An experiment by Astrid

Hello Shimmerz friends, thanks for dropping in!
I have been wanting to try for ages how Shimmerz paints and sprays would work on Black gesso, - so today finally I am sharing my first experiment...

What you are seeing here is the cover of one of my journals, but this project started life as a simple tag.

I used a large G45 Kraft tag and started my adding some textures with the help of some stencils and texture paste. I also added some embossing powder.

Next I covered the tag with black gesso and then adhered some embellishments, chippies, die cuts and some flowers. The colours at this point are irrelevant, as everything will be covered with more black gesso anyway.

For my colour palette I chose the following paints and sprays:

Inlingz in Ruby lost her Slippers and Chocolates and Diamondsz

Vibez in Snowstorm

Coloringz in Night Moves.

I started by putting down a first layer of colour with the Ruby lost her slippers paint and the Chocolate and Diamondz, I also gave it a few spritzes with the Snowstorm to lighten it all a bit in the centre. The Snowstorm gave it a subtle shimmering layer.

At this point I noticed that the tag was exactly the right size for the cover of my journal, so I started to prep that.

Now this particular journal is actually an old hardback book. (If you want you can see one of the pages inside that I did for Shimmerz, just click HERE )

The book had the title printed in gold on the linen covered front, so I covered the entire thing in black gesso too and then added some old book paper and some embossing powder for more texture. Next I adhered my tag with gel medium.

Here finally you can see how I completed the tag and pulled it all together. 

As I wanted to lighten it all a bit further, I mixed some of the Ruby paint with gesso, this made it slightly more opaque and made it possible to create high lights here and there.

I added some darker shadows with the Night Moves Coloringz and a paint brush and finally added a bit of gilding paste here and there to add further highlight.

Below are some close ups still:

The heart was done with the help of texture paste and a stencil, I stamped into it with a text stamp before the paste had dried.

Here you can see the colour changes going from Chocolate and Diamondz, to the Ruby Lost her Slippers to the same paint mixed with a little gesso.

The sentiment was a Tim Holtz sticker, mounted on the little label die cut coloured with the Ruby paint. You can also see the shadows created with the Night Moves Coloringz.

Well that's it for today. I will definitely continue experimenting on black gesso in a different palette too. Meanwhile, thank you for your visit, and like usual, don't forget, you can order Shimmerz products directly from the Shimmerz Paints Store. If you do, mention my name (Astrid Maclean) in the «Instruction to Merchant/seller» part of your order form (just below your name and address). After clicking «add», you'll get a FREE product in the color of your choice. And for people from outside the US, Shimmerz do a really good deal on postage!