Canvas tutorial with Hobby Art Stamps.......

Morning all, Lisa B here........

Well I hope you are having a lovely week, I was very busy at the tail end of last week and the weekend working for Imagination Crafts at the NEC HobbyCrafts Show in Birmingham. 

Thanks you so much to all of you that attended the show and came on to the stand and supported us by buying some of our fabulous goodies to play with. Remember, you can always post what you have made on our Facebook timelines as we love to see what you have made.....

I was working on canvases at the show which was really up my street as I love mixed media and playing around with messy stuff. 

 I promised you last week that I would post a tutorial this week of a canvas and this is one that I created for the last workshop using the gorgeous
Hobby Art March Hares....... 

So, let's start from the beginning........

If you have never had a go at a canvas before and you find the thought somewhat daunting, them sometimes it is best to size up to a slightly bigger project than just a card base and use something in between. For this one I used a That's Crafty White/Grey Board Square with rounded corners. These are the perfect size as a go between from a card to a canvas as they are 8x8" and a great substrate to work on......

Now it was at this point that I forgot to take the photos but lucky enough, I had just done a White/ Grey Board Tag in the same way and had taken photos of that, phew!!
So you would do exactly the same as I am about to describe on the square as I have done on the tag.....

I first coated the tag in Deco Art Black Gesso giving a nice thick even coat, this is a really nice gesso to work with and great quality. You can leave it to dry naturally or heat it with a heat gun.

Once dry, I added a thick coat of Imagination Crafts Crackle Medium and then let that dry. Again if you wanted to dry it with a heat gun, then you can.

Once that was dry, I then applied a thick coat of  white MDF Chalk Paint . Now one thing that you need to know about Imagination Craft Crackle Medium is that it works really fast. It is probably one of the fastest crackles that I have used, so you need to load up your brush with plenty of paint and start at the top and work down the page. If you miss a bit, don't be tempted to go over it as it will already be crackling and you will mess up the crackle and it doesn't matter if you do miss a bit as it is going to crackle anyway and show the black.  

So this is the effect that you are going to get at the end and I think it is fabulous and a great background for a canvas. 

So as I said, I did this with the square grey board and came up with a similar effect below.

I then added some Bundled Sage Distress Ink  to the bottom of the page and Tumbled Glass to the top of the page around the edges with a Blending Tool.

I then stamped on the march hare main image in Versafine Black Onyx to get an idea of where I wanted him to be.

I then repeated this on to white Watercolour Card and embossed the image with Wow Clear Embossing Powder.

I then set about colouring my image with watercolour pens and here is the result below, I was quite pleased with the result as I have not coloured for a while.....

So then I wanted to start on the background and decided to add some ghosting effects with the Imagination Crafts Bubble Background Stencil and some white gesso. It looks bright at this stage but really does sink in to the background as you can see later.

So next was to add some grasses using two stamps from the Hare set which I also embossed.

So at this stage I got so engrossed with my canvas that I actually forgot to take anymore in between photos, so I will explain the rest.....

I added some colour to the grasses and flowers with watercolour pens and added a moon that I stamped on to a piece of white card, coloured, cut out and attached to the canvas. I also added a Stampendous Message Life Is Art that I stamped also onto a piece of white card and the coloured and drew and cut around it to create a wood effect banner.

I added more stamping around the moon from the Hare Stamp Set in the way of foliage and coloured it with the watercolour pens too. Then I added some texture around the edge of the canvas using a dotty stamp from Hobby Art Texture Stamp Set and Versafine Black Onyx and then added some Gathered Twigs Distress Ink around the edge to draw the eye in to the centre.

At this point I felt that the piece needed a little more detail, so I decided to add some butterflies and a mouse from the Hobby Art Bluebell Wood stamp set, this is one of my all time favourite set of theirs. It has so many lovely stamps in the set and you can create so many scenes from it. I stamped and coloured them in the same way and then cut them out and attached them to the canvas and then I was done.

I loved making this piece and took so much pleasure in working out what I wanted and where to place everything,it was so much fun.
I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial and it gets you in the mood to have a go as I have said many times. Canvases don't have to be scary, they are no different to making a card really, you just break down the stages......

I hope you have a lovely week and I will be back soon.

Love & hugs

Lisa B xx


  

     

          

             


***On the website, some Hobby Art stamp sets have been reduced in price by 25% - 40%.***