Monday, July 2, 2012

Tips & Tricks - July 2012

Hello everyone and happy July! Did ya'll get your orders in for the new DeNami release yet? I sure got mine in! Last week was so fun wasn't it? I just LOVED all the little hints and sneak peeks! :)  I'm sorry for the late post, Wendy was going to have a little something for you today but has went MIA on us. I'm betting she's probably at the beach...lucky girl! So, ya'll are just stuck with me :)  Please excuse my pictures and blogging abilities this morning...it's only 6AM and the only thing I've managed to do is brush my teeth and then get inky for ya'll...I haven't even had my Diet Pepsi yet. ;) 

Today is the first Monday of the month, so that means a new "Tips & Tricks" segment for you.

You may not have ever noticed, but I RARELY ever heat emboss. I love the effect, however, it just never turns out all that good for me. I use the little anti static thingie and inspect my card front ways, side ways, even upside down ways ;) for errant embossing powder, but no matter how well I inspect it, after I heat the embossing powder, I always find a spec or two randomly where it did not belong....grrrrr! It has to be a pretty dang important card for me to heat emboss!

 Good thing for me that there are ways to get a rather cool effect with some faux embossing techniques. There is one that I have used a few times and find that it gives a great result. I've put together a few photos on how I've done it. I wish I could remember one of the sites where I've seen this, but here's how it's achieved....

The basic items you need is white and black inks, cardstock and some type of stamp aligner. (I just grabbed some random colored cardstocks from my scrap pile and chose a sentiment, however, this works with just about any image).
 The first step is to ink up your stamp using the white ink pad and stamping where you'd like your image.
Then using your stamp aligner, line up the image so that it's just barely off the white stamped image and stamp it again using the black ink. That's all there is too it...2 easy peasy steps. The white creates a little "shadow" of sorts and gives the image depth and dimension.
 I've made several samples using different colored cardstocks. It was hard capturing it on camera, but I hope you can see the effect.

I'm wondering what the effect would be if you used a grey ink vs. the white. Unfortunately, I have no grey to try it out. I bet it would work better on white cardstock than the white ink. I hope you give it a try, let me know if you do, I'd LOVE to see what you've created!! I'm off to get ready for work, hope ya'll have a wonderful day!

4 comments:

  1. I have never had much luck with heat embossing plus I put a few round heat marks on my brand new table ten years ago trying it out in addition to it never looking quite right.

    I will have to give that technique a
    try. Thank you for sharing!

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  2. I hate heat embossing. If there is any kind of problem that could possibly arise, I'll have it. I just might have to give your technique a try.

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  3. Neat! What kind of white ink do you like to use?

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  4. Thanks, Heidi :)

    The only white ink I've ever owned or used is the white pigment ink by Stampabilities and can be purchased at Hobby Lobby. The consistency/way it inks up on a stamp reminds me of a chalk ink. I'm sure that you can use whatever white ink you have on hand.

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