Paint Play and a friday freebie!!

A month or so ago I purchased a rubber stamp of waves, it is a very traditional Asian design, I had been looking for one for some time.  I thought this would make a great background stamp for my Asian cards.   I had in mind using acrylic metallic paint instead of going the ink/heat embossing route.

Today's post is about this trial and error process:
Here is the stamp, and to be honest I'm not crazy about it, the quality is fine, but the etching is really a little bit to fine for what I have in mind.

Since this was a cling mount I decided to try it first on my Mega mount block which I really like
 
My Acrylic paint of choice, Martha Stewarts , I buy this at  Home Depot.  This giant jar was 5.99 and will last at least a year!  The screw top lid really keeps this from drying out, so it will sit on a shelf for a long time and still be good.  It has a very high shine look to it.
 
 
Applied to the stamp with a stick sponge
 
 
first attempt, way to much paint!
Second attempt much better using less paint.

Next I tried a more traditional block; and my stamp press, this block it to large for me to comfortably hold and apply pressure so I use my speedball press (I've linked to a review in my blog about this tool!)
BTW  I love this press and it really does a wonderful job of turning out hard to stamp images.  Since I started using this there has not been one time I had to run over a stamp with my car tire!
 
Better!

Next I tried the heat embossing method:
 
Results:
Fine and detailed but to me  BLAH.....
 
So after letting the images sit overnight I would have to say the Paint with the press images are the best and I will be working to get more detail.  The gold paint left a brilliant shiny image.  I will also try it down the road with non metallic colors and see how that goes.
Here is a little flat stamp elephant image I did with the paint:

It is quite pretty in real life!
I hope you try using some of your supplies not necessarily intended for stamping, it is a lot of fun and it gives you more options.  I know there are new products out every day for our craft, but I'm not really interested in spending more $$  Just because another product has been launched.  I think we all know we can spend so much time buying, sorting and learning that we never have time to CREATE and become proficient at technique. I'd like to avoid that if at all possible and work at become really good with the things I already have! 
I'm going to take a look at using old fashioned pastel chalks for stamping next week, an take a look at printer ink refill economy and alternative stamp ink refills.
I do have a new toy coming by UPS today too, and I am excited to be sharing this organizational too with you and there is a good change you may already own one!!

Here is my freebie for this week!!  Have fun with these springy Art Nouveau images!!
Have a great day!
Ginny M
 

Comments

Hi Ginny, glad to see it looks like you are having fun with your new background stamp! I still need to buy a mega mount too. Have a lovely weekend!!

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