The Weekly Tut - Better late than never!!

I've had the most manic few days and life in general is really holding me back from what I love best - art. What can you do? I think the tuts are a great way to claim back that art time! ;)*
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I'm pretty sure you have all heard of Bernie Berlin's Atc workshop - that book is a pure joy to read, lots of eye candy to salivate over too. This week, I am revisiting a favourite technique taken from the said book - Paint on Paper towel. Not such an exciting name now, but this is a really fun and random way of building colour, shimmer and texture into your project whether it be postcards, chunky pages, atcs's, rolo's - whatever!
Here's a couple of atc's I've made using the said technique....
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You will need,

• paper Towel/Kitchen Roll - any & all types is great
• Pearlescent Paints - lumiere is great
• Gel Medium
• Wet Glue - Elmers Glue-all is tidy stuff
• Babywipes
• atc/rolo/chunky blanks

1. To begin, pull out a couple of sheets of paper towel, I didn't have the rough grainy stuff 'a la Bernie' so I used my 'oh so fancy' two ply with circular dots. {...dots are circles Tanya}

2. Now apply your pearly paint using a dampened brush, if its too wet it'll break down the texture in your paper. I alternate from warm to cool shades, lay the colours over each other and they really start to sing. When covered, let them dry for a bit - a heat gun or radiator comes in handy.
Once dry, rip these up into nice chunks of shimmery goodness.You'll probably find that 'oh so fancy' comes apart in two sheets. Not to worry - you can use both! They are equally delicious in their own way.
3. Now take out your atc blanks. I place a nice fat blob of glue in the lower corner so its handy {& quick} to brush on. Start to layer the towel pieces on the card in a haphazard fashion, gluing each bit as you go.

4. Oh look, completed blanks. But look at all those raggedy bits! Feel the love for raggedy, raggedy is good. If that rough look dosen't float your boat then simply snip them off. Its all up to you and what style you are going for.

Some Variations;

• Overstamp with a darker dye ink
• Sponge on pigment inks
• Versamark and emboss the edges
• overlay with an acetate image
• whatever else you have in mind :)*