Tag: … Art Journals

MiC Alice in Wonderland Release

~ sproatmeyer ~ 82 Comments

It’s time for the Make it Crafty to pour a round of drinks at the super special tea party celebrations! Not only are we celebrating the magical release of Alice in Wonderland, but Make it Crafty has turned 3! All thanks to YOU, the incredible artists and the amazing Make it Crafty team!


Let’s dance around from chair to chair, sipping a drink, eating a cake, shrinking then growing with excitement as you watch the entertainment unfold before your eyes. Be careful not to miss the hidden words as you’ll need to collect them along the way and string them all together to form a quote. Simply enter the quote at the end of the hop for a chance to win!

Hopefully you’ve found your way from TRUDIE
but if you’ve just skipped a chair or two you might want to start back at Zoe’s Blog.  
For my project I’ve used three of the newest images and composed a page in my art journal.  It’s been a while since I added a page in there and these kinds of releases are perfect for that.  😀  The images I used are Alice, Hidden Hole and the Chesire Cat.  Many of the embellishments are from Zoe herself (thank you!) and my favorite by far are the gumnut thingies on the lower left side.  I only had three and wish I hadn’t used them up so quickly since those are they’re surprisingly a rarity here in Texas.  Zoe… you need to send me more!  LOL
Now for the best part of this post… a small tutorial on coloring the tree.  Now, mind you, this isn’t a tutorial on “how to color,” rather it a breakdown of how each color is applied.  (For a small giggle regarding tutorials, click HERE and see “How to Draw The Tick.”)
For the tree, I used much the same technique as coloring hair.  The colors I used are Copic E57, E55, E41, E44 and E47 and each panel shows how that color was applied.  I started with a mid-tone brown and worked my way up to the lightest color. Then to add more depth, I went back to a mid-tone brown and finally a dark brown for the darkest areas.
There are many different ways to color this tree especially when you get down to the knotty parts.  I wasn’t sure what to do with them myself until the fourth color!  I thought if a tree like this is going to have a large hole into Wonderland, then a small concave area would be fitting.  You can also fill the area around with all grass or all wood… it’s quiet the versatile little tree.  
The fun doesn’t stop here and if you head over to JENN’s blog
she’ll be sure to treat you with even more fabulous inspiration!

Rocker Chick

~ sproatmeyer ~ 35 Comments
Let us Entertain You!!
It’s SHOWTIME at Make it Crafty!
We’re a tapping our heels together with a tap a tap tap,
Clanging the symbols and beating the drums with a bang a bang bang,
Pulling rabbits from hats and lifting our legs – oooooohhh ahhhhhhh,
Singing our hearts out and jamming to the beat –  doo do do daaaaa…
You should have arrived here from the amazing JENNY!
(If you’re lost you can start at the beginning with ZOË.)

It’s time to be entertained at Make it Crafty with the
new Entertainers Collection of digi and rubber stamps!
You’ll find all the new digital stamps here and you can now pre-order the rubber stamps here!
You can’t have a GRAND SHOW without a DOORPRIZE!
Hop on through to be inspired and leave comments along the way for your chance to
win hidden prizes and be in the draw to win one of the grand door prizes!
One person will win the full collection of digi stamps
and another will win the full collection of rubber stamps!
ENJOY THE SHOW!!

I’ve been wanting to color the Messy Room for a while and when I saw this Rocker Chick, I thought it would be the perfect combination!  Plus I’ve had the sentiment on the shelf just screaming to be used!  LOL  The official names of the products used from Make it Crafty are Rocker Chick (which is part of the Paper Rock Scissors Band – very humorous and a perfect band name), Girl’s Messy Bedroom and the Fancy Ribbon Sliders chipboard.  I think the quote is Inkadinkado Rockstar.

So is anyone a guitar player?  If you are, you can probably figure out the chord she’s strumming!  My fingers are all thumbs when it comes to music but that doesn’t mean I don’t try!  LOL  Now if I can only get more than my dog to sing along with me.  He he he

You’re next stop in the hop is the talented ÅSA!

Thanks for coming by and we hope you’ve enjoyed the show!!

Cleopatra in the Ancient Egyptian City

~ sproatmeyer ~ 9 Comments

Make it Crafty this week is having a “Walk Like an Egyptian” theme which matches perfectly with the latest release.  If you haven’t seen all the fun images you need to check them out! I’m joining in on this week for fun because I was lucky enough to have two projects using those image and wanted to share them both.  This time I created a journal page.

Many time on my journal pages I color the background and the characters separate.  Then I cut out the characters and place them on the side of the image or next to the background image.  However, this time I wanted Cleopatra to be standing in the center of the action and didn’t feel like fussy cutting.  So I merged the images before printing then only had to fussy cut part of the character. 

On the journal page, I switched things up a bit and add my ribbon vertically instead of the traditional horizontal.  I think it helps with the illusion of the pillars being tall but in reality, it just looked better to me.  😀  Then the rest of the embellishments were grabbed here and there and added.  Not sure that there is much meaning into it other than my thought process was … old, Egyptian, collections, then trinket box.  Does it work?!  LOL

The sky was colored with blues then I went back in with grays and darker blues to color in clouds.  Finally the blender marker was used to take away those colors in the clouds and this is the effect that it creates.  They’re kinda fluffy looking and I liked how they turned out.  It was pretty easy so I’ll be trying that again!

I debated how to color the city and finally decided to color it all the same to look like sun-bleached sand on a dry desert day.  Then I added some shadows with BV23 and a little color here and there on the greenery, baskets and market stands.  For the most part, the sun is shining down from the upper right corner of the image so I could have Cleopatra’s face stand out more.  This was a different spot from where I normally put the sun (upper left) so there are a few mistakes – lucky for me, none of them stand out.  he he he

I was able to contrast Cleopatra in a white and black dress with lots of gold.  Compared to the town, I really wanted her to stand out like royalty would have.  The dress uses cool gray colors and I used warm grays for her hair.  The shadows were added with BV23 which seems to be working out with most colors.

This project was colored with Copic Markers on printer paper.  Thanks for checking out my project and I hope this has given you some inspiration to play along with us this week!  Here are the images I used…
Make it Crafty Images:

Jude Valentine

~ sproatmeyer ~ 8 Comments

It’s been a long time since I’ve created a journal page and these three characters came together perfectly for the scene!  They’re part of the Jude Valentine release from Simply B Stamps and I thought made a great story.  Now tell me, with of the two girls do you think is the most mischievous and instigator of this Valentine crime scene?  LOL

The three images, from left to right, are Ariel Cupid, Jude’s Heart and Brittany’s Bag of Valentines from Simply B Stamps.  Then I also used a ribbon slide chippie from Make it Crafty called Fancy Ribbon Sliders. And I just found a fun way to use those sliders by cutting them in half and using them as tags sticking out from behind a layer – it looks awesome!  I used one HERE on my Frenchie Claudine project.

I have forgotten how fun it is to create pages in my journal and how much the extra space gives way for background, stories and trying new techniques.  See all those blank pages… yes, I will have to do that again.  ;D  I would like to enter this into the Simply Challenged Challenges “Anything Goes” themed challenge.

Wishes

~ sproatmeyer ~ 33 Comments

It’s my day to post a project on the Some Odd Girl blog and today I’m bringing you a special project from the pages of my art journal!  Like many other crafters and color enthusiasts out there, I have several boxes full of cards to send out (or keep) that were starting to cry out begging to be used.  Although I send out several cards a month, I still have stack and stacks and decided I could start making journal books instead.

For this project, I’ve used the faerie Nouveau Girl Wishes from Some Odd Girl and the background is Metallic Flowers from Make it Crafty. The book is about 5″x8″ which is a bit larger than a square 6″x6″ card so I have a little more room to work with.  I love to include at least two images on them, if not more, because the size allows me to focus on what I like to do the most … color!

This is the fourth book I’ve started and I love having it proped up on my desk – and just like a calendar, I can flip the page to something else inspiring for that week.  I’ve also started a smaller sized one which is about the size of a trading card which I like to use for single character stamps.  Those I plan to use later on as actual trading cards and I think having them all bound up will make it easier to transport.

The books I like to use the most are multi-purpose heavy duty art journal books with thick sturdy pages.  I found mine at the local craft store but you can find book at any art supply store too.

I had the background metal flowers colored long ago and had the colors jotted down so I’ll share those with you – they’re my favorite color combination for Copper, Steel and Brass:

E41, E42, E43, E44, YG91, YG93, YG95, YG97, YG99, BG93, G94, T4, C1, C3, C5, E11, E13, E93, E95, E97, E15, E17, YR30, Y32, YR21 and Y26.

That’s about it for this project.  😀  Thanks for coming by and I hope this gives you an idea for your next project!

Welcome to Hollywood Day 1

~ sproatmeyer ~ 65 Comments

Welcome to the combined release hop for Make it Crafty and Simply Betty Stamps!!  We have so much exciting goodness to bring you that we had to divide it into three days.  😀  What’s the theme you ask?  Hollywood!   For this post I’ll include all the basic details of the release, hop and prizes then a little more personal for the next two days.  ;D

I’m lucky to be the first on the hop!

Simply Betty Stamps has a range of characters from Betty Monroe, through to Action Chris the movie director!!  Make it Crafty has a range of background scenes perfect to switch and match with your famous characters!!  Here’s my project for the day which uses Hollywood City Corner, Christian the Dark Hero and Action Chris.

Of course we are going to have heaps of fun with this theme so June 1st  and June 2nd we will be showcasing the release and then June 3rd we’re bringing you a fun guessing game… Will you be able to guess the movie??  There’s a grand prize involved and we’ll be giving you some clues to help!!

Join us for the two inspiration days and leave a comment along the way for your chance to win a selection of new images.  There will be FOUR winners each day receiving a surprise character with matching background digi stamps. Then on June 3rd, guess 6 out of 12 movies correctly and you will have a chance to win the Grand Prize!
 

What’s in the Grand Prize?  Glad you asked because I have those details too.  LOL  The Grand Prize includes a DVD Movie of your choice PLUS the whole collection of MiC & SBS digi stamp Hollywood release images!  In addition, a Second Prize will receive the whole collection of MiC & SBS digi stamp Hollywood release!

Can’t wait?!!  But we know some of you just can’t wait so both Betty and Zoe are offering you
25% off their Hollywood collections between June 1st and June 3rd!

We hope you have lots of fun with us this weekend!!!
Your next stop in the hop is the talented COLLEEN!
Here’s the complete hop in case you get lost along the way…
Barbara (That’s me!)