Ink-Painted Cat Tags
Cat Tags
Remember the free online course I enrolled in? One of my assignments was to make an ink-painted flower. It’s basically using the ink from your stamp pad to paint paper. The assignment called for painting a flower cut from a page of text, but also encouraged the use of other shapes. I decided to make a set of tags featuring cats, a text background and ink painting.
Here are the general steps on how to make the cat tags:
- Cut out a tag shape from card stock. An old business card with two corners cut off works nicely too.
- Cover the tag with printed paper (use a page from a book, magazine, or old office correspondence), and trim any excess paper.
- Color the paper with your choice of medium. I used stamp pad ink, but you can get great results too with a watercolor wash, watercolor pencils, or even tea or fruit juice — as long as the text shows through the color. Let the paper dry thoroughly.
- Now the fun part: Add any additional backgrounds such as a strip of decorative paper, a piece of decorative tape, or a cutout paper flower.
- Glue the cat pictures in place.
- Next, use a felt marker to write your sentiment on a piece of paper: Hello! Thanks! Relax! I used a computer printer to print the text on vellum for a soft, blurry effect. Cut out the text and stick it on the tag. Almost there.
- Punch a hole at the end of the tag, add a binder hole reinforcer, or a punched flower with a hole in the middle.
- Tie a piece of ribbon through the hole. Voila!
PS: My cat Picart modeled for the Relax! tag.
Challenging Myself
Note to self: Find time to make stuff!
I constantly need to challenge myself to “make stuff”. Otherwise I’d end up vegging my weekends away and not getting any art or crafts done. Blame it on poor time management! I envy those artists who challenge themselves to produce one piece of art on a regular basis and actually stick to it — like Randel Plowman and his Collage a Day project.
One of these days I’m going to join Sunday Postcard Art, which shouldn’t be that demanding on my schedule (I hope) since the challenge is weekly.
But given my currently hectic lifestyle (yes, I’m blaming the Day Job!), I needed something that would still challenge me to actually make something based on certain criteria, but would not be too tough on my schedule. My solution? An online craft course!
Last month I signed up for My Creative Classroom’s free course called “Everyday Moodlings”. Every month you’re taught a fun craft or technique via video or PDF, and you have to upload a photo of your assignment to the site for grading. Since classes started last January, I’m like four assignments behind (argh!), and have lots of catching up to do! I’ve already submitted a few assignments, and I’ll post them here next time. For now, I’ve some homework to finish…
Brian Dettmer
Dettmer's take on Webster's New International Dictionary, 2nd ed. Photo courtesy of Packer Schopf Gallery.
Brian Dettmer is brilliant! He’s the guy who carves old books into awesome works of art. And I mean AWESOME! Talk about altered books!
Frankly, I’ve never heard of Brian Dettmer before I read “The Cut-Up Artist” in the May/June 2008 issue of Fine Books & Collections, a copy of which I discovered in the bargain bin just last week. Oh, happy find!
Till that moment, my pathetically limited idea of altered books meant painting, tearing, and collaging pages until a book remotely resembled its former self. But to seal a book and dig out the illustrations one at a time — now that’s a real mind-blower!
Brian Dettmer’s official website is still under construction, but it links to other sites that feature his works, including Packer Schopf Gallery, Kinz + Tillou Fine Art, and Flickr. Check them out for more inspiration!
ATCs: Mini-Scrapbook Pages
The scrapbook page
It just occurred to me that ATCs are an excellent way to test themes and layouts for scrapbook pages, and vice versa. Of course the “page” dimensions may be different, but you can pull together different elements related to your chosen theme (say, Autumn) and see how they turn out.
I’ve done this with the “Dream” ATC and “Piper’s Dream” digital scrapbook page. Both use the same photo (though it’s not the main picture on the scrapbook page), dream theme, and color scheme, and the background of falling leaves is common to both, although done in slightly different ways.
The ATC
So the next time you have a theme or color scheme for a scrapbook page (whether traditional or digital), try a mini version of it on an ATC.
Also, if you have scrapbook page that you’re particularly fond of, try making a mini version of it on an ATC. You can even use the ATC as an added attraction to the scrapbook page by turning in into an embellishment!
Dream
An ATC of my cat Piper sleeping on my computer monitor.
“Dream” is an ATC version of a scrapbook page I made titled “Piper’s Dream”. The leaves punched from vellum mirror the falling leaves used on the background paper, and emphasize the autumn scene in the picture.
A totally unplanned effect was the text. I used an inkjet to print on white vellum, and the edges of the text bled into the paper, adding further to the ethereal, dreamy effect. Talk about serendipity!
Day Job vs Evil Experiment
Arrgh, I just hate it when the Day Job gets in the way of my Evil Experiments. Thing is, it’s the Day Job that funds these Creative Pursuits, so there’s not much I can do about it just yet…
My first sale ever - yipee!
Digital Collage Sheet
Yipee! I finally sold something on Artfire.com! My first-ever sale: a digital collage sheet featuring old keys! Will have to list the item again. In the meantime, visit my humble shop at http://Blynken.artfire.com.
You are My Sunshine!
Digital postcard art, March 2009
Haha, am having a blast with these medieval tarot cards! Here’s another image, The Sun, from the Visconti-Sforza deck. What better way to let someone know that he or she is special than with this “You are My Sunshine” medieval-inspired postcard?
This one was easy to make: I simply cropped the original image down to size, then layered on a strip of torn paper stamped with the sentiment and doodles. Oh, and I had to give our sun-bearer a fig leaf of sorts so as not to offend anyone. Tah-dah! Another digital postcard in a jiff!
Hope your day’s all warm and sunny! 
Save Our Wildlife
Digital postcard, February 2009
OK, here’s another study of the animal-cruelty-prevention postcard. Heck, couldn’t make up my mind which one was better, so I decided to post both.
Stop Animal Cruelty
Digital postcard art, February 2009
My first attempt at postcard art. This one’s inspired by the Visconti-Sforza tarot deck, and shows the “Strength” card. Well, beating lions to death with a club may have been a very acceptable - even highly laudable - deed in the old days, but not anymore. Unless you enjoy the attention that comes with being targeted by PETA.
This took less than 30 minutes to put together in Photoshop Elements, but of course the idea’s been nagging at me ever since I spied this image at Liam Quin’s site. If you need old illustrations that are public domain (and free!), do visit the site!
