The Dusty Attic Blog: On the Sculpture trail - Heather McMahon (with a mini tutorial)

Sunday, 28 February 2016

On the Sculpture trail - Heather McMahon (with a mini tutorial)

Hello there! It's Heather McMahon here today with a step by step process showing how to alter your chippies to make them look like wood, plus I've been playing with the new Colour Blast products that are now being distributed by The Dusty Attic.

Here's my layout:

Yes! I used purple! We received some fabulous Colour Blast products to try and I received some purple spray. More on this later in the post.

I really wanted to make my chippies look like the wood used in the sculptures. You might be able to see here in the close ups how the chippies reflect the same variation in colour that the sculptures do. They are not just all the same brown. (The first photo looks like it has a crackle effect but it's just the light playing tricks.)

Here's how I treated the chippies. Note that this demo piece is a much smaller version of the scroll that I used in my layout.

Step 1

Randomly apply gesso to about three-quarters of the surface of the chippie. Just use your finger - variation in texture is good!

Step 2

Stamp Timber Brown StazOn ink heavily over about half to three-quarters of the chippie.

Step 3

Apply Vintage Photo Distress Ink over the whole surface.

Step 4

Now here's my secret weapon - while the Distress Ink is still wet, coat with Dusty Attic's Clear Gloss Varnish. As you apply the Varnish, the wet ink will bleed and give a beautiful mottled appearance. Leave to dry for at least a couple of hours.

I also used Clear Gloss Varnish to coat my title. I use this product for everything! You can find it here.

To create my background, I used ink through a Dusty Attic script stencil. For some reason, this stencil just seems to work with any type of layout! I then sprayed Colour Blast spray over the areas behind my photos and journalling. This spray is really light - perfect for when you just want a subtle touch of colour.

I spread Colour Blast Colour Paste through the Dusty Attic butterfly stencil. The Colour Paste adds an incredible shimmer! It comes in a gorgeous array of colours too. You can find the Colour Blast products here.