Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Inspired by Chelsea Edwards: Day 3, or Lessons in Stamping a Little Collage

Stamping a collage can be a little challenging. Getting the balance and colors right, and giving a sense of movement to the whole thing can be intimidating. But it's less so with a small 1 3/4" by 2 5/8" piece of card stock. If you ruin one or two or ten, you're not out much, so there's not much risk to playing around and trying to get it right.

My first effort was so-so (although the colors really do look more balanced in real life!). The red and dark brown elements form nice triangles that anchor the design. There are three elements of text, three fronds of leaves, five spots of light brown, one spot of green. The odd numbers work pretty well, but to my CAS-loving eye, there are just too many of them. Also, there are too many colors. The green is a bit too dark.

For better design, there needs to be either a third word or autumn and grace need to be closer together so they relate better because the triangle they make with the brown half pearls gets lost in the chaos of that green grunge splatter. Placing the collage in the dead center of the card makes the card look...odd.




As flawed as it is, I'm satisfied with it as a first effort and am not embarrassed to post it (you might feel differently, though!), but it's just too busy for my taste. So I tried again, this time with a Christmas theme. This one scores MUCH better!



The balance of color and design on the Christmas card works well. The strong focal point of the poinsettia grabs the eye, and the Grunge Me paint splatter stamp in very light green stays in the background where it belongs yet adds a fresh look to the bright red and green. The holly berries are accented with a red Sakura Stardust pen and match the red ink much better in real life, allowing the eye to move from the focal point to the sentiment to the border with ease.

Some tips for stamping mini collages:

1. It's a good idea to start with a strong focal point, then work from there. Put the focal point in a sweet spot. Draw imaginary lines to divide the piece into thirds; the two best sweet spots are the upper left and lower right intersections of the lines.

2. Use differently scaled shapes or images and vary the shapes. The Autumn card has too many elements that are roughly the same size and visual weight and a bit too much variety in the shapes. The Christmas card has repeat border of tiny holly and a nice, big poinsettia, and the round poinsettia works in contrast to the trinagles of holly and straight line of the sentiment. The grunge spatter relaxes the crisp images a bit.

3. The background needs to stay in the background with lighter colors as support.

4. Add a little extra something...bling, glitter pen accents, beads, buttons, ribbon, twine, etc.

5. Place the collage off-center as Chelsea did with her samples in Take Ten. This adds much more interest to the card and feels much more natural. Utilize either the sweet spots or the rule of thirds. On my Christmas card, the imaginary one-third horizontal line of the collage is lined up on the imaginary one-third horizontal line of the card base, leaving about twice as much white space below the collage than above...hope that makes sense!

Why not play around and see what sort of mini collage you can stamp!

Supplies
stamps: Autumn (Grunge Me, First Fruits, Turning a New Leaf, Text Style, Beautiful Blessings); Christmas (Peaceful Poinsettia, Holly Jolly, Grunge Me)
inks: Memento
paper: Papertrey
accessories: half pearls, Stardust red pen, sponge, gold half bead, dimensionals

20 comments:

  1. Sorry, but I LOVE the Autumn one!! Thanks for the inspiration- a day off today so I will try to have a go!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yep, I like the autumn one, too. But I'm _pinning_ the Christmas one. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Both cards are just gorgeous. I loved your lesson, and the why's and wherefore's of each. I think you were too hard on the first one, though. Even though the center area is "chaotic," there is so much lovely white space around it that I think you can get away with it. I like the "unplannedness" of it, as opposed to the predictableness of the second. The second one may be more correct, but the first is no less lovely. Thank you for the great lesson, and the great tips.

    ReplyDelete
  4. As always, I learn so much from you and your designs. I appreciate your explanations; they make me focus when trying a technique. Off to create now. Thanks for the inspiration.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hi Susan......what a fun new technique and how well you explain the options. I understand what you're saying about your second card but I love the softer shades of the first......perhaps replace the soft brown dots with the brown sprinkles.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I love these!! I am going to have to give this a try!! Very cool! Very striking!

    ReplyDelete
  7. ooh.
    i really like the first card. it is random and scattered, but not too. i love all the huge white space around it. very, very lovely. thanks for all your explanations. they are most helpful.
    marty

    ReplyDelete
  8. ooh.
    i really like the first card. it is random and scattered, but not too. i love all the huge white space around it. very, very lovely. thanks for all your explanations. they are most helpful.
    marty

    ReplyDelete
  9. oops. hit the same button twice.
    reminds me of the time i was trying to print my bording pass for SW. my computer was having a little temper tantrum, so i kept pushing the print button...... nothing.....
    i decided to print my boarding pass at the airport.
    when i returned from my trip, there were 15 copies of my boarding pass on the computer table!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
    thanks for listening :)

    ReplyDelete
  10. I prefer the first one too, though not in your eyes 'perfect' it is more pleasing colourwise than the second one. Great idea to do it small and not be intimidated by a larger piece of paper and the threat of wasting anything. Great idea.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Like some others, I prefer the first card-love the colors!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Looooove the Christmas card. Thanks so much for walking us through the process!

    ReplyDelete
  13. When I saw the first card - my first thought was "how lovely", but I do like the Christmas one where your collage is placed above the midpoint. You're teaching me! Thanks.

    ReplyDelete
  14. I love collage but struggle because (and this is surprising because I subscribe to your blog) I like order and rules. Thanks for providing some! Great tutorial!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Your second card is PERFECT, as is!!

    I would LOVE your first card if the focal panel were removed and placed atop a small card base as a note card.

    I'm SAVING your instructions!!

    Thanks much ~

    ReplyDelete
  16. Susan, I also prefer the 1st card! I guess you could say I like the rhythm of the images and the warmth of the colors. Collage images don't usually speak to me so I don't know if my opinion even counts :) tfs

    ReplyDelete
  17. I actually like *both* of them. I also struggle with collage so I appreciate the lesson.

    ReplyDelete
  18. i think they're both pretty perfect, but my standards are way lower than yours (heh)

    ReplyDelete
  19. Susan, thank you so much for the design lesson on collage cards. I keep wanting to try doing them and never quite know how to start as I like things to be very tidy and orderly on my cards! But at the same time, I see other people's collage cards and really like them. I'm keeping your instructions and will give it a try. I love both of your cards but do see why the second one is better.

    ReplyDelete
  20. Well, I guess I'll jump on the bandwagon and say I like the first card better too! I really do. The colors are nice and everything "blends" for my eyes making it soothing to look at despite the "chaotic" arrangement.

    The second card is nice, but it's too orderly to count as a "collage" in my opinion and the color palette reads very bright on my monitor. Still the explanation of the principals is very helpful. :-)

    ReplyDelete

Thank you so much for taking time to comment!