Happy Accident

I meant to duplicate the "popcorn paper" technique using mat board, but I goofed. It turned out to be one of those happy accidents.





I started by spraying a deep red scrap of mat board with the texture spray described earlier. In the last project I covered the chipboard completely so that no chipboard showed through. This time I sprayed more sparsely and left mat board showing through.



Since the Twinkling H20's floated on the top when the chipboard was completely covered, I thought with some of the mat board showing through I might get a nice sparkly effect. Wrong! The Twinks completely saturated the top layer of the mat board and dried disappointingly flat. For some unknown reason, I started rubbing the surface with my finger while it was still damp. The top layer began to roll up and peel off, revealing the next layer with just a touch of color left. Interesting effect, but the picture is dark, so you have to click on it to look at the larger version to see what I mean.





One look at the resulting surface and I knew it was going to take Radiant Rains very nicely. I used Sky Blue and Periwinkle. (I get mine from After Midnight.) The rough edges resulting from rolling off part of the mat board's surface layer actually gave the piece a marbled effect.

Once I got the color saturation I liked I decided to add a little webbing spray on top.



Here's the finished piece photographed in the sun on an angle, in a desparate attempt to get the shimmer to show up.

If I do this again, I'd change the process in the following ways. First, I'd skip the texture spray altogether because most of it rolled off when I removed so much of the surface layer. Second, I'd probably wet the top layer of the mat board with inexpensive watercolor paint rather than Twinks since none of the glimmer showed up in that early stage. Third, I'd use a different color of webbing spray. White was all I had on hand. I might even try Golden Clear Tar Gel mixed with Luminarte Primary Elements to get the webbing effect.

I love learning from happy accidents.

Popcorn Paper

I decided to play with unconventional supplies again. I was wandering around in my local Lowes in the paint department when I stumbled on the stuff that is used to repair the "popcorn" texture in ceilings. "Surely I can use that in my art," I thought.

The base of my "Popcorn Paper" is actually chipboard, not paper. I used the chipboard that comes folded into my husband's laundered shirts. It's similar in thickness to a cereal box, maybe a little heavier. Here's how I did mine.

1. Spray the chipboard with the ceiling texture goup. You'll find it at any home or hardware store. It dries in about 30 minutes.

Here's what it looks like after it dries. It was late in the evening so this photograph was taken with ambient light. The blue is a result of my florescent bulbs. It's actually very, very white.








2. When dry, spray with black spray paint.
3. Highlight with burgundy and cream spray paint.

4. I added Twinkling H20's to one corner (lower left), but they floated on top of the spray paint layer. It doesn't show up well in the photograph. If that's a look you like, go for it.

5. Finally, I added layers of pigment ink and blended them with my finger. Click on the finished photograph to get a better look at the texture.

This was fun.

Koolaid ATC

I've had some koolaid around for ages to try on paper. Today I decided to experiment with it. I wet an ATC size piece of watercolor paper and applied pinches of koolaid through the middle. Then I added Twinkling H20's to the rest. I salted the whole thing. When it was dry I scraped off the salt (it really sticks to the Twinks) and stamped with Ranger Archival Ink. I liked the color and the effect of the koolaid application.