Friday 9 June 2017

Tag It Tuesday: Steampunk/Gears

This is my contribution for the monthly tag challenge with Tag It Tuesday.  The theme is Steampunk/Gears so I thought this stamp from the Time Traveller collection by Sheena Douglass would be perfect.

I started by stamping the Steampunk Woman stamp by Sheena Douglass onto a #8 manilla tag using Coffee Archival ink.  This was a tricky stamp to use and as you can see it was a case of eighth time lucky (using both sides of each tag); I used rocka blocks, an acrylic block, and tried with and without a stamp mat.  The final image required a tiny bit of touching up with a brown Sakura micron pen but finally worked with a stamp pad below and with the stamp on an acrylic block.
I coloured the woman using a water brush with a range of distress markers in Ground Espresso, Rusty Hinge, Antique Linen, Gathered Twigs, Tattered Rose, Worn Lipstick and Mermaid Lagoon.  I loved the finished look and was glad that I'd used a manilla tag as the base, rather than cutting a piece of white card into the shape of a tag.
I then went round the outside of the image blending Vintage Photo Distress Oxide onto the tag, leaving a 'halo' around the image.  A quick spritz of water (with the coloured image protected) caused the 'oxidation' effect and the whole tag was dried with a heat gun.
In the mean time I had die cut and embossed the two smallest gears from the Geared Up die set by Sheena Douglass, the smallest Sprightly Sprocket from Spellbinder and four of the XCut cogs out of kraft card.  These were then either stamped with the matching set (Geared Up) or brushed over with Coffee Archival ink.  Gilding wax in both Cast Bronze and Patina was rubbed randomly over each gear.  That step was then followed with a touch of Gold Treasure metallic gilding polish and some jet black archival ink to add further depth and interest to the die cuts.
The gears were attached to the tag using Cosmic Shimmer acrylic glue, then any overhang was trimmed off using scissors.
The final step was to add two of the Tim Holtz Clippings Stickers which seemed to fit the theme.  I really like the finished piece and despite the stamp being fiddly to work with, will definitely use it again now I know where I have to apply additional pressure.

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