Book Fairy - Through the Craftroom Door, Distress Oxides and Glossy Photo Paper

This week's sponsor for the Through the Craftroom Door blog challenge is Oddball Art!

Artist, Poet, Fruitarian............. Lizzy Love is a perfect combination of sweet and sour that glitters up the grunge! Easily lose yourself in her artistic realm of sometimes spooky but always delightfully cute, big eyed waifs and their animal friends. Lizzy’s whimsical, one of a kind dream world is easily recognizable by her signature style of creepy yet cute, all the way from the haunting darkness to the rainbowtastic, her original creations are lovingly sprinkled with a heartbreaking sweetness. Though she is completely enthralled by her Twinkling watercolors right now, Lizzy employs many different mediums when she creates, from drawing to painting, sewing and cutting, the end result always being the same; A gothic fantasy land painted in soft pastels and neon colors; filled with big eyed beauties, creepy little cuties and quirky monsters of all shapes and sizes. Lizzy Love’s artwork includes original paintings both acrylic and watercolor, giclee fine art prints, art dolls, digital and rubber stamps of her characters , hand painted merchandise such as bags, tshirts and more..... limited only by her imagination the possibilities are endless. http://www.oddballartco.com/

My project features Astrid the Fairy, a bookworm fairy perched on her stack of books. I used glossy photo paper with Distress Oxides for the main image and chipboard decorated with Nuvo Mouse and Art Alchemy wax to make it into a wall hanging.

Putting It Together

The first time I saw the technique using Distress Oxides on glossy photo paper, I was blown away. It's an easy technique that has stunning results.

I started by printing the digi on glossy photo paper. I used the specialty settings for my printer with max DPI for a crisp black image.

I first coloured the image in with Distress Oxides and a water brush. Painting on the glossy photo paper is not like any other paper. The colour does not move at all and only slightly blends. Working in little strokes, almost like pointillism worked best for me. 

I used a lot of the colours from the original release set of the Distress Oxides. I really need to get the rest of the released colours. I do love working with the Oxides for several techniques.

Now on to the technique magic. First I added some blotches of colour to a bit of plastic packaging. Any plastic will do. It just needs to be a non-porous surface.

I sprayed the splotches with water. The absolute best results I have had with this technique have been with very watery wet ink.

Blot the photo paper on the wet ink.

Continue splotching and smushing to cover the paper, dipping it into the colours. Unlike with normal Oxide smushing, don't worry too much about building layers.

Use a heat tool and dry the paper. The surface will have a chalky surface. 

Lastly, use a wet wipe and wipe down the paper. The colours will come alive in an amazing way.

I was thrilled with how crisp the printing remained and the pre-painting did stay subtly setting the fairy and her stack of books apart from the multicoloured background.

I trimmed the image panel with a CC Designs die. I also cut a black glittered matting. Then I decided I wanted to make a wall hanging so I used an Sizzix edge die to trim the top of a 6" x 6" chipboard panel. I used a Plus embossing folder from Simply Refined to give the chipboard dimension.

I used Nuvo Embellishment Mousse with a Distress blender tool and Alchemy Art wax with my fingers to decorate the panel and enhance the embossing.

I added my image panel and matting with double-sided adhesive tape.

To add a ribbon hanger, I used a pair of brads from Echo Park.

The Through the Craftroom Door blog challenge is always Anything Goes. This week the prize is three images from Oddball Art. Come join us and show us your creations!

Challenges

Incy Wincy: Things That Fly

Fab 'n' Funky: Embossing

Try It On Tuesday: Die Cuts

Pearly Sparkles: Things with Wings

Sketchy Challenge: Ribbon

Creative Craft Cottage: Dies