Video: Colored Pencil Highlights, Blog Hop + Giveaway (Jennifer McGuire Ink)

Hello! Today’s video is all about taking a solid stamped image and bringing it to life using colored pencils highlights. This post is also part of the Altenew Blog Hop with a giveaway.

(All supplies are linked to multiple sources in the thumbnails at the end of this post. To watch the video in HD on YouTube, click

HERE.)

One of the most effective ways to add the look of dimension to an otherwise flat, solid stamped image is with colored pencils. For today’s cards, I started by stamping the new flower image from Altenew (one of my favorite stamp companies). I then colored different areas of the petals with my Prismacolor White Colored Pencil to add highlights… and a good eraser to soften and blend it. I really love the velvet look this gives! It is amazing how effective that one white pencil can be.

You could stop at this point, but I kept going. (As I tend to do – lol.) I added a touch of coloring with a darker colored pencil for even more dimension. I also traced over the white lines of the image using my white colored pencil to make it pop. I did the same thing with the peach flower but used my white Gelly Roll pen instead. It comes out very fine and thin, which makes it perfect for this technique. I think these kind of small details really add up and make a big difference in making your image stand out.

To create my background, I drew lines on a white note card using my pencil and t-ruler… to help me keep my stamping straight. I added two sentiments onto one acrylic block to save time and stamped them using three different shades of gray ink. I started with the darkest (Charcoal from Hero Arts), then a medium shade of ink (Silver Lining from WPlus9), and then finished off my stamping with the lightest shade of gray (Fog from Simon Says Stamp). You could instead do generation stamping here.

This technique gives such a nice ombre effect and I love that I can stretch my sentiment stamps to create backgrounds. I wanted to make sure the main sentiment stood out from all that stamping on the background, so I stamped it in VersaFine Black ink and heat embossed it using clear embossing powder. To finish off my card, I attached my flower using some foam adhesive and tucked some silver thread behind it.

Like this colored pencil technique? Click

HERE for another video showing a variation. Oh, and you can get a great deal on the large Prismacolor pencil sets HERE.

BLOG HOP

This post is part of the Altenew Blog Hop celebrating their third release. (I love new companies!) You can see all their new products HERE.

The next person on this hop is the adorable Pamela Ho. You will love her blog! (If you want to start at the beginning of the hop, go to the Altenew blog.)

GIVEAWAY

To celebrate, I will choose a winner from comments left on this post and the prize will be two Altenew stamps sets of your choice! You have until 11:59 EST on 10/31/14 to leave your comments for your chance to win.

Also, Altenew is giving away five stamp sets of choice to three lucky winners! The winners will be chosen from comments left on the Altenew blog.