We asked our design team to look at new ways of using products that we all have in our stash. We kick this off with a look at stamps – just take a look at the results from Louise and Iris.
Louise W isn't the world's most confident stamper so tends to get around that by using a pigment ink and stamping onto a plain transparency instead. In this case she did that with the tree from the Tattered Angels stamp set - it makes it much easier to position it and avoid smudging. By stamping on the front of the transparency, she was then able to use alcohol inks to colour the tree on the back, adding interest to the image and allowing it to be customised to suit the layout colours.
The tree stamp adds depth and grounds the heading for the layout, while the vintage branch echoes the trunk and ties it in with the dual-meaning heading 'Buds'.
Iris' style usually involves some misting and a lot of stamping... She likes to try different mediums for stamping and for this assignment, Iris used glossy cardstock for her base. The edges of the glossy cardstock has been stamped and distressed using alcohol inks... a great solution for multi-colour stamping on non-porous surfaces according to Iris.
With this technique, Iris was able to work on a glossy surface, and stamp multi-colour and vibrant images. To achieve the crisp images, Iris applied two to three colours of alcohol ink on a felt pad and dabbed the pad on to her stamp. She then stamped the image immediately. With the still moist felt pad, she dabbed the felt pad on the edges of the cardstock to give it a distressed look.
