Let's go Trick and Treating!

Hi and servus! Claudia here to bring to you another (hopefully inspiring) tutorial.

I know it's been quite some time since my last post over here as the RGD (Resident Guest Designer) - due to my usual creative silly season. But once it gets colder and darker outside the cosier and more comfy it gets inside the house - and then spending time at my crafting desk (with a warm cup of tea and all of my paints, dies, stamps and mixed media supplies around me) is what feels right and good again.

This year I am in a very Halloween-ish mood and have already admired a lot of inspiring spooky goodness in blogland! This is my share:

I created this art journal page using some of my all time favourite Tim Holtz dies (the On the Edge "Graveyard" and the "Rickety House" Alterations die) and my new favourite Dreamweavers forest stencil and combining it with some hand drawn images.

I always keep the acetate packaging the Sizzix dies come in for later use. This time I die cut my own reusable stencils and masks from it to combine with other stencils to create some scenic backgrounds for my illustrations.

I just love this cute little graveyard and the mask I made with it! I decided I wanted to use it together with the forest stencil in one go and fixed both to my journal with masking tape, making sure both were in place. The page's background had previously been given a coat of rough wide brush strokes in dark grey and black acrylic paint. Now - with my masks in place - I stippled on some Medium White, Beige and Orange with a stipple brush, making sure the paint wasn't too liquid and the brush was dry.

I had also die cut an acetate mask using the "Rickety House" Sizzix die and I used both - the outer frame and the house-shaped mask to create my house shape first by adding more black paint using the house stencil (=outer frame)...

...and then stippling in the yellow-ish lit windows (using the house mask) and their shine thrown upon the ground in front of the house (you will find that I redid this once I had finished my trick'n treatin' children's drawing as I wanted their shades to be in a specific spot and angle on the page). You can also see that I had to go in again with the Dreamweavers stencil and redo the bit of forest that was now covered from creating the dark background for the house (the spot at the veranda).

The owl was first stamped on, painted over with beige and black where needed (to cover up the branches that showed through) and then I hand drew in the feathers and face using a black permanent fine tip Faber Castell PITT artist pen. 

Here you can see the redone thrown light from the window - ready for my fussy cut children's image and the stamped and painted on quote to be glued in place:

Once I had found the proper spot for my drawing I glued it on with matte medium and then painted some shades of the green-yellow colour from the window lights and some orange  shades (from the sun shining through the fog behind the trees) around the children's shapes to blend them in and make them part of the whole scenery.

The drawing was done freehand - after doing a rough sketch with a soft pencil first - with the fine tip black Faber Castell PITT artist pen. I didn't worry too much about them maybe looking awkward - with Halloween projects this may well add to the spooky impression, right? But here they are - obviously a bit scared of the house and still deciding whether to ring the bell and shout their "trick or treat!" or not.

I hope you like my little Halloween scene and what I did with my selfmade masks and stencils!

Hugs and happy crafting,

Claudia 

xxx