New Journal Pages

I just wanted to share a couple of recent journal pages with you.They are similar colour tones but created in two very different ways.

 I usually start with the background and build the page up but this page started out with the sketch of the three mushrooms. I then went in with some distress stains in broken china and peeled paint. The mushrooms were coloured with distress inks and more ink was layered through stencils on the background. A very quick page.

The second page started out totally differently. I used various different washi tapes to cover the page vertically. I really wasn't sure what I was going to do with this background at first, but then I started to see the shapes of the New York skyline in the page.I outlined various shapes in black permanent marker and the 'city' started to come to life. I let the patterns of the tape dictate the shapes and locations of the windows in the buildings and coloured the buildings using black Inktense block. For the sky I used the Inktense blocks also. I scribbled graded colours up the page to create a sunset and then applied water to blend. I love the effect I got. Hope you like the pages. 

Icarus Falling- Journal page

This page/ pages started out as a sketch idea for another project. I was just laying down some colour and texture as a background when my Derwent inktense block made a kind of circular shape on the page.

So as the name suggests the page is based on the Greek Myth of Icarus, the boy who flew too close to the sun. The pages were gessoed in white quite thickly. While the gesso was still wet I dragged my spreader through it to create grooves and patterns. I let this dry and then started adding paint. I started with a deep yellow which I painted on one page. I closed the journal over then and pushed down to transfer some paint to the other page. This gave a great mottled effect. I dried this off with a heat gun and then applied a lighter yellow to the opposite page and repeated the process. This results in one page being brighter than the other. This is where the happy accident happened. I got out my Inktense blocks to add a little more depth to the background and ended up with a large sun which just didn't want to be contained on one page! Then I thought, 'what does the sun bring to mind'? and I thought "Icarus". Off I went to the trusty internet to find some images of Icarus. I found this great one by Frank Wright, which has a lovely sketchy quality to it. I printed it down and used an image transfer paste to transfer it to the page. I used some more texture paste and stencils to add a little bit more interest and sprayed the lot with Cosmic shimmer mist in Mango Blaze. To finish I added the story of Icarus around the son.

A close-up of the texture

A close-up of Icarus

The Secret Garden - Journal Page

This is my latest journal page. I started with the idea of trying an image transfer. The base page and border were already done when I did a previous page opposite. If you want to check the post out it's here. Well the image transfer went totally wrong, so I ended up printing the image again and colour tinting it with Distress inks. The roses were cut from some old wrapping paper. The leaves were drawn on and coloured with Derwent Inktense blocks. The quotes were taken from the book "The Secret Garden" by Frances Hodgson Burnett. This has to be one of my all time favourite

This is a close-up of the image and text. I have to apologise about the bounce back from the flash. The days are so dull here at the moment there is no decent light to take photos!

Cover of Journal

Journal Progress

I couldn't think how to decorate the front cover of my journal, so I decided to use some of my favourite quotes. I like the result that I got. I feel that I have got past the whole mental block that I think we are presented with when creating the cover for any album or journal. I always make a mistake and hate the result and don't want to use the album then!

This is the overall cover. I was going to paint out the manila colour, but decided to leave it in the end.

A close-up of the lettering. I hi-lighted the lettering with a signo white pen.