Index card - Into the abyss

Hi everyone,

It's June and that means for me it's ICAD time! If you are not familiar with this, it stands for "index card a day" and is about doing something creative on an index card every day for two months. This is the third year I'm participating in the challenge and I decided to follow the weekly prompts. This week is about typography, text and poetry and so today's card contains a few text and letter elements.

When I started, I knew I wanted to do something a little "steampunky" and had a rough idea for my focal point. With an eye towards the weekly theme, I started with this fantastic steampunk alphabet stamp set. I got out my quite dry Archival Ink and stamped the words "brave hearts dive deep", not caring too much about a perfect stamp impression.

I wanted to add some color and therefore chose two Moonshadow Mists. I sprayed them on top and also dipped the card into the puddles on my working surface to get some additional texture. When building layers with these sprays (or any other water soluable colors) it can be helpful to dry the piece in between as it adds some interesting textures.

Next, I stamped my focal image - the whimsical diver - with Versafine Claire Ink and used watercolor brush pens to color it in. I used some brown and orange/gold tones first and went over parts of the image with a very light blue wash then. Doing this wash is easy: Instead of adding the color directly to the page, I scribbled some on my glass mat and picked it up with a water tank brush. The blue wash created this pretty greenish metal look.

I cut my image and inked up the edges with a black marker. Then I decided where to place it on my index card. For more interest in the background I added some messy stamping with the "into the abyss" text stamp. As I wanted a stonger impression as I had with my first layer, I used my juicy Versafine Claire ink pad again and made multiple stamp impressions without reinking the stamp very often. With this technique I did two areas around the diving helmet and one in the right top corner.

To finish my card, I did two more steps. First, I glues the image down together with some washi tape to avoid a weirdly floating focal point. Of course I could have simply glued the image to the bottom, but I just liked it to be a little higher.
Also, I collected some text fragments from books. I have a few old/used books (novels and poetry) that I just keep for this purpose. I went through them quickly (just a quick skimming) and through the snippets I already cut from some of the books and chose some fragments to form a new text. I love when you can see that the fragments are taken from different books, and to be honest, I love that it turned out a little oppressive.

So heres my finished index card again, as well as a few detail images:

Stamps used:
Steampunk Alphabet Unmounted (5888)
Whimsical Diver (19354)
Into The Abyss (19352)

Other material:
- index card
- Archival Ink (jet black)
- Versafine Claire Ink (nocturne)
- Lindy's Moonshadow Mist (buccaneer bay blue, moonlit mulberry)
- ZIG watercolor brush pens
- washi tape
- old books / text fragments

See you soon!

Art Journal Page: "Time is an Abyss" by Jenn Engle

Hey Everyone! I have an art journal page for you today. It is a page that took me awhile and has a lot of steps, so rather than fail miserably at trying to explain it, you can just check out the process video included at the end of this post.

I ended up loving this spread. I mean, with the awesome images at VLVS, how could I not?!

 

These are the Viva Las VegaStamps! I used:

“Clockface”

"The Great Unknown"

“Into The Abyss”

"Whimsical Diver”

"Stitching Line”

 



You can check out my exact process Start to Finish here:

Thanks for looking,
Jenn

Into the Abyss~ Altered Altoid Tin

Greetings, stampers! It's Amy here today, to share an altered Altoid tin I made into a fun little "shrine" of sorts on the inside.

I used a regular Altoids tin, and covered it with vintage book pages in layers (on both the inside and outside), using gel medium. When those were dry, I added a layer of copper paint, that had been thinned in half with water........to cover the entire tin and papers. This half paint mixture allowed the papers to show through, and gave a cool realistic metallic shimmer.

For the outside of the tin, I added flicks of turquoise, olive green shimmer, and Mediterranean blue, and when that was dry, I added stamping with the Area 51 Warning  stamp.

I added the whimsical diver stamp in two layers. One is stamped on cardboard, and fussy cut, and a second is stamped onto a library card, fussy cut, and added on top with foam adhesive. I then stamped the into the abyss stamp onto a small scrap, and adhered it, along with the metal wing (with a little bit of cheesecloth behind it),and chipboard star. I sprayed the outside with a protective gloss spray, and wrapped it with copper wire, attaching a clasp.
 The inside was simple to complete, since it has already been covered with the vintage pages. To the top, I simply added some washi tape,a chipboard piece,button and a fussy cut vintage image of octopus tentacles. The wire from the front wraps to the inside, so it adds a nice line of color, as well. For the bottom, I adhered a playing card to the bottom, and a strip of washi; added cheesecloth/twine to the sides/edges....and then added a stamped and fussy cut Octopus/Cephalopod...to happily slink along the bottom edge. A die, and a star pin stamped image, and little sewing machine charm (because every octopus thinks about sewing) complete the project!
I am going to give this little tin to my husband, for his desk at work. Because...everyone needs a little whimsy during a work day. :)

Thanks for having a look today, and for more inspiration from me, visit my blog at www.sparklinggnome.com! Have a great rest of the week!

Supply List: 
Viva Las VegaStamps!: Whimsical Diver, Octopus/Cephalopod, Star Pin, Area 51 Warning.
Ink: Clearsnap Mix'd Media Inx (black, denim).
Paper: Vintage, digtal download-Stampington and Co.
Chipboard: UmWowStudio
Metal Wing: Tim Holtz