Transparent Poppies (by Anne)

Good morning. Today I am sharing one of my samples for the recent shows on Hochanda featuring the Pretty Poppies and Poppy Meadow stamps.

I coloured my scene using the fabulous alcohol markers from Chameleon. I simply love the new Color Tops that allow you to blend 2 completely different colours seamlessly – very tricky to do with standard alcohol pens.

Materials:

• Pretty Poppies, Poppy Meadow, Nature Table, Butterfly Poppy Collage stamp sets
• 8 X 8 inch card blank, 6.5 inch square card suitable for alcohol ink (I used Velvet Card) and scrap copy paper (to make masks)
• Inkpads: Versafine (Onyx Black), Distress Ink (Tumbled Glass), Memento Dye Ink (London Fog)
• WOW embossing powder (Clear Gloss)
• Zig 2 way glue (temporary adhesive for masks)
• Alcohol pens (yellow, green, blue, beige and pink): Chameleon Pens (YG3, YL2, BL3) and Color Tops (NU0, PK3)
• Permanent marker (black)
• Coloured pencils (black, green and pink/purple)
• Water based fine tipped pen (light grey)
• Gel pen (Hybrid Ink - black with metallic red)
• Stickles glitter glue (Crystal)

How it was done:

1. The card background was stamped with the honesty stamp and Distress Ink. The corners were stamped with Versafine and the edges blended lightly with Distress Ink.
2. The foreground poppies were stamped onto copy paper and cut out to create masks. Small dots of zig glue were added to the back and left to dry (turns from blue to clear) to create a temporary stick to hold them in place.
3. The foreground poppies were stamped with Memento (water based ink that will not bleed when colouring with alcohol ink pens) and then covered with the masks before stamping the background poppies.
4. The stems were extended where needed by drawing with the fine tipped pen (NB. Make sure it is suitable for colouring with alcohol pens without bleeding – test if unsure).
5. The image was then coloured with alcohol pens. I love the delicate transparent finish – perfect for delicate poppies. I used the new Chameleon pens with Color Tops. These enable really easy one step blending of one colour into the next. Leaves were coloured with YG3 and NU0 Color Top, Flowers with BL3 and PK3 Color Top, Buds with BL3 and NU0 Color Top, Butterfly with YL2 and and PK3 Color Top.
6. A little texture and extra shading was added where needed with coloured pencils. The sentiment was stamped with Versafine and heat embossed with clear powder to emphasise. The card was edged with black marker to frame and glued to the card front with 3D foam for added dimension.
7. The butterfly was stamped with Memento onto a spare scarp of card, coloured with alcohol pens and cut out. To enhance the butterfly details (the grey ink was a bit pale) I overstamped it with Versafine Ink.
8. A little metallic ink was used on the butterfly and stamens. Further sparkle was added with Stickles glue.