Elegant Writer for the Group of Seven Cardmakers

The Group of Seven Cardmakers are trying out Elegant Writer pens this month.

The Elegant Writer is a calligraphy pen that has a pigment that will separate out with water into tones of grey, teal green, and a pinky mauve.  Lydia (Understand Blue on SCS) did a great video on using it (see it here) and I followed her technique for this card:  

I put the stamp in my MISTI and stamped with Distress Vintage Photo.  Instead of adding the Elegant Writer directly to the image and then drawing the colour out with a wet brush, I took my wet brush to the nib of the Elegant Writer, picked up some of the colour and took it to the image on my wet brush.  The more water you use, the more colour separation you get.  I got a nice variation throughout the flower and leaves.

For the stems, buds, seed heads, and butterfly, I used a clean wet brush and pulled out some of the Vintage Photo from the stamping to colour them in.

I decided not to add a sentiment as I love just the look of the image - it's a wonderful collage image of the poppies, the text, and the background dots.  I trimmed the panel and popped it up on fun foam on a kraft card base.

I'm really happy with the CAS vintage look to it.

I then wondered what would happen if I scribbled with the Elegant Writer onto my palette and picked up ink from there.  I laid down quite a lot and it started turning very green/grey on my palette.

 

I coloured the berries with a bright red marker, fussy cut the stamped image, mounted it on a square of red cs cut with a stitched die, and then popped that up on fun foam on a square card base. I finished off by going over the berries with Glossy Accents.

 

I then moved on to trying the method of going over the stamped lines with the Elegant Writer.

For this card, I stamped the image and then went over the holly leaves with the Elegant Writer and then drew the colour out with my water brush.  I started with the middle leaf and was too heavy handed - I got a nasty big blob of black that I couldn't get to bleed out enough so covered that blob with my sentiment.  I used a much lighter hand with both the Elegant Writer and the water brush on the other two leaves, and got just green and grey tones, with a tiny hint of pinky mauve.

I coloured the berries with a Cherry Cobbler marker, trimmed the panel with a stitched rectangle die, mounted it on fun foam on a dark red card base, and added a sentiment cut with a stitched banner die.

I then wanted to bring out the pinks that are in the Elegant Writer:

I stamped the poinsettia with the Vintage Photo Distress ink as I did in the poppy card.  I went back to the technique of touching my waterbrush to the tip of the Elegant Writer to pick up a bit of colour and then watercoloured the poinsettia petals one at a time, blotting each one after I painted it.  This took away some of the blacks and greens and left me with a lot of shades of pink and pale grey.  I lost some of the lines inside the petals of the poinsettia so went over them with a matching coloured pencil.  I added a sentiment, trimmed it with a stitched square die, popped it up on fun foam, and placed light brown pearls in the centre.  There was a bit of Elegant Writer ink left on my water brush so I did a very light bit of splattering. 

I've used the Elegant Writer on the same poppy stamp before.  Here is that card plus a close-up of the flower and a link to the blog post that describes it.  For this one, I added small lines and dabs onto the stamped image with the Elegant Writer, pulled some colour out, but left some white sections in the petals.

  

https://cardmakersgarret.blogspot.com/2023/09/gemstone-ornaments-and-elegant-writer.html

My conclusion from these four cards is I much prefer the method of touching my wet brush to the nib of the Elegant Writer and taking the colour to the image that way (as in cards 1 and 4), rather than scribbling some ink onto my palette as in card 2) or going directly to the image with the Elegant Writer (as in card 3).  If I do go directly to the image, I will stick to tiny bits of Elegant Writer as I did in card 5.

There are additional examples over at the Group of Seven blog, and other videos with lots of tips.  If you try out the Elegant Writer, we'd love to have you post your card as inspiration for others!

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Carabelle Studio poppy
Ink - Distress Vintage Photo
Paper - hot press watercolour paper, kraft cardstock
Size - 6x4.25"
Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, fun foam

Supplies 2:
Stamps - Serendipity holly
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black
Paper - watercolour paper, red and off white cs
Size - 4.75" square
Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, Lil Inker stitched square die, red Tombow marker, Glossy Accents, fun foam

Supplies 3:
Stamps - Visible Image holly, Penny Black sentiment
Ink - Versafine Onyx Black
Paper - watercolour paper, dark red cs
Size - A2
Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, SU Cherry Cobbler marker, stitched rectangle die, stitched banner die

Supplies 4:
Stamps - Penny Black
Ink - Distress Vintage Photo
Paper - off white cs, watercolour paper
Size - 5.25" square
Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, light brown pearls, Lil Inker stitched square die

Gemstone Ornaments and Elegant Writer Poppy

A Twofer today.  First for My Time to Craft Christmas "Ornaments", I did something a bit different and used a deciduous tree die cut with gemstones for ornaments.

I die cut the tree three times and glued them together for dimension.  I sprayed my focal panel with enough blue spray to provide contrast to the white tree.  Stamped a sentiment on it and popped it up on fun foam on the card base.

And then had lots of fun finding various shades and sizes of blue and silver stick-on gems for the ornaments on the tree.

My second card is for Cardz4Guyz "Poppies or Remembrance".  I did a muted colour scheme (seems more guy-like to me) by using my Elegant Writer pen to colour the poppy.

 

I haven't done this technique for a long time so my Elegant Writer pen was a bit dry and I didn't get as much colour variation as I've gotten in the past, but I still like the effect.

I stamped the image in Vintage Photo, added small lines with the Elegant Writer on the poppy, seed heads, and butterfly, and then with water and a paint brush, pulled out some of the Elegant Writer and Vintage Photo ink.

For the leaves, I scribbled a bit of Elegant Writer on a palette, spritzed with water, and then picked up some colour for the leaves.

I pulled out a bit of Vintage Photo to ground the image and sponged Antique Linen around the edges.

The panel is popped up on fun foam on a cream card base.

Here's a close-up to show the colour variation from the Elegant Writer pen:

 

 

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Stampendous sentiment
Ink - Archival Hickory Smoke
Paper - white cs
Size - A2
Accessories - Penny Black ornament tree die, blue spray, blue and silver gemstones

Supplies for card 1:
Stamps - Carabelle
Ink - Distress Vintage Photo and Antique Linen
Paper - mixed media cs, cream cs
Size - 6x4.25"
Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, fun foam

Elegant Writer Poppy

Loll has chosen a great theme for April's CAS Watercolour Challenge:

I love poppies and have many (far too many) poppy stamps so it was hard to choose which one to use.  But finally got it narrowed down and here is the resulting card:

I got out my Elegant Writer pen and decided to use a technique I learned from Lydia Fiedler (Understand Blue).  See her post here for a video describing the technique. 

If you're not familiar with the Elegant Writer pen, it's an amazing ink pen that goes on black but will react with water to separate into different shades of grey, teal, and a mauve/pink. 

All was going really well for the first part - I put the stamp in my MISTI and stamped with Distress Vintage Photo.  Then there was a major problem with the next step where I was supposed to go over some of the lines with the Elegant Writer pen - my pen seemed to have dried up and would not write.  But there was still ink down at the bottom of the nib - it just wouldn't flow to the tip to write.  So instead of adding it to the image and then drawing the colour out with a wet brush, I took my wet brush to the bottom of the nib, picked up some of the colour and took it to the image on my wet brush.  The more water you use, the more colour separation you get.  I got a nice variation throughout the flower and leaves.

For the stems, buds, seed heads, and butterfly, I used a clean wet brush and pulled out some of the Vintage Photo from the stamping to colour them in.

I decided not to add a sentiment as I love just the look of the image - it's a wonderful collage image of the poppies, the text, and the background dots.  I trimmed the panel and popped it up on fun foam on a kraft card base.

I'm really happy with the CAS vintage look to it.

We're looking forward to seeing a gallery of wonderful poppies this month.  Head over to CAS Watercolour to see the rest of the inspiration from the Design Team and our talented Guest Designer, Rachel (Creating Paper Hugs).  You have until April 24th to link up.

Supplies:

Stamps - Carabelle Studio

Ink - Distress Vintage Photo

Paper - hot press watercolour paper, kraft cardstock

Size - 6x4.25"

Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, fun foam

Elegantly Written Bird

Time for a reminder about CAS Watercolour's "Bird" challenge!

I was inspired to make my reminder card by the latest Technique Lover's Challenge at SCS - "Pen Painting" - to use the Elegant Writer pen to watercolour.  More about that after I show you my card:

The Elegant Writer is a calligraphy pen that has a pigment that will separate out with water into tones of grey, teal green, and a pinky mauve.  Lydia (Understand Blue on SCS) did a great video on using it (see it here) and I followed her technique.

I stamped the bird in Distress Vintage Photo on mixed media cs, then added some thin lines with the Elegant Writer here and there around the edges.  With a small brush and water, I pulled the colour out of the Elegant Writer lines and out of the Vintage Photo stamping.  The browns are from the Vintage Photo ink and the greys, greens and mauves are from the Elegant Writer.  When dry, I fussy cut the bird.

I used an embossing folder for my background, trimming it down to leave space on one side for my vertical sentiment and to keep my card CAS.  I topped it with a leafy die cut made from a piece of watercolour paper and brushos.  I glued down the bird's feet, legs, and tummy, and used foam tape to pop up his back and head.

Don't forget to come and join us at CAS Watercolour with your clean and simple cards featuring birds and watercolouring.  You have until April 24th to link up.  There's lots of inspiration over at our reminder post from the Design Team and our Guest Designer, Stef of Perry Papercrafts.

Supplies:

Stamps - SU Best Birds, Technique Junkies sentiment

Ink - Distress Vintage Photo, Memento Cottage Ivy

Paper - white cs, watercolour cs, mixed media cs

Size - A2

Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, leafy embossing folder, green Brushos

Watercoloured Poinsettias

I am thrilled to be on the Design Team for Loll's and Bonnie's new challenge "CAS Watercolour".  The idea of the challenge is to create a clean and simple card that involves both watercolouring and the monthly theme.

I'm honoured that Loll and Bonnie chose a theme that I suggested for November:

The idea is to use some text on the card that is not the sentiment or is in addition to the sentiment.  It's an element that I've seen used by many cardmakers that I admire.

Here's my card:

As you can see, the script is a subtle background feature that enhances the overall look of the card.  See below for a version without the script for a comparison.

For the watercolouring, I stamped the poinsettia with Distress Vintage Photo ink on watercolour paper and coloured it partly by pulling out the Vintage Photo with a wet brush and partly by adding some black Elegant Writer to the edges of some of the petals and pulling out the colours that separate from it - amazing tones of teal green, pink, and black.

I learned this technique from a video made by the very talented Lydia Fiedler (aka UnderstandBlue).

Heather Telford also did a tutorial on this technique but hers is slightly different as she brings in more colours than just the Vintage Photo and the Elegant Writer.

Once the poinsettia had dried, I trimmed the image down to a square, masked the poinsettia (I stamped it and fussy cut it on masking paper), added some random bits of text in Antique Linen, and sponged around the edges with Antique Linen.  I watered down a bit of Black Soot ink on my craft mat and flicked it lightly over the background, and bordered the panel with black.  I used PTI Vintage Cream cs for the card base - it's the closest colour cs to watercolour paper that I've been able to find.  I embellished with a few black gemstones in the centre of the poinsettia.


Here is a version of the same poinsettia without any text on the background:

For this version, I masked the poinsettia, added a bit of black splattering and a sentiment, and left it at that.  I like this version as well and it's a cleaner look, but the text stamping adds some texture that I feel is lacking in this one, and also enhances the vintage look created by the Elegant Writer.

Let me know which you prefer!

And come and join us at CAS Watercolour with your cards featuring watercolouring and text.  You have until November 24th to link up.

Supplies:

Stamps - Penny Black poinsettia (both cards), Stampington script and postmark (first card), Tim Holtz sentiment (second card)

Ink - Distress Vintage Photo, Antique Linen, and Black Soot

Paper - watercolour paper, black cs, PTI Vintage Cream cs

Accessories - Elegant Writer pen, black gemstones and pearls