Altenew Educator Certification Program (AECP) – Clean, Simple, and Colorful Techniques

So.. My first project for Level 3 of the Altenew Educator Certification Program and I opted to try my hand at Ink Blending & Copic Flicking from the Clean, Simple and Colorful Techniques class.

I have started to appreciate the details that I see people add to their cards in a big way. I love learning some simple techniques that can really add depth and copic flicking over ink blending is definitely one of them. Now… I don’t own any copic markers, but I do own Altenew’s Artist Markers which are equivalent alcohol markers to Copics. With the Altenew Artist markers I love the fact that it’s easy to match many of the Altenew Crisp Dye ink colours as they’re made to match!

I started with the second largest flower from Altenew’s Build-A-Flower: Anemone Coronaria stamp and die set. Then I used Versamark Ink and Brutus Monroe’s Icicle Embossing powder and heat embossed three of the same flower on a panel of Neenah Solar White cardstock.

Then I grabbed my Simon Says Stamp’s Blending Brush and Altenew’s Crisp Dye Ink in Levander Fields and ink blended over the entire flower, except the center. I used a piece of a Post It note to mask the center.

Then I coloured the center using Altenew’s Warm Sunshine Dye Ink and a small blending brush from Honey Bee Stamps.

Then I grabbed my Altenew Artist marker in Lavender Fields and starting at the base of each petal proceeded to do a flicking motion towards the outer edge of the petals with the brush tip of the marker. I repeated this motion for each petal.

I then grabbed the Deep Iris artist marker and repeated the flicking motion but didn’t go out as far towards the tip as I did with the Lavender Fields. After I completed each petal with the Deep Iris marker, I went back over each petal with the Lavender Fields to help. To soften the flicks. In retrospect, I’ll start with the darker shade first.

I repeated for the blending and flicking process on the second flower but instead I used Cotton Candy Crisp Dye Ink for the blending and Cotton Candy and Coral Berry Artist Makers for the flicking detail.

I used the coordinating dies to cut both flowers out and set aside.

I then grabbed an A2 Panel of Neenah Solar White cardstock and stamped the same sized flowers using Altenew’s Evening Grey Dye Ink. I stamped the flowers in the exact positions that I would be adhering the die cut flowers. By stamping the flowers out, I knew exactly where to stamp my leaves in relation to where the flowers would be.

I took a variety of the leaves from the same stamp set and stamped the outline in Jet Black ink, then filled them in with the second layer of the leaf stamps with Firefly Dye Ink. I opted to stamp three leaves as odd numbers are more pleasing, and they help to ground my two flowers and make the overall number of elements an odd number as well.

Once all the leaves were completed, I opted for an inspiring sentiment by mixing “You are Amazing” from Altenew’s ‘Amazing You‘ stamp set and “Dear Friend” from Altenew’s ‘Thinking of You‘ stamp set. I stamped the sentiment using Altenew’s Obsidian Pigment ink and heat embossed using Brutus Monroe’s Icicle embossing powder.

I wanted to have a little bit of a pattern peeking out behind my main panel so decided to use Altenew’s “Elements” mini stamp set and Evening Grey Dye Ink to stamp a repeating pattern on a panel of Neenah Solar White Cardstock measuring approximately 4×5.25 inches.

In retrospect, I really only needed to stamp the outer edge of the panel as the middle wouldn’t be seen. Alternatively, I could’ve also used a shape die and cut out the center of the patterned panel to save for another project.

Then I trimmed down my main panel to be approximately 3.5 x 4.75 inches to allow a bit of the patterned panel to show behind. Then adhered the main panel to the patterned panel and then I adhered my flowers to the main panel using Simon Says Stamp’s Big Momma roll foam tape.

To add a bit more depth to the card (and some shine) I used varying sizes of Studio Katia’s Onyx Crystals. I limited myself to five crystals as odd numbers are more pleasing to the eye and I didn’t want to overwhelm the card and distract from my detail in the flowers.