Colouring 'Gorjuss' with Spectrum Noirs

The following steps through my first attempt at colouring my new 'Gorjuss - You Brought Me Love' stamp (GOR 907106).

The image was stamped with Memento 'London Fog' onto blending card (purchased from Crafty Capers) as I wanted a soft outline. Sorry about photo quality here - cardstock is actually white!

  My downloaded and completed colour chart was used to select Spectrum Noir colours to match thesuggested colours on the stamp as follows:

Skin: FS2 with FS5 for shadowed areas + BG2 - see note * belowbeside first picture.

Cheeks: PP3 with FS6 to soften

Petticoat, socks, bows: Blender pen and BG1 (+BGR3 for socks)

Dress: BT9 and BT8 with  BGR4 shadow base under medium and dark areas as photographed further down.

                                          Hair: IG5, IG8, IG10 and True Black

For the skin I wanted a very pale tone with pinkish grey shadows. I'm happy with the final result.

I feel the finished cheeks are a bit too pink and would probably palette-blend PP3 and FS6 for a softer pink next time.

My addition of a warm grey to the dress on the shaded areas was because only the BT9 and 8 matched the colour I wanted but I felt the image I was matching had grey tones in the shadows.

 I tend to colour the lighter skin areas before darker hair and clothing, my logic being that if I do the dark areas first the lighter solvent-rich colours may push away my dark areas.

So - legs coloured first, then arms, then shoulders/chest, then face. (*After colouring the legs with FS2 and FS5 I added BG2 to the areas of darkest shadow at top of legs and reblended the area - BG2 chosen as a  warm grey. I did the same at the side of her neck.)

  

 

 
Dress coloured next, laying down light area then BGR shadow. First image here shows BT8 and BGR4 on lower part of dress. (Top bit has had BT9 blended with BT8). BT9 and BT8 then blended repeatedly over this base.

Shoes in same colours as dress.

Petticoat next, then socks. Blender pen over whole white area then BG1 touched onto shadow areas; softened with blender pen if necessary. Same technique for her bows. The socks were a challenge - my BGR3 nib is 'wide' and the pen very juicy so I used tip-to-tip from BGR3 onto BG1 (narrower nib, less juicy pen) to colour the outer edges of the stripes on the socks.

 

Dots on dress drawn on with Copic black 0.03 multiliner.

Bows outlined and dotted with multiliner. Eyes retouched with multiliner.

Borders of hair and areas beside neck done with multiliner.

Hair coloured (as 2 groups - right of part first then left of part) by applying IG5 to 'shiny' areas of hair. IG8 flicked in from centre of part into IG5. Ditto IG10 then True Black.

My next job will be to put Gorjuss onto a card - hopefully some time this weekend.

I can't wait to try colouring her in purples for this month's Spectrum Noir Challenge.

Will walk for fruit cake

We're holidaying in Walpole this week. We've kayaked off Coalmine Beach, caught fish for dinner (black bream) and today we did the Nuyts Wilderness Trail out to Thomspon Cove. It was a 6.67km walk each way. It took from 8.45am until 2.40pm and we're shattered! It was the thought of fruit cake that kept us going the last 2 km!

Here are a couple of the locals at our caravan park:

                                                 Fruit cake? Did someone say fruit cake?

Humph - no one offered me any fruit cake. And they pulled their fish back out of my mouth before I could swallow it. "Not happy, Jan."

Colouring over glitter

Inspired by Craft Stamper's latest issue I had to give this technique a try:

I've use CT3, OR1 and OR3; CG1 and CG3; EB8 over normal crystal glitter on Jac paper. Pens wiped clean on a scrap of paper towel after use. Colour touched on - no attempt at blending on this surface. The stamps are from StampIt sets 019jh and 014.

How I colour ... Long post!!!

Colouring Christmas Tilda With Puppy

On a recent visit to my local newsagent to see which new card-making magazines were out, I spotted an issue of Magnolia Ink magazine (No 6, 2012) with a free stamp - Christmas Tilda With Puppy.
This describes in detail the process I used to colour the image for the first time with Spectrum Noir pens. You should be able to colour different Tildas with the same colour combinations, or use the process to select first-time colours yourself.
You may like to work through the Spectrum Noir blog section on Palette Blending, and to look at Tip-to-Tip colouring to familiarise yourself with techniques I am going to mention. After each of these techniques MAKE SURE you CLEAN OFF the light pen or blender pen by wiping repeatedly onto scrap paper until pen is back to original colour.

Whenever I first colour a new stamped image I like to have a coloured image to copy - many stamps have a coloured image on them, or I may search for the stamp on Google adding the word 'images' or 'gallery' to my search. In this case there was an illustrated image in the accompanying magazine - coloured with Distress Markers but no mention of the actual colours used. (There are also several coloured images on Pinterest - some with Spectrum Noir pens, some with Copics).

After stamping the image onto blending card with Memento Tuxedo Black ink, I grabbed my Spectrum Noir colour chart (printed onto blending card and coloured with my pens). I used the chart to select Earth Brown tones for her shoes and hair and the basket, True Blue and Blue Grey tones for her stockings and dress, and Flesh and Tan tones for her skin and the puppy. I also added Coral CR3 for her cheeks and the pup's mouth.

Colours used are - Hair, Shoes and Basket - EB1 and EB3 + blender pen
    Stockings and Dress - TB1, BGR1 and BGR2 + blender pen
    Lace trim on dress - BGR2 + blender pen
    Face  - FS2 and FS3 + CR3 cheeks
    Hands - FS2, FS3 and TN2
    Puppy - FS2, TN2, TN5 + CR3 tongue
    Bows - BP1 and BP7

I started with the hair, colouring the left side of her head. I put EB1 over the entire area. I then scribbled EB3 onto an old CD for palette blending and repeatedly picked up the EB3 with my EB1 pen and stroked it onto the darker areas of her hair. (NOTE - when palette blending, land the pen where you want the darkest colour and move towards lighter area).  I also put EB3 from the EB3 pen down the centre of her hair then stroked it out with the palette EB3/EB1 combination. I repeated this for the right side of her hair. Next I touched the blender pen over the areas that looked lightest on the magazine image. If it went too light after drying I re-touched with EB1.
The same technique was used for the shoes - EB1 over all the shoe, palette-blended EB3 on the EB1 pen onto darker areas. Blender pen onto lightest part of shoe; retouch if necessary.
The woven basket was done differently - I coloured most of each small square on the basket with EB1 then dotted EB3 into each top left corner and blended it with the EB1.
For the stockings I 'coloured' with the blender pen the area that would be lightest, then coloured over the whole stocking with TB1. I put BGR1 onto the shadowed areas and blended with TB1, then BGR2 onto the darker shadowed areas, blending with BGR1 and TB1 where necessary.  This was repeated for sleeves and dress.
On the lace vest and dress trim, I touched the tip of the blender pen onto the BGR2 pen and lightly touched it onto areas that would be shadowed. After cleaning off the blender pen I softened any areas that needed it.
Face was done with FS3 around hairline (also on top left of neck) blended with FS2. CR3 dotted onto sides of cheeks and blended with FS2. I repeated the FS3/FS2 step to increase colour.
Hands were TN2 to darkest part, FS3 beside that, FS2 rest of hand - all blended.
Puppy was FS2 in lightest areas, TN2 around dark edges, blended with FS2. TN5 touched around darkest areas, blended with TN2 then FS2. The pup's face only had one layer of FS2 to keep it light.
The bows were coloured with BP1. BP7 was touched onto darkest areas then palette- blended with the BP1 pen from dark areas out.
An Atyou Spica pen (02 Pink) was touched over the bows when all colouring was complete, to match the magazine image. (I could also have used Stickles at this stage).
Remember not to add anything non-Spectrum to your colouring area before finishing with the Spectrum Noirs as you will probably contaminate your pen nibs. I should have put in shading around my image and will now have to fussy-cut her out and overlay onto a shaded background image.

Another Spectrum Noir Challenge - Bling

Due tomorrow, here is my entry for this month's challenge - using only Spectrum Noir pens to colour, and adding BLING. Here is the link for the challenge - http://www.spectrumnoir.com/challenge/
I've coloured the stamped image (from a Stamp-It set) with PP2, PP4, PP5, DG2 and DG3. The colours were chosen to match the Washi tape used all over the card. PP6 was used to colour the rhinestones. Spellbinders Romantic Rectangles and lots of careful plate placement used to cut the frame around the image.
So, without further ado ... taken without flash

and with flash - to highlight the BLING!!

SN Links?

In case you are wondering about the SN Links tab on the top row, it is short for Spectrum Noir Links. The page contains a number of links straight to relevant areas of the Spectrum Noir blog so that you don't have to spend time searching for resources we mention in class at Crafty Capers.

On Holiday

If you've been
 to this spot you'll recognise it!
Hint - we're in Busselton for four days, staying at Restawhile. Usually we head off to the above spot for lunch and a swim. This time it was lunch and no swim, thanks to a big black helicopter and a siren. The only fins I could see belonged to two dolphins - mother and calf. Just as well I wasn't one of the lifeguards on duty!
In complete relaxation mode - morning beach walks, leisurely lunches, maybe a swim in the pool. Wish I'd brought my SpecNoir pens to try some freehand sketching. Having to make do with pencil sketches.
Back to reality tomorrow :(