Faith's Guide to Tim Holtz Distress Inks - Part 2

The Water-Squirter Method

Begin by smudging on two colours of ink, just like for the Basic Backgrounds. Remember to always use a circular motion, and always start off on the mat and work your way onto the card. With this technique, try to really overlap the colours of ink. I've started here with the Dusty Concord Purple, and when I've put on the Victorian Velvet, I've overlapped it quite a way onto the Dusty Concord.

Next, you need a water-squirter. Any kind will do, one for doing your hair, one for misting the plants, or in my case, the Cat's naughty spray! Give your card a light squirt of water all over. The two colours of ink will blend again, and once it's dry, you're left with this fabulous result!

The Aged Background

This is a brilliant one! Gives a fabulous Vintage effect. First off, it's my two favourite colours, Antique Linen and Vintage Photo. So, starting off with the Antique Linen, you need to give your card a good cover of colour.

Next, screw your card up, no really, screw it right up!

Don't worry if it tears a little, this is Vintage! Rips and tears are good. Once you've unscrewed it, you want it to look something a little like this;

Next, you want to add the Vintage photo. Blend it on your mat as usual, and very lightly smudge it over your crumpled card.

Ta-da! Beautiful Vintage background! I just love that effect. When I'm using something like this, I tend to stick it down with the Stick-It glue stick, purely because having an all over covering of glue, you can get your piece to flatten back down again nicely.

Here are some ATCs made using these two techniques. Artist's Trading Cards are a great way to play with new goodies and try out new things. They're just a tiny little project, the size of a playing card, so they're really quick to make. The idea is to keep them for inspiration, and swap them with other crafters, a bit like those football trading cards for children...but more fun!

That one on the right with Big Ben uses the water-squirter technique. And up the top there is the Aged Background technique. I've just changed the colours a little since the Urban Stamps I've used on this one are from the Jubilee-themed range, Portobello Road. The blue is called Blue Jeans and the red you see is Aged Mahogany.

Stamping with Distress Inks

There is so much you can do with distress inks when it comes to stamping! But for now, this is just a simple little add on to the Vintage Background. I've used an Urban Stamp from my favourite set and inked it up with Aged Mahogany. You don't need to use Cut N Dry, this is one of the few times you use the distress pad itself, just treat it like a normal inkpad.

Ink it up, and stamp it on! And this is the fabulous result you get made into an ATC;

I glued the crumpled card onto another piece of card cut to the same size, and this flattened it out nicely. The Love detail was made using the water-sprayer technique with the wording stamped over the top once it was dry. The heart was made using a different technique, more on that one next time when I'll be showing some of the other brilliant things you can do if you're stamping with distress inks!

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Part 1

Part 2

Part 3