Next month’s theme for my art journal session (Monday 6th August, 7:30pm) is ‘tints, tones and shades’. I wanted to try a cool ombre effect as part of my suggestions (tint, white added, lighter; shade, black added, darker), so that’s what forms the background of this layout. Then a quick play on words for the shades and a suitable quote and this page is complete.
In my last art journaling post, I wrote about knowing when a page is finished. This time around I went a step too far and completely spoiled the layout. See the staining through the gesso middle left and bottom right? That’s archival ink soaking through several layers of gesso. I thought once the butterflies were on, and the gesso painted around them that I would stamp more butterflies over the top. What a mistake to make…
I’ve tried another bible journaling experiment – this time using an image transfer technique. The text and image are printed on a laser printer, and the toner is essentially glued to the page and the paper is taken off. The colouring behind the text is acrylic paint, dabbed on and off with a baby wipe. A little tweaking with coloured pencils and it’s turned out ok, I think.
So February turned out to be a bit quiet on the daily bible journaling. I managed three days. Well, it was a short month. Here are two…
The above were drawn freehand, with a couple of stencil flourishes. I’ve started pencilling outlines first after finding this, though taking a little longer, gave better outcomes. I still enjoy designing with more fonts than I can draw, so for my next verse, Psalm 8:1, I created a digital version first and traced it onto my Bible margin for colouring.
As a quick experiment, I’ve saved the digital image as a PDF and you can download it below if you’d like to add it to your own Bible. If there’s interest, I’ll be sure to pop up some more printables in the future (that’s the experiment bit).
I’m still on a mission to journal in my Bible(s) at least once a day. And I’m still missing my own goalposts 50% of the time… Here are a few more examples from the times I did manage to sit down do some bible journaling. I’ve tried a few more ways of putting down backgrounds, experimenting with text styles and even allowing stamps and a bit of illustration to creep in.
I have been trying to get into the habit of illustrating a bible verse each day since the start of the New Year. On average I think I am hitting a 40-50% hit rate, which isn’t too bad with everything else that’s happening. Here are the results of some of those bible journaling episodes. I think a typography style is developing nicely, but I’m also very fond of the illustrated ‘Immanuel’ page spread.
It’s still busy at The Studio, as there’s a That’s Crafty! One Day Special on Hochanda on 8th/9th December. That means I have six hours of live TV to prepare for – samples, show prep and lots of mental rehearsal! There are moments, though, where drying time gives me the chance to have a bit of ‘me’ time – and I’ve done a couple more Bible journal pieces. I have a couple of favourite verses from the psalms – Psalm 139:14 is one. The opposite side is the refrain in Psalm 136, used for page balance.
I experimented with a different medium for this double spread. By using [amazon_textlink asin=’B000PD3M8E’ text=’Derwent Inktense’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’themanicstamp-21′ marketplace=’UK’ link_id=’991cfa48-d2a1-11e7-a146-679050d7348b’] pencils on clear gesso/matte medium mix, you can direct the concentrated colour and use a dilute wash to create the background. For those unfamiliar with Inktense pencils/blocks, they are a richly pigmented colour pencil, which when wetted on or off the page become more vividly saturated and easy to blend. Once wetted and then dried they become waterproof – so much so they can be used to dye fabric too.
I topped off the text with some Stickles glitter glue to add a little glitz.
Continue reading
Whilst some things I am making, that I can’t tell you about yet (but it has something to do with upcoming TV appearances), are drying, I have started to dabble again with doing some art journaling in my NIV journaling bible. I turned to these passages in Isaiah and picked out a couple of verses to concentrate on. Today I had a little experimentation with things to seal the page to prevent bleed through.
For the left side, I used a wiped-on layer of matte multi-medium, heat dried. For the right, I didn’t prep the page at all. Add some pigment inks for background colour, and watch them slide right off the multi-medium… it just has no tooth at all. It did, however, seal the page very nicely and not too much bulk added. I got around it by applying some ink, drying with the heat tool and then reapplying the ink. I sealed the pigment in with a spray fixative before using a Posca pen to add the text.
Last Monday was my regular art journal session at The Studio. We took the theme ‘baby, it’s cold outside’. Coincidentally, it was one of the coldest evenings of the autumn too. The theme called for cool colours, shimmer and sparkle to evoke frost rime on windows and icy surfaces:
I started with layers of gesso, creating ridged fans/feathering by jittering the edge of a palette knife to make the texture. Sprinkle a little Ultramarine Color Burst. Add more layers of gesso and then iridescent medium. Stamp with archival inks before adding the quote. Smear some Stardust stickles over the page and set aside to dry. I think the quote source is fairly obvious and just fits the theme perfectly!
In tonight’s art journal session, we’re going to look at using large scale layouts. Though we will be working in our normal journals (mine is A4 spread), we’ll be using 12×12″ stencils and very large stamps to build our layers, only adding detail towards the end. This exercise is designed to encourage the breaking down of large patterns into manageable chunks… a lesson for life too!
