Eco Green Paints - Part One

pic One -background painted, main colour painted over lines ready to be buffed back to reveal the embossing

pic Two - the whole design has been painted in - just needing the white gel pen highlights

Pic Three - the finished piece

I've been playing with the Eco-Green paints this weekend... so look out for some blogs over the next week or so with some hints and tips to get you started with these fab paints.

Today's project is using your paints to 'colour in'. I've started with a piece of greyboard - but you can use your paints on ordinary card, or even mount board. I painted the whole piece with aged gold and allowed to dry thoroughly. Next I have embossed the lady stamp (from UMount) in the usual way - firstly rubbing over with my anti-static mat, then inking up with VersaMark and using a detail black embossing powder. Then heat your powder until ready. You need to make sure your first coat of paint is properly dry before doing this - if you try to rush it, there's a chance that your embossing powder will stick to your background.

Use a small pointed brush to paint in the detail so you have lots of control. I always put a little paint onto a non-stick mat that can then act as a paint palette. The embossing will be a bit of a resist for the paints. You can paint over the edges slightly and then buff back to show the embossing through. Bear in mind that if you put lots of coats of paint over the embossing, it will be trickier to get it to show through - so if you need to build up your colours, paint a coat, rub it back, then paint your next coat and so on. These paints also buff up to a high shine - just use an old towel or tea towel for a good result. Don't be tempted to hurry your paint drying with your heat gun - remember there's embossing underneath and you don't want to overheat the embossing or it'll disperse into your card!

I've used butternut and orchid for the flesh tones and pomegranate and periwickle for the dress colours.

As a final handy hint - a few highlights with a white gel pen can make a big difference. If you compare the before with the after pictures above, you can see how much zing it brings to the finished piece. We stock some fabulous value gel pens for just 50p a pen, available in gold, silver and white and I highly recommend them!

More to come this week on Eco-Green techniques...

happy crafting

Jane