This month, my focus was to show you a project using the brayer. We all know several different techniques including Joseph's Coat, Serendipity, Brayered Batik, and Emboss or Versamark resist. I wanted to try something different, so today I am going to show you a technique I found called "Random Brayered Background".
You will need the following items:
- Rubber brayer
- 3 coordinating ink colors
- small to medium sized solid stamp
I first cut a piece of Cryogen White cardstock to standard A2 size. Then, I chose a small flower from the Kim Huges Silhouette Blooms 2 set, and inked it my lightest ink color Ranger Adirondack Caramel. I left the stamp ink side up, then rolled the brayer over it, to transfer the image to the brayer. TIP: use light pressure when rolling the brayer, or else the brayer will "slide" over the inked rubber. Repeat this process several times, reinking the image before each pass with the brayer. Your goal is to have the brayer full of the image with some space in between them. Here is a photo of how the brayer will look (sorry about the blue stain on the brayer, just ignore that, LOL!)
After your brayer is full, roll it on to the cardstock from bottom to top. You will see a lovely random pattern of the image that has a softer look than a directly stamped image. The edges are softer, and it has an almost silkscreened look.
Clean your brayer, and then repeat the process with your second color. The color I chose was Adirondack Rust. Clean the brayer again, and then repeat with the third color. My choice was Adirondack Raisin. TIP: Try this technique using 3 shades of the same tone.
After I completed all 3 colors, I trimmed the cardstock down to 3 1/2" square. To add some more interest to the random flowers, I chose 2 background stamps to layer over the images. I first stamped the CHF Scratched Grid in Adirondack Caramel ink, then stamped CHF French Script on top of that with Adirondack Oregano ink. I then sponged the edges with a bit of Ranger Distress Vintage Photo ink.
I stamped a scrap piece of Cryogen White cardstock with the Scratched Grid backgrounder using the same Caramel ink, then stamped the sentiment using Raisin ink. I ran this through my Wizard, using a tag from the Spellbinders Tag Dies to cut and emboss it. Leaving the tag in the die, I then used my Copic airbrush system to quickly add a splash of color using the Copic E99 marker. I removed the tag from the die, and sponged the edges with Vintage Photo ink.
The focal image was matted with Memory Box Dill cardstock, and I added some aged copper brads to each corner. This was then mounted on dimensionals to a Memory Box Vanilla Bean cardfront. I adhered the tag to the cardfront, also on dimensionals, then used my anywhere hole punch to punch the hole for the tag all the way through the cardfront. This allowed me to wrap the ribbon through, then knot.
I hope you enjoyed this fun, easy technique! Please give it a try, and post a link for me to see! As always, thanks for visiting!