Hey everyone! It's Carissa Wiley here with you today! Welcome to Satur-YAY! We're celebrating the weekend by getting our craft on. Today, we're putting those background stamps to good use. I'll be showing you five ways to use your background stamps.
There are a variety of different background stamps from a variety of companies. I tend to choose background stamps with patterns that I can use on a variety of types of cards. This gets me more bang for my buck. You can check out a wide variety of background stamps at the Ellen Hutson shop by clicking HERE.
Background stamps are a quick and easy way to add texture, color or patterns to your entire card front...or just a portion. I'll be walking you through all of this in the video tutorial below. Be sure to check that out. I'll also give you lots of tips and tricks along the way. Let's get to it.
Patterned Paper
I use black and white patterned paper on many of my cards. But do you want to know a secret? I actually make this patterned paper myself with my well loved Bold Diagonal Stripes background stamp from My Favorite Things.
Creating the intensity of color you want from a patterned paper can be a little tricky when using a background stamp. I like to mount my background stamp in my MISTI tool and stamp it several times to build up the intensity of the ink.
I create several pieces of this all at once and keep it in my stash to use when I need it. I tend to use small strips of it on my card projects, so it lasts me a while.
Multi Colored Inking
My next project uses multi colored inking to create beautiful backgrounds for your card projects. You can create an ombre effect or even a rainbow effect by inking portions of your stamp with different colors.
I used Distress Inks in several shades of pink to ink up my Mermaid Tail background stamp from My Favorite Things. I don't get too concerned about contaminating my ink pads. But if you're concerned, try starting with your lightest color first and move to your darkest color.
If you want to stamp your background in multiple colors, you can use your MISTI tool to ink portions and stamp it several times, cleaning between each color of ink. If you allow colors to overlap slightly, you'll get a beautiful blend between the colors.
Partial Inking
I used partial inking in combination with Multi Colored inking for this card. Instead of inking the entire stamp and covering an entire panel, I inked just a portion of my background stamp. You can see that my pattern slowly fades off and I'm left with just a portion of my card front with stamping.
In order to avoid harsh lines along the edges of my inking, I like to take a cloth and gently blot the edges of the inked area. This helps to soften any harsh lines that the ink pad may have left behind.
Emboss Resist
Emboss resist is such a fun technique for creating beautiful backgrounds. For this technique, you'll need to emboss your background image. (I'll show you this in the video tutorial below.)
Once you've heat set your embossing powder, the embossing acts as a shield. You can use dye inks, watercolor, or water based markers over the top and the embossing will resist the color.
In my example today, I embossed the pattern in white and then blended some Distress Inks over the top. This background was creating using the Concord & 9th Dotty Turnabout stamp. I'll walk you through getting your turnabout stamps ready for stamping in the video tutorial today. You can see I'm left with white where the embossing is and I have a gradient of pink on a portion of my card.
Tone On Tone Texture
Last but certainly NOT least, background stamps are great for creating tone on tone texture. Ink your stamp in an ink that's slightly darker than the card stock you're using and stamp away. This will add texture, without overwhelming the card. You can also try a watermark pad, like Versamark, to create tone on tone texture. I find the watermark pad gives better results on some colors than others.
If you want to kick your tone on tone texture up a notch, you can clear heat emboss the pattern over the paper. I've used the Hero Arts Wallpaper Pattern background stamp to create this tone on tone pattern on my gray card stock. This leaves you with a tone on tone finish that is slightly raised and shiny. It tends to intensify the color a bit, so if you want your pattern to be more subtle, you should probably just go with a colored ink on a colored card stock.
For all of my cards today, I used dies from Honey Bee to create glitter sentiments. They're my favorite. I love the sparkly and shine that they add to any card.
To enhance the sparkle, I like to finish the glitter sentiment off with a layer of Glossy Accents over the top. This add dimension and even seems to intensify that glittery effect.
So there you have it! Four different projects showing five ways to use your background stamps. It's time for you to dig out your favorite background stamp and get creating. I'd love to see what you're creating this weekend. Be sure to share it on Instagram using #EllenHutsonSaturYAY so I can check it out!
Thanks for stopping by today. I hope you've enjoyed these background stamp tips and projects! Which one is your favorite? I'd love for you to let me know in the comments below. Until next time, I hope you have a fabulous day!
XOXO
Watch The Video
You can watch this video in HD on our YouTube channel by clicking HERE. Don't forget to subscribe while you're there so you don't miss any of our crafty video tutorials.
