Art Journaling with DIY Stencils (Video)

I'm in the midst of a stencil making jag. Sure that are plenty of stencils you can buy, but making your own is so easy. I'll share my tips and tricks for DIY stencils.



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You can see a video of my 2014 journal plans here.

2014 Journals (Video)

I'm trying something new with my journals this year. Some ideas are working better than others, so I thought I'd share my process and the journals I am using this year.



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Journal page: Creation process

Have I mentioned how much I am loving playing in my larger journal?

While making my most recent page, I took photos at various steps along the way and made a little video showing you my process.


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It is really fun to not start with a blank page, and see where you end up.

Mixed media (Click to enlarge)

She looks sunburned! I'm going to have to work on mixing skin tone colors. The idea for this page came to me in a dream. I kid you not. Something about those green numbers on the bottom looked like grass. And I saw a girl and some buildings. Love how it turned out. 

Journal page: Creation process

I decided to capture the creation stages of my most recent journal page.

Step 1: Apply masking tape in a random pattern.

Step 2: Gesso the pages.

Step 3: When gesso is dry (or maybe not as in my case), spread acrylic paint all over the pages.

Step 4: The messier the better. Though to be honest, I was a little horrified with it at this stage. Here is a closeup of the mess. Nice textures no?

Step 5: How much worse can it really get? I pulled out a stencil and watered down black acrylic paint in a spray bottle and did some spraying. Not really much of an improvement.

Step 6: Might as well go all in. Circles stamped with white acrylic and a bottle top.

Step 7: Closeup of the mess. Was liking it more at this point.

Step 8: It need something. Had just read Saga, Vol.1, and thought an image from there would perfectly capture the mood I was in. Traced it, and glued down the tracing paper image with gel medium.

Step 9: Painted her with watercolors, and gave her a border to make her pop out from all that textured mess. Final step was a date stamp.

And there you have it, a true mixed media spread. I realized only afterwards how well it reflected my mood that day, and how playing in my journal helped soothe me, and get it all out. 

Thanks for checking in.

Custom Labels Tutorial

While making a new travel journal for my upcoming trip to Turkey, I decided to create labels with the names of the places I will be visiting. This is a fun and easy way to play with basic office supplies, and I thought I'd make a quick video to show how I do this.

Journal Page

I was inspired by this Geo Paper project, and decided to try it. I did not have Sumi ink, so used watered down black acrylics. I found painting this quite meditative.

I fly tomorrow and am looking forward to seeing similar landscapes outside my window.