Color Matching Tool

The other day on Pinterest, I stumbled upon the neatest color tool.  Teresa McFayden had color matched her work-in-progress painting to Sherwin-Williams paint colors! It's called the Chip It! tool and you can get it HERE.

I had to give it a try with some of my work....

Not only can you color match your own artwork, but your photos, too!

Next I tried the Chip It! tool on some of my ribbon from my Etsy shop, which are loaded with color...

The Sherwin-Williams Chip It! color matching tool can be used on photos you find online, as well, plus you can save and organize your pics into albums, called Chipbooks.

I had a lot of fun playing with this tool!! 

Have a ball...

warm wishes,
Marilyn :)

It's a clip-art give-a-way!!!

 In keeping with our tool and supply spotlights, today is clip-art wednesday!

I'll be showing you some ways I like to use clip-art in my mixed media pieces.

The best part about clip-art is that you can enlarge or reduce the images to fit your needs, and use the same image multiple times!  I have books from which I simply copy & print with my scanner/copier, and also books that come with a printable CD, which is super easy and very convenient.

I not only use clip-art for backgrounds, but also for the focal image as well, such as in the piece below. I paint, draw, and layer other paper images over the clip-art for depth and interest.

Clip-art in the form of line drawings, and especially the old engraved type clip-art from the turn of last century, are my favorites.  I love the look! The black lines don't take away from the other elements in my artwork.  I like my clip-art to fade into the background just a little bit.

Adding a wash of paint helps to blend the clip-art into the other background elements.

Try copying the clip-art images onto a nice beige-colored sheet of newsprint sketchbook paper.  It matches the vintage book papers (also another favorite of mine) perfectly.

 I have a packet of some of my favorite clip-art images for one lucky winner. 

Leave a comment and tell us how you use clip-art! 

I'll be picking a winner at random next Friday, July 6th!  

Warmest wishes!

Marilyn

xoxo

THE LOVE OF ART JOURNALING

As a young girl I made myself a promise that I would write in my journal daily. It did not matter how long or the content as long as I wrote a little something about each day. Through the years I have kept several journals making note of my life, but honestly, they seemed a little boring. 

That was until I discovered that there was such a thing as "art journaling." I was thrilled to learn that I could incorporate paper, paint, glue, and ink all on one page creating something that was interesting to see and very fun to do.

Thank goodness for the internet and blogging. I was able to follow several artists and learn of classes that were being taught. One of my favorite artists is Pam Garrison. Her art speaks to me. I was beyond ecstatic when I was able to take a 2 day art journaling class with her in Malibu, California.

Here is a picture of me.............I know you think that looks like my beautiful friend Lorraine Lewis - and of course, it is...........but if you look REALLY close to the left you will see my nose and my hands - thats me! Can I tell you how excited I was to see me on Pam Garrisons Blog! It made my day!!! And especially that I was with Lorraine! 

Pam had several of her personal journals there for us to look through. I felt so inspired just holding her books. The wheels in my head were spinning and I couldn't wait to get busy making my own art journal. 

(picture from Pam Garrison Blog)

I started with a piece of canvas, some gel medium and a paintbrush. 

I gathered from some of my favorite papers, images and sayings from my drawer of collected papers.

I simply collaged them onto the piece of canvas.

After the glue had completely dried, I sewed a piece of fabric on the backside of the collaged canvas, for the inside cover to my journal.

I used some silk ribbon to tie my journal pages into the cover so I can easily add more as I go.

 
It was so much fun to make and very relaxing. I am absolutely in love with “art journaling.” It is a perfect way for me to write my thoughts - and not be bored :)

Me with my son Maxwell

Diana Camomile Peck - vintage.clementine@gmail.com

WINNER and May Art Group!

It's time to announce the winner of our Favorite Tool Tuesday...Just a Bed of Roses!!!  Thanks for all your comments and make sure you email me your info so I can send you a Sharpie Meanstreak!  Let us know what you use it for.  We'd love to even see pictures!

Last Thursday was our May Art Group.  Cheryl was very generous and let us meet at her house (house is a relative term here....her house is more like a French Chateau).  Food is always a big part of our meeting, so we thought we'd have a tea party!  None of us actually drink tea, so it was more like lemonade and strawberries and fondue and cupcakes party....YUM!

Julie, Candice, and Cheryl

 

  
Here is a look at our project (unfinished):

We made books out of watercolor paper using old vintage children's books for images and book paper for text.  Mine is a nursery rhymes book.  


The method we used is a kind of tunnel book.  Here's how:

 fold a 21 1/2" X 14 1/2" piece of watercolor paper in fourths (mine is marked so you can see the folds)

fold into eighths

 cut up the middle to last fold

 keep folding until your book looks like this

Next, cut out your tunnels on pages B, D, and F.  Your tunnel shapes will vary according to what you want on your page.

After folding and cutting out our pages, we painted our backgrounds and glued images inside the books.  If you don't like using real images,  take Marilyn's copying idea from the previous post and you can reuse and resize whatever you have.

 I painted backgrounds with watercolor on a few pages and used papers on others

Here's what the first page ended up looking like (without text)

a couple of other pages (unfinished)

We didn't have time to finish off our books, so next month we are binding them.  Be sure to check back for instructions on how to finish your book!


Have you ever made a book?  What materials did you use?  Leave us a comment!


Happy Monday to you!

Amanda

The Perfect Image

Old photos are beautiful and have such charm! 

I love to incorporate them into my work, especially as the focal point. Sometimes a certain project calls for the real thing, but I find there are advantages to using a photo-copied image.

•  A favorite photo can be used multiple times, thus saving the original.
•  The surface of the photocopy is not glossy, as the original is, and is therefore accepting of  other media, such a paint.
•  Sometimes an enlarged or reduced image is needed.
•  No pressure in making a mistake...a new copy can be made from the original.

Using photo copied images in my work is by far one of my favorites. I am able to manipulate the image in many ways. Below are some pieces of mine where I used photocopied images.

*Adding colored pencil marks*

*Drip with beeswax*

*Applying chalk and distressing with sandpaper*

*Highlighting just a few elements and punching out details for emphasis*

Take your favorite photo to a copy center. (scanners and home ink jet printers won't give you the same result as a good old-fashioned toner copier.  I have a toner printer at home, but printing scanned imaged just doesn't give the same beautiful grungy results that a real copier can give.) Make an enlarged copy.  Here I did 150%. You can see just by enlarging the photo I have achieved some wonderful less-than-polished results, which is what I am going for. 

Now, making a copy of a copy (2nd generation) will perpetuate that nice distressed look.

Try sanding off some the toner from your copied image, and then making a second and third generation and copy of the sanded image.

I just love the way I can grunge up a photo by recopying it over and over.  Try crumpling your copy before copying a second or third time.  Another fun idea is to really enlarge your photo, grunge it up with sandpaper, and then reduce back down to the size needed.  Play around with this technique and have fun!

My name is Marilyn Healey and I enjoyed sharing my art and one of my favorite techniques with you!

Warmest wishes!

Favorite Tool Tuesday

Hi Art Groupies!  Today is the beginning of a monthly post we're calling Favorite Tool Tuesday (or Wednesday or whatever day it happens to be).

What are your favorite art tools?  One of ours is a cool white paint stick called "Meanstreak" by Sharpie.  It's waterproof, dries fast, and is a great alternative to using white paint.  It almost feels like an oil stick.

Here are some examples of what I've used it on:

I used it on the bigger areas--the small white detail is a gel pen.

I like to use it in journaling!

Here is a bigger view...

What are your favorite art tools?  Have you used this one in any of your art?  We will be choosing one random art groupie to win a Sharpie Meanstreak!  Leave us a comment!

Happy day to you!
Amanda