The Acid Test

Well, in my last post I said that I was so disgusted with the quality of the photo that I was going to buy myself a camera rather than continue to use my 5MP camera phone. New camera duly arrived today and here's the result, even from taking a quick snap with it's auto settings it seems better to me. What do you think? The camera phone pic is on the left, the new camera pic is on the right. Click on the image to see a larger version, where the differences should be clearer! :)

The central image with the moustache is certainly more in focus. The lighting was different due to taking the pic at a different time of day so that makes it a little harder to compare as it's not really like for like. At the end of the day, I'm pleased with the camera and think that it's going to allow me to take much better photos of my work, and I guess that's all that matters! :)

How to Pass

"Gothic Elements" is the theme over on the Gingersnap Creations blog this week. Hopefully you can see that the gothic element I went with was a gothic arch!

The solid arches and the frame borders for them were cut on the Cricut using the SCAL program, as were all of the hats and the moustache. The stamped images were coloured using shades of warm grey Promarker. The frame borders were stamped in Barn Door distress ink using one of Tim Holtz's stamps, then coloured with a yellow promarker. A piece of graphic 45 paper for the background and some TH memo pins complete the project, which is housed in a shadow frame (from Tesco, sadly they no longer have them).

BTW, I am so disgusted with the quality of this photo that I've ordered a new camera! This is probably an instance of a bad workman blaming his tools, but time will tell! :)

Pop over to the GC blog to see how the other DT members have interpreted the challenge - go on, you know you want to! :)

Numbers Challenge

Over on the Simon Says Stamp & Show Challenge blog today the new theme is "Numbers". I've been a bit naughty and am showing a project using 10 Second Studios materials and tools. After all, 10 is a number, right? :)

Another recycled item, this time a gift box made from 2 bases from Tria pen boxes. I've been unable to make anything new this week, so regular readers of my blog may recall having seen this before. You can see what the bases look like below. I removed the inner lip from one of them, and it became the lid, fitting perfectly onto the other base!

Using a paper stump and rounded silicone tool, I taped the metal onto the plate and then rubbed it into the design. I combined brown and green acrylic paint and a lot of water to make my own distressing spray, which I poured into a mini-mister. After each spritz, the metal was dried with a heat tool, until I was happy with the result.

The tile on the top was made several months back, on a metal class at LB Crafts. The copper was embossed on a Ten Seconds Studio mould and distressed with a patina spray. A square of patterned paper was cut from a Crafty Individuals sheet and placed in a silver Ranger Memory Frame, which had been rubbed with copper wax.

That’s about it, I hope you like it! :o)

Why not head over to the SSS&S blog and check out how the other design team members have interpreted the challenge - their work is amazing! Even better, why not join in yourself? Simon Says Stamp have another great prize up for grabs again this week! :)

As ever, click on the image if you want to see a larger view :)

Halloween Box-o-Tags!

First of all, let me get this out of the way immediately, the candy corn in the pic is faked, I photoshopped it in! I looked in every sweet shop I could think of to find some to sprinkle on the table for these pics but just couldn't get any - candy corn just isn't a UK thing! I hope you'll forgive my artistic licence! :)

On with business...
Over on the Simon Says Stamp & Show Challenge blog today the new theme is "Distressed/Sanded". I'm a bit of a stamping purist at heart and restricted myself to straightforard stamping for this project, I thought it would work well with the images, style and theme I was going for.

You've heard of a jack-o-lantern? Here's a box-o-tags! I used mostly Tim Holtz and Inkadinkado Halloween stamps, in conjunction with Bundled Sage, Dusty Concord and Wild Honey distress ink pads and an Archival black ink pad. Given the nature of the theme, I used a Tim Holtz sanding block to sand the edges of everything in sight! :)

Why not head over to the SSS&S blog and check out how the other design team members have interpreted the challenge - their work is amazing! Even better, why not join in yourself? Simon Says Stamp have another great prize up for grabs again this week! :)

As ever, click on the image if you want to see a larger view :)

Neutrals and 1 Bold...

... is the theme over on the Gingersnap Creations blog this week. I enjoyed making last weeks inchie card so much I decided to do another, but this time stepping even further outside of my normal style to make it as stripped-down and simple as I could!

September is birthday month for many of my family, so this card is definitely going to find an owner sooner rather than later. A grid of inchie stamps using Memento Tuxedo Black were then coloured with putty, almond and berry red Promarkers. I did say it was simple - perfect though for those times when you need a card in a hurry! :)

Pop over to the GC blog to see how the other DT members have interpreted the challenge - go on, you know you want to! :)

"Your Grunge!" Challenge

Over on the Simon Says Stamp & Show Challenge blog today the new theme is "Your Grunge!". I've had grunge paper kicking around for quite some time but never really gotten around to using it much, so I thought this would be the perfect opportunity.

Part of the inspiration for this piece was the title sequence of the recent series of Big Brother here in the UK. I really enjoyed the sinister circus/mad house feel used in the titles and set decoration of the show. Those who haven't seen it or are overseas can get a sense of what I mean here.

The circus letters, bunting, awning and curtain with a hole in it were all designed on the PC and cut on the Cricut using the SCAL program. The awning was cut from grunge paper, painted with acrylic paint and then overstamped with some Tim Holtz paint splatters. It was also sanded and inked to distress it further, before being glued in place inside a 2" deep frame from Ikea.

I used my TH design ruler (those grid markings are just so darned useful!) to mark the stripes on the curtain and then coloured it using promarkers. I distressed it with a walnut stain distress ink pad applied with an ink blending tool and then overstamped some paint splatters too. "For the eye" and "See All" were stamped separately and fixed to the curtain.

I wanted the eye to be quite a distance behind the hole in the curtain so I constructed a box from white card, and stamped the eye in the middle of the bottom surface before assembling it and sticking it to the back of the curtain. By sticking the base of the box to the rear of the frame it also allowed the curtain to stand 1/2 way between the front and back of the frame, adding more dimensionality to the composition.

I wanted the eye to look like a black and white photograph, though it's just a stamp. so I coloured it with various shades of grey promarker and then used the shape cut out from the hole in the curtain as a mask to apply a shadow around the eye. The circus letters were coloured with promarker and then stuck into place. At the very back is a piece of Graphic 45 striped paper and infront of that a partially coloured section of a TH clowns stamp.

I deliberately left some parts of this piece partially coloured or un-coloured as I wanted to stress the artifice of the whole piece and in a way make myself part of it all. The pointy hat is a section cut from a large notepaper stampe. coloured with promarkers then distressed with walnut stain. All of the elements were layered with 3d foam tape and the memo pins stuck into place.

I hope you like it :) As ever, click any of the pics to see a larger view!

Why not pop over to the challenge blog and see the amazing entries by the rest of the design team? Even better, join in the fun! :)

Our ever-generous sponsor Simon Says Stamp is offering a $25 gift voucher again this week! The winner will be chosen at random from those who enter the challenge, so why not give it a try?

Blog Hop Candy Winner!

Thanks everyone for joining in with the blog hop over at Simon Says Stamp! Those of us on the Simon Says Stamp and Show Design Team loved looking through all your creative entries!

I've used Random.org to select a winner from the comments on my blog, and the winner is Ingrid, who made the comment below:

Ingrid said...

Pretty scary card... lol! Thanks for the hop-fun :-)
Hugs Ingrid

11 September 2010 19:11

Please email me with your address Ingrid and I will make sure your bat stamp gets off in the mail to you!

Inchies Halloween Card

Over on the Gingersnap Creations blog there's a new challenge starting today - the theme is "inchies".

I decided to step outside my comfort zone for this challenge, and tried to make something clean and spare, not my usual style at all!

The inchies were stamped with Tim Holtz stamps and the background coloured with a "pumpkin" Promarker. They were then mounted onto a square of orange card and fixed to the card front.

Not much else to say about it really, other than I hope you like it! Why not pop over to the GC blog to see how the other design team members have interpreted the challenge? :)

Holiday Blog Hop

Simon Says Stamp are sponsoring an awesome blog hop with some great prizes including a $100 spending spree and it all starts today! The theme for the hop is "holidays" and full details of how to join in with all the fun can be found at the Simon Says Stamp and Show blog!

My piece for this week's theme is a halloween card, as you can see :) All of the elements were stamped in black using various stamps from the Tim Holtz range and coloured using distress ink pads and marker pens. The title on the Witch Hazel label is highlighted with glossy accents and the October calendar page is covered with acetate affixed with glossy accents. The charms hanging from the metal memory frame are two of Tim's newest Halloween stamps, stamped onto shrink plastic. The photo of "Vlad" is one of the photos from the Lost and Found paper stack. The white parts such as the teeth were scratched with a craft pick (or pokey tool if you prefer!) and the hair and cape were added using marker pens. It was finished off with a piece of chain and a gold brad.

Oh, one thing I forgot! You need a clue letter from me, don't you? I think I'll lEt you guEss what it might bE! :)

And now for the blog candy... Those of you who leave a comment on this post will be entered into a prize draw to win Tim Holtz's Vintage Bat stamp, which I used to create one of my shrink plastic charms, courtesy of Simon Says Stamp!

Your next stop on the blog hop is Lynne's amazing blog - have fun!!

Layers Challenge

The theme this week over on the Simon Says Stamp & Show challenge blog is "Lots of Layers". I tackled the challenge from two separate angles - multilayered stamping and by having the squares of the main image at different heights within the shadow-box frame.

Strips of Lost and Found cardstock were used to face the front of the frame. The main piece inside the frame was stamped and coloured, then cut into 9 squares, each of which was distressed. The image was then re-combined, with the pieces at different heights and angles.

I hope you like it, it was a lot of fun to make! :) Click on the picture for a larger view!

Why not head over to the challenge blog to see what the other designers have created for this weeks challenge, they're a talented bunch! (While you're there, why not enter the challenge yourself? There's another FANTASTIC prize up for grabs, a $25 spending spree, courtesy of sponsor Simon Says Stamp!).