The Professor is in the House

Today I had the pleasure of a few hours playing with distress oxide inks, trying to create a rusty, grunged look. I experimented with a few colour combinations then picked one for the background of my card. Here tis:

Pretty much all Tim Holtz products here, but SU officiandos may spy the brass 'Hodgepodge Hardware' piece from quite a few years ago. 

Materials used:

• stamps - The Professor (TH)
• card - early espresso, very vanilla, watercolour
• oxide inks - vintage photo, walnut stain, spiced marmalade, cracked pistachio, antique linen
• other - Gearhead dies (TH), Big Shot, Mechanics 3D embossing folder (TH), tag die, Mini Stencil Set 1 (TH), blending brush, distress micro glaze, vintage photo archival ink, Hodgepodge Hardware, Dimensionals, Stamparatus, Delicata celestial copper ink

Love the texture these deep embossing folders give, they make you just want to reach out and touch, lol. I couldn't decide on a sentiment (maybe 'Gearing up for another birthday?') so went without for now.

Here's how I went about making it (instructions by request! lol)

Background:

• Used heavy watercolour cardstock and oxide inks, water spritzer, heat tool

• Smooshed walnut stain and vintage photo oxide inks on craft mat, spritzed to get droplets, gave card a light spritz also then laid onto inks and gave a twist to get both colours covering most of the card

• Dried

• Applied again to any leftover ink

• Dried

• Smooshed spiced marmalade ink on craft mat, spritzed to get droplets, ran fingers through to break up then dipped card in various spots to distribute colour

• Dried

• Did same with cracked pistachio oxide ink (the green gives a patina look)

• Dried

• Applied a light mist of water to allow inks to blend and to encourage oxidisation

• Dried

• Once happy with the effect, I applied a light coat of distress micro glaze over the whole piece, wiping any excess off with a tissue. This not only seals the inks but also enhances the colours.

• Dried

• Spritzed it on the back with water and placed it in the Mechanics 3D Texture Fades embossing folder and ran it through my Big Shot three times

• Ran very lightly over the raised portions with Delicata Celestial Copper ink pad, also adding some ink using my finger (this doesn’t really show in the photo, but catches the light beautifully)

• Inked around outside edges with vintage photo archival ink

• Mounted on to a piece of vanilla cardstock, lightly inked around the edges with antique linen oxide (as the original vanilla was a bit stark/bright)

• Mounted both on to espresso card base

Tag:

• Background of tag:

• o Cut a piece of heavy watercolour cardstock using tag die
• o Ran vintage photo oxide ink pad dry across tag surface; spritzed with water to move ink around
• o Dried
• o Decided it was too dark so did same with antique linen oxide ink; dried
• o Spritzed with water and applied kitchen towel to absorb moisture, thus also lightening the colour; continued this until happy with amount of colour; dried
• o Stencilled vintage photo oxide ink through Industrial mini stencil over whole tag
• o Inked edges with vintage photo archival ink

• Cogs:

• o You could use metallic embellishments, but I made my own
• o I covered a piece of heavy watercolour cardstock with Delicata Celestial Copper ink then cut a number of cogs of various sizes using Gearhead dies
• o Each cog then had black soot and vintage photo archival inks applied in a random manner, as well as cracked pistachio distress paint applied in smudges using my finger

• Professor:

• o Stamped onto watercolour cardstock using ground espresso archival ink
• o Fussy cut by hand
• o Decided it was a bit stark (bright contrast to my background) so used waterbrush to lightly colour with antique linen oxide ink (except his goggles)
• o Adhered him to base of tag, cutting off excess, applying adhesive only down the centre of the image so I could lift the edges to adhere some cogs underneath

• Glued the cogs on using distress collage medium

• Punched a hole at top of tag using Crop-o-dile and attached brass embellishment

• Attached the tag using dimensional squares

Thanks for stopping by!

Cheers

Kerry