Thoughts and Theories - SanDee&amelie's Steampunk Challenges

Servus and welcome to my little crafty spot! Thanks so much for stopping by!

Team B are sharing their makes today over at SanDee&amelie's Steampunk Challenges (where our challenge theme for January is once more an "Anything Goes - Steampunk/Industrial" one), so it's time to share a little steampunk tag that I made while creating a happy mess on my studio desk.

Especially the background was a lot of fun to do and as I have the habit of taking steps images (also and especially for my own reference) I can share the how-to with you as well.

As I had some "semi-glossy" cardstock from old packaging materials, I decided to experiment and try out techniques that work best on less absorbant surfaces (like working with alcohol inks for example). What I came up with is a kind of "monoprinting directly on your palette pad" thingie. And it is really quick and easy to do!



All I did was apply tiny dots of DecoArt media fluid acrylics English Red Oxide, Yellow Oxide, Diarylide Yellow and Prussian Blue Hue directly to the top sheet of my palette paper pad and generously spritz with water from the spraybottle.

Then I took a brayer and smudged the paints (not too much as i didn't want to end up with mud...so I "cleaned" the brayer by rolling the excess paint onto a sheet of paper before I repeated the dragging-the-paint-process). 

Quickly I placed a die cut tag (that I had cut from the semi-glossy cardstock) face down onto the "mess" and rubbed gently before I lifted it up again. 

The result was even better than I had expected! Yay!

A cool marbling effect with loads of awesome random texture and colour mixes:

While that was set aside to dry, I die cut some pieces of "pipeline" using said Tim Holtz Sizzix dies set and heavy cardstock.  Using a worn old bristle brush I stippled some DecoArt media Texture Sand Paste onto the parts I wanted to use and heat dried. 

Then I applied a coat of DecoArt Americana premium Carbon Black acrylic paint with a soft brush and heat dried that as well. 

That was followed by a wash of DecoArt media English Red Oxide...

...and once that had dried as well, I dipped the pieces face down into a wash of DecoArt media Yellow Oxide (also directly on my palette paper sheet) until I was content with the look. 

I used the left overs from the wash to tone down an idea-ology quote chip:

While these pieces were set aside to dry, I continued working on the tag's background.

Using archival black stamping ink I added some steampunk images to the tag (from the Tim Holtz "Dapper" stamp set).  Then I stippled some DecoArt media Translucent White fluid acrylic through a letter stencil to add some depth. 

I used a splatter brush to use up the left overs from the Translucent White and added some white speckles.

Then I blended the tag's edges with black archival stamping ink (using the stamp pad like I would use a piece of blending foam). Then I also added some black speckles using a DecoArt media Carbon Black Mister. 

I set the tag to the side and rubber stamped and fussy cut my three guys (the stamp is from loast-coast-design) :

Now it was time to assemble all the prepared pieces and play around to create some cool layers.

I used some stamp stickers, MDF numerals, a copper brad,...

... parts of left over scraps from  die cut, painted and embossed pieces from previous projects (like the golden circle piece which was done with a Spellbinders die I had played with)...

I only used parts of the stamp stickers to create the impression of stacked layers...

...and of course there had to be a copper brad to "fix" the (glued on) turning valve:

I just love these guys (and that rubber stamp)!!!

...and the finished tag of course!

Some close ups:

I hope you like it too!

Click HERE to get taken to our challenge blog! The makes of my wonderful teamies need to be checked out too (the ones from Team A too of course if you haven't seen these already)! You will love them all! 

Hope to see you play along soon!

Hugs and happy crafting!

Claudia 

xxx