teal and the pink.  I randomly tore the paper and tried to match the color changes with the tear.  You can see a small amount of pastel chalk ink on the edge of the black roses.

Detail 3: Black Rose

These roses were originally white paper stencils by Heidi Swapp in the Lace Paper Pack.  They are pretty papery.  I originally used it to make a negative white rose design with modeling paste (with the flowers as a single piece) on a Big Benefit Board I made for the Totally Tiffany Organization group I am in.  I then made another layout (I will post both on here eventually) in which I made the same relief, but with black modeling paste.  I could tell that the flowers couldn't handle being a stencil much longer, so I cut up the stencil and laid them on here in various places.  That is what gives them their thick and textured look.  I will try to post the other layouts soon so you can see what the stencil left behind and decide rather or not you want to take the same route, if you use this technique.  I really like the texture of the roses.  You could just paint them with a couple of layers of modeling paste verse filling in all of the negative space of the stencil if you want.  I use a artists knife when I spread mine which also adds a little of the line texture that you can see.  The black and white skull paper was just a scrap that I had of some Bella Blvd Funny Bones paper.

Detail 4: Butterfly and Skull

The Skull in the glass is a cutout from Graphic 45's Rare Oddities.  I "fussy" cut it out of sheet #4501142.  Be forewarned, I have been on a fussy cutting kick, so you will see it on a fairly regular basis.  I love how it looks, though it can be a time consuming process.  Take your time and buy small scissors.  I own a few pairs, but right now my favorite are a pair of Ek Success Cutter Bee scissors.  I also have some generic tiny embroidery scissors that I use for really small cuts.  An X-acto knife (ro something similar) will work wonders as well.  For this glass skull I didn't have to get too fancy.  Most of it was a simple rounded edge.  I also cut out the tentacles after I stamped them.  When I did the red edge on the middle pastel tentacle, I just touched some dark red ink from my Color Box Petal Providence set.  I just guestimated where I thought it would land.  The top tentacle is all red and dark brown ink from that same set, no pastel chalk ink.  I brushed the dark brown and red on the top half of the small pink butterfly and used the same Ranger Garnet Pearl paint for the edge of the body.  The antenna are jeweler's wire, the top red and the bottom one is purple.  

Supplies used:

Papers:
Graphic 45 Rare Oddities #4501142
Bella Blvd Funny Skulls
Moxxie's Zombie Attack Hollowed Ground (to include the red blood spot paper strip you can see on the full layout page).
Echo Park's Arsenic and Lace Large Demask#AL71002
Light colored cardstock for the stamping

Embellishments  
Prima Flowers Aquarelle
Prima Flowers Evita-Elsa (brown butterfly)
Blue Fern Studios: Express Yourself Chipboard
Heidi Swapp Lace Paper Pack 
I think the butterfly came from a K&Company Smash bag of mixed butterflies.  If anyone recognizes it and can let me know, I will appreciate it!
Purple, Red, and Green Jeweler's Wire

Inks and Pastes
Quick Quotes Powder Puffs Caribbean Blue and Brandywine  
Prima's Blossom Tree chalk ink
Tattered Angels Simply Sheer Very Purple mist and Dragonfly glimmer mist 
White Gesso
DecoArt Media black modeling paste
Color Box Petal Point Provence set, Merlot and Chestnut (I think)

Feel free to comment below!  I hope you enjoy.  If you have any tips or constructive critics I am always happy to hear.