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Tuesday, May 9, 2017

Glazed Over

Welcome to another installment of Bumbling Around With Mixed Media by Susan Raihala!

Today, we're bumbling with glaze!

There's a small tube of glaze in my Gelatos Mixed Media kit, and I decided to play with it over an underwater scene created with Gelatos and Memento Luxe black ink.

While the stamping leaves a bit to be desired, the glaze performed admirably!


The background uses the three shades of blue Gelatos in my meager stash rubbed on and blended with my finger. This technique is easy and forgiving. Don't like something? Add more Gelatos until you get the colors right! The residue cleans easily off your finger with a wet wipe.

One concern I have with the Gelatos is that they will rub off or smear even when dry. The few pieces I've made would, I believe, rub off on the inside of an envelope if not sealed in some way. The glaze over the background would seal it in, but I wondered if it would make the Gelatos run.

It didn't. The background looks exactly as it did before I added a very thick layer of glaze. See how shiny it is!


Now, however, my concern is that the glaze will adhere to the envelope. It's totally dry after 24 hours but a tad tacky, which may be because I put such a thick layer on or because glaze is simply going to be a bit tacky to the touch. For art pieces, such tackiness wouldn't matter so much, but for mailing cards, it might matter a lot.

Anyone have experience with this? If it is a problem, cutting a piece of waxed paper and putting it in the envelope might solve the problem, but we're quickly moving into the fussy realm where I simply lose patience.

Anyway, before covering the mat board with the glaze, I stamped images from Color Layering Octopus (Hero Arts) with Memento Luxe black and immediately regretted it. It looks a bit goopy (although it is completely opaque over the blue Gelatos). The edges of the piece are particularly not perfect. But there's a good bit of drama on this card because of the bold black, so I'm choosing to overlook the imperfections and will try to use less ink next time around.

These Gelato backgrounds--made simply, as I explained above, by coloring the Gelato onto paper or mat board, and rubbing it with my finger--are generally easy to make and pretty. But if you enjoy sponging or stippling ink or painting watercolors or blending Copics, you'll get similarly colorful results with no worry about transfer to the inside of an envelope or frictional smearing inside an envelope sent through the postal service...assuming these really are a problem. Tentative bottom line: fun to play with but perhaps not a must-have for your average card maker unless s/he wants to explore mixed media regularly.

The jury's out on the glaze until I can get an answer about sticking. It's certainly pretty and works as advertised.

Tomorrow we'll take a look at a basic ink and bling card. I just HAD to make one after expending so much patience for drying times that mixed media products foist on a stamper.

Like I said, patience is a virtue I need RIGHT NOW!

Mercy, grace, peace, and love,
Susan

Supplies
stamps: Hero Arts Color Layering Octopus, A Muse (old ocean themed set)
ink: Memento Luxe black
paper: Papertrey white, mat board
accessories: Gelatos, my finger, a wet wipe, glaze, brush, glue

6 comments:

  1. love this card!!! hope the glaze dries and isn't tacky. Your card arrived today. Thanks, it is beautiful.

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  2. Love what you have achieved here. I like the 'soft' feel to the Luxe; it has the perfect ethereal appearance of 'things' seen in deep ocean water. (As a young child, I traveled from Guam to the Mainland by ship and still (65 y.o.) remember the great fear of having the ship sink and 'things' nibbling my toes! :)

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  3. Love the look of the glaze .. especially with a water scene. I've heard that the multi media ladies have problem with the pages of their journals sticking together - and the solution is to cover with a layer of Dorland Wax. I even use it on my glossy and enamel accents (the liquid kind) which also tend to stick even though dry.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you for this!!! I suspected as much. One product leads to another, which leads to another, and another.... Alas!

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  4. Beautiful. This series of posts is like a personal tutorial in mixed media -- I look forward to each one. This has such a calm feel to it-- hope you can figure out the tackiness mystery.

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  5. This has been an interesting adventure with you and the Gelatos, Susan. You've done beautiful work with them, including this card. I can see how these products might be fun for a canvas if a person made canvases.

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Thank you so much for taking time to comment!