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Sunday 23 June 2013

graffiti art meets tag

I have been playing with a lot of techniques lately.  Working them out in isolation and seeing how well they play together.

I've recently rediscovered the world of collage and created my first collaged card (to be posted later this week - it's birthday time sensitive). The success had me eager to try my hand again.  It was the desire to collage and the graffiti art found downtown Edmonton that became the tiny planted seeds I needed to create my tag for the A Blog Named Hero challenge (challenge #26 #tag).


To create the base of the tag I used Tim Holtz distressing inks (tea dye, peacock feathers, vintage photo) and some left over splatter from a Dylusions Spray project (dirty martini).

I printed off the photo that I had taken of the graffiti art onto regular white printer paper, tore the image to give the edges some personality and distressed it using vintage photo.  I'm not sure you can see the lines of the liquid glue running across the tag. I think the lines add some very nice texture.  It wasn't part of the original plan, however, the brush I used was stiff and I had an instant love for the ridges.  I was hoping to get a little resistance from the stamping to the glue ridges, as you can see in the bottom right corner with the flower bunch, however it wasn't going in that direction in the rest of the tag.



With everything set in place and the wings (the wings are Tim Holtz, however, I'm not sure which set this came with - my apologies) stamped on, I began to doodle. 

I highlighted some of the flames with Heidi Swapp's neon pens and used Ranger Distress Marker (Picket Fence)to really bring the two images together and anchor the photo onto the tag.  I doodled with metallic markers to anchor areas and to bring attention and emphasis to places that were somewhat lost beforehand.  I love the micro-dot stamp which gave the overall image a worn-in appearance.


 Viva Decor's Pearl Pen has a translucent gel quality which if used on water-based products can pick up some of the inked colour when doodling.  I, however, sealed my inks with the liquid glue and the result was a shimmery pearl design and highlights throughout the photo.  A touch of semi-bling.


The tag was quite naked without ribbon and I toyed with the idea of distressing white ribbon and mucking it up with a heat tool to make it more worn-in and messy.  I decided, however, to go with a combination of different lengths in ribbon in different colours, all distressed with vintage photo and tied it together with a touch of jute.  The effect was spot on.


It was really great fun making this tag and having free rein with my design.  My next few projects have a pretty set direction and I'm glad I had the opportunity to get messy and play.

Grab a coffee, look around, say hello.

3 comments:

  1. Hello,

    Good luck in the contest. Your tag is awesome.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Gorgeous, gorgeous rich colours and details! Thanks so much for playing along with us at A Blog Named Hero!

    ReplyDelete