Who doesn’t love a good technique?! I certainly can’t resist trying out something new; it’s a great way to push yourself, your talent, and you never know – you just might like it. There’s an artist in the U.K. that I discovered, when I discovered Brusho Crystals, her name is Joanne Boon Thomas. She creates amazing art using traditional watercolour paints, as well as the Brusho Crystals and charcoal. Recently, I watched her video tutorial called ‘Watercolour Line and Wash’, and fell in love with the technique. Of course, I bemoan the fact that I can’t draw! So I thought – could I try this technique, but with stamps & ink, instead or my own drawing. So – the faux line and wash technique.
FAUX LINE AND WASH TECHNIQUE
The idea of this technique is that you draw your sketch onto watercolour paper, and then trace over it with waterproof ink. You keep your lines very loose and ‘sketchy’ – not worrying about ruler straight lines, or following the exact line of the image. With the actual watercolour line & wash technique, after you’ve gone over you sketch with the ink, you then add your watercolour paints, again in a loose fashion.
For the ‘faux’ technique, I decided that I would use a multi-layer stamp image, and draw the lines of each colour layer. I used my favourite floral image from the Beautiful Day stamp set by Altenew. On the first card, I actually stamped all 3 layers of colour, and then drew the ink lines. For the second card, I drew the ink lines after stamping each colour.
DRAWN LINES AFTER IMAGE STAMPED
This is the card where I drew the image lines after the complete flower was stamped.
To draw the lines around the colours and image, I used Micron .05 archival ink pen. To add the heavier lines, I used my Zig Clean Color Real Brush Marker in Black. The images are stamped using Stampin’ Up! classic ink in Grapefruit Grove, Mango Melody and Calypso Coral – all very close colours. To stamp the leaves, Pear Pizzazz and Spruce Grove inks are used.
The sentiment is stamped in Versafine Clair Nocturne ink, covered with clear embossing powder and heat set. It is from the Penny Black Sentiment Collection stamp set.
LINES DRAWN BETWEEN COLOURS
For this card, I used my Micron pen to add the lines between each colour. You can see the difference quite easily, I think.
Because the colours on the first card were so close, I decided to change up the ink colours on this card. This time, I chose So Saffron, Grapefruit Grove and Cajun Craze. The leaves are still Pear Pizzazz and Spruce Grove. I used the same pen and marker to add the lines.
This sentiment is also from the Penny Black Sentiment Collection stamp set; again stamped in Nocturne and set in clear embossing powder.
Each of the front panels is attached with foam squares to a Mango Melody cardstock panel, and attached to a black card base. The black rhinestones are from my stash.
DO YOU HAVE A PREFERENCE?
Do you have a preference on which faux line & wash technique card you like? Or perhaps me switching up colours throws things off? I think this is a fun way to give your stamps a different look, and I hope you’ll give it a try! Be sure to watch Joanne Boon Thomas’s video on this technique; you can always fast forward if you don’t want to watch the entire process. I hope you’ll have a moment to leave me a comment on this post, and let me know what you think!
