AFC Pink Inchies

Here's my first step for the process of a new project I am currently working on: Pink Inchies - created for a charity art auction for breast cancer awareness via Art For Cures, which is run by the super talented, ever-creative, fount of seemingly endless energy Renmeleon (Ria) ...

I started with a 9x12 sheet of 140lb watercolor paper I prepped using my salted watercolor BG technique, using some metallic pan watercolor and a bit of red-pink tube color that I watered way down and used as a wash on parts of the front as well as the entire reverse of the paper, to give just a bit of color to the back of the pieces instead of leaving them white (I don't feel a piece is really finished unless I've done something to the back as well, so most of my paperart work will usually be arted on both the front and back in some way)

We're supposed to be using Ria's "collage 88" technique, in which you collage your entire work on one single 8.5x11 paper then cut it up into 88 inchies, and then add any embellishements or whatever. Which is actually the way I normally do a set of inchies anyway (paint, collage, etc an entire BG sheet, then cut the squares, then add "extras") I'm just using a larger sheet of paper, which should yield more inchies, right? Yeah well, we'll get to that later ... So I start collaging (now remember the color theme of this project is shades of PINK, with some minor black, white or silver the only other colors allowed) with pink shaded papers from my stash (some KoolAid stained sheet music and papertowel bits, some tissue paper and pink mulberry scraps) - and here's where I make a mistake right off the bat.

I end up almost completely covering my beautifully textured shimmery pink watercolor background! I shoulda (coulda, woulda) collaged on the BACKSIDE that had the plain pale pink, and let the pretty side be the reverse which would show nicely under the backplates but! Oh well, too late now, yeah? So I was kinda GRR'd about that for a bit but let's just move on ... Once I finished my collaging - and yes that last picture is it, I didn't do a whole lot of collaging as far as the actual design, more just a buildup of the background - I decided against any rubberstamping or doodling on the whole (though I had originally planned to splatter paint a little bit at this point, to help tie all the collagy-ness together a bit better - but, well, I just forgot. Woops.), so I went ahead and proceeding to the cutting them up stage:

And here's where mistake number two rears it's head. From a 9x12 sheet of paper I should get 108 individual inchies (88 to send in for the swap, plus a nice batch of extras to provide the host some more material for the auction goods) But for whatever reason, the last 2 strips or so do not come out to be a full inch wide. Did I make a mistake and cut a tenth of an inch too big on some earlier strips? Is the trimmer in need of a new (whatever the little rubber cutty-strip piece is called? and the answer there is YES, it is. I think I have maybe one good edge left on it before it's totally shot) Can I just not measure correctly? (also a yes.) So anyhow I'm left with approximately 94 inchies all told and not even all of those are compleeetley 1" square (grr.) so I just barely squeeked in my 88 pieces from that sheet. And here they are, remixed in no particular order:

So that takes care of step one - step two is the addition of my "goddesses" and any further embellishments and doodly funstuff. Which I need to get a move on with since these are due to Ria pretty much by week's end (!) And I'll post that process later ... maybe ...
~ gem ~







UPDATE - Here are the finished inchies!

Watercolor BG with Salt Technique

Finally getting this how-to done! Although the actual process pics and pages I am showing you today were made back in May, I am just NOW getting around to them ... but I am working on another piece right now that started with a "salted" watercolor background paper, so before I post any tutorials for that one I figured I better get the steps for the background technique posted first ...

I always use watercolor paper for these, but I will use anything from the nicer 140lb coldpress to just a sheet from a cheap discount store watercolor pad. I typically make these background papers in batches of 3-6 pages at a time in maybe one or two color variations, on days when I am bored or don't have any other pressing projects to do. (Some days just scream "make backgrounds!" you know?) Then I have a nice stock of papers to go to when I need to start a new project later. (I also do the BGs for several pages in my journal books at the same time, since I already have the stuff out. It's nice to open the journal and have a whole bunch of pre-colored pages to work on)

I assembled the supplies I'll be using and laid them out on newspaper:

Sheet(s) of watercolor paper
Assorted watercolors - tube paints, watercolor cakes in regular and metallic (Coloriffic Metallic Shimmering Watercolors are a poor-mans Lumieres / Twinkling H2O's!)
Paintbrushes - I'm using the 1" hardware store nylon bristle type for the tube colors, and a smaller half inch brush for the cakes
Pan of water and small spray bottle of water
Cuppa salt! I only use kosher salt (the kind you cook with) though probably sea salt or any course salt would work too. You can try table salt but I think all you'll get with that is some pretty sandpaper ; ) WHICH! could be cool in a project too, so - I dunno, try it!

I start by wetting my entire sheet of paper by spritzing with the spray bottle then spreading it with a brush. I apply my chosen colors either straight from the tubes onto the paper or (in the photo shown) by using the pan colors that have been pre-wetted. I just randomly add color with the brush in an abstract fashion, sometimes adding a bit more water, and letting the paints run and bleed into one another until I have the mix and coverage that I want. *With the direct from the tube method, I squirt small dollops of paint randomly about the page and then work them together and into the paper with the brush. I usually let this stage get jussst this side of dry, then I take the spray bottle and spritz a bit to add droplets that will bleed and blend the colors even more. THAT itself will add little waterspots (you can vary them by applying the spray in a fine mist and larger splat-drops - sometimes I get it dowright wet, just depends on my mood really) and if you want you can stop here and let it dry and that will be a very fine BG paper

But I like to get a much more marbled, waterstained effect so this is when I add my salt - while the paper is still a bit damp - just sprinkling small handfuls all around, 'til I'm satisfied with the amount. The salt crystals wick up the remaining "pools" of water, along with some of the paint pigment, in whatever little spot they were sitting. Wait until the paper is totally dry, then brush all the salt off and voila! what's left behind is a neat bunch of little dotted areas where the salt "ate" the paint & water, giving your page a dappled look, and refining and melding some of those areas where your paint colors met and maybe didn't look so blended before.

Here's the end result on the pages I made that day, including one in a journal (that one I didn't salt but used alotttta water in the paint and just let it pool up together - came out pretty cool) Be sure to click on it to view it at fullsize so you can really see the details.

This is my ALL TIME FAVORITE page background making technique, and I hope you enjoyed reading it (or at least understood what I was saying!) and are ready to get out your art supplies and make some BGs of your own ... Have fun painting!


~ gem ~

Piggy Bank for the Cure

Piggy Bank for the Cure
Originally uploaded by gemgirlart

I took this photo last week specifically to upload to the Passionately Pink for the Cure group at Flick'r:

In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, Yahoo! will donate $1 to Susan G. Komen for the Cure, for each pink photo added to this Group from October 1-31, 2007 up to $50,000! This donation will be used to fund breast cancer research, education, screening and treatment programs.

Pick your Pink. Play Your Part. End Breast Cancer.

The group is already at just over 30,000 photos, so I would like to urge you to take a pink pic and put it up, please! Full details are available at the Flick'r group page. Thanks!

~ gem ~