Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Brayering - Quick and Beautiful

Welcome.

Today I have something new for my technique toolbox: brayering. When my friend Lisa came to visit, she brought her brayer, along with some lovely ink pads - and access to a YouTube video tutorial on how to make this gorgeous card.



Now, I was completely new to this technique, and I found it quite fast for the effect it achieved. The first task was to punch a circle mask and adhere it to the card stock where we wanted our sun.

Next, we cleared the table top to avoid ink splattering on any other papers, and then rolled the brayer over the first ink pad. We started with the lightest color first (Crushed Curry) and rolled the entire surface of the card stock (white). Then we cleaned the brayer and applied a second ink color (Dusty Durango), rolling horizontally to leave some of the light color at the bottom; we took the darker color (Bravo Burgundy) all the way to the top in successive rolls.  A few horizontal striations just above the mountains give you a sense that all was not perfectly blended. Still, the effect is not distracting.

The next step was to tear some scrap paper to form the mountains. This was placed on the image above the area to be rolled, and the bottom area was brayered in a brown color (Close to Cocoa) to form a mountain. We then moved the torn paper and slanted it a different direction to form a mountain range - and brayered once again.  I was really excited at this point, as this technique was pretty close to idiot proof! 

Once the ink had dried to a large degree, the sun mask was removed and a bit of additional color was sponged on the sun to match it to the rest of the card. Then, the reeds were stamped using Stampin' Up's Inspired by Nature stamp set. We used simple black ink (Tuxedo Black Memento), although we might also have used Versamark and then black embossing powder.

Finally, a number of birds were drawn in with a black Sharpie pen. This was a fun finishing touch, as we were both able to decide for ourselves where our birds wanted to fly! The whole image was layered with a light-colored mat (More Mustard) card stock, and then taped to Bravo Burgundy.

It seems to me that it took longer to type this post than to make this card! So, never believe that beautiful has to mean complicated or lengthy. I'm very pleased with my result, and I will surely use this technique again.

Please also drop by my friend Lisa's blog to see her matching card. Lisa loves to scrapbook and has become a real YouTube sensation!

Thanks for stopping by today.  I hope you'll join me again.  Blessings to you and yours!

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