How to create your own spray booth.

Many peoples favourite way to use our Inks in a Bottle, and the New PURE Colour Chemistry inks is as a spray ink. This can be fast and beautiful. This little post is to share how we protect the rest of our stash whilst doing this technique.
We are all crafters on the design team and don't have expensive professional spray booths in our home, so what do we use?
I started out with cardboard boxes that I got from our office supplies warehouse, they held paper pads so  were quite strong, and A3 sized, perfect! but we stopped getting pads packed this way BOO! how dare they?
DT member Lynne Vowles uses the boxes that boots come in and tells me that shoe shops are happy to get rid of these and may save some for you if you ask.
I am a big fan of spraying out in the garden, especially if I want to do big sheets of card. I have been known to re-purpose A1 mount boards this way, spraying over the boring white back. Elaine Kettle likes using her garden too.

I started to use a cat litter tray I am fairly certain didn't cost me very much. This is Barbara Daines method too.

The cardboard boxes are cheap or free but won't last for ever. I used to lay a craft mat in the bottom to collect the over-spray which makes the great source of ink more use able. Plastic on the other hand, it washes out. If you are changing colours a lot I suggest you wipe out your tray with some kitchen roll, or better still soak up excess ink on a tag or scrap card.

Then I as I was teaching bigger and bigger classes I decided I needed something not too expensive and that stacked. I would have gone the cat litter tray route had I been able to find a cheap source but I was going through a "use what you have" phase of my life and realised I had 20 of these trays from Ikea, it did mean emptying a few, but it worked, and I will be buying more of these for the Autumn classes.

My best advice is to keep what ever you use close to hand, because if you don't, like me you will be too excited about your project and promise yourself you will be careful and it is just one quick spray and before you know it everything on your desk with have a nice splash of Paris Pink on it. What ever you do with our inks I hope you take the time to enjoy what you do..... now that would make a stamp, oh yes it already is stamp x

How to do my favourite technique with spray inks

For a long time I have wanted to write a post about using the bottled inks as sprays. But all the time I am finding more ways and it was one of those impossible tasks you set yourself which grows and grows and so you never do it.  Yes I do that a lot!

So today I thought why don't I just show you a couple of techniques that work well together. I know I called this post my favourite technique, but that is a big ask, as I am not sure what is my favourite technique, and like most people it is usually the one I have just learnt or developed. But this set of techniques used together in this way is probably the one I use the most.

There are three steps to this, all of which work on their own or with other techniques.

1. Swipe   2. Spray  3. Spritz

All very easy really, but using them together and in this way is a really great go to way to use the inks.

1. SWIPE

Apply ink to the card/tag and swipe the ink over the whole surface. I use a sponge or a paper towel or a baby wipe...... what ever is close to hand, by preference I guess a sponge.
This puts a light colour over the whole surface of your tag and so gets rid of that "whiteness"

2.  SPRAY

It is important to use plenty of ink but not all at once or you loose the spray effect. Be prepared to spray several times drying in between coat, this is one of those times when we say several light coats in better than one thick coat. The good news is you can speed the drying process with a heat gun or a hair dryer. If I doing lots of pieces of card I lay them out in a clean tray and place that some where warm, Over a radiator in winter outside in the summer.

3. SPRITZ

 This final step adds depth or highlights to your project. For this I use a dark ink is the same colour family as the main ink colour so for reds I use Brazil nut. For blues use Bobby's grey and Denim Jeans. For yellows I might use an orange or a green.
This is when restraint is needed. One or two little sprays off one corner of the project. A light touch is essential so test out the spray on some scrap paper or spare card. Aim your spray off the edge of the card and move onto the project as far as you want to go.

Don't forget to mop up the left over ink on another tag,hopefully you will see that using the range of colours you get more depth,, and that first swipe layer really helps you save ink, if you try spraying to cover all the white it will take a few layers. 

 

As I said this a set of techniques I used the most often.
It gives you depth of colour. Everyone will be different.

Have fun and live your life in full colour!

In these photos I have used the Inks in a Bottle which are ideal for using as spray inks. x

Through the window

Elaine here with another card made using the Vintage Blue Inks from Oak House studio - both the Ink in a Bottle spray and the Pure Colour Chemistry Watercolour Ink.  

I started by spraying some watercolour paper with Vintage Blue Ink in a Bottle and added a little Delicious Damson too.  I silver embossed the Block Frame stamp, painted the frame with Vintage Blue Pure Colour ink and cut out the sections.  To add a little more interest I painted Pure Colour ink onto a small acrylic block and stamped this to create the mottled 'brick' pattern.   The flowers are from the Spring Blooms set (as is the sentiment) - these were silver embossed onto some card sprayed with Delicious Damson and Paris Pink Ink in a Bottle and arranged in a plant pot.  The net curtains are the Mack Rose stamped with White Brilliance onto vellum.

I'm loving playing with these new Inks - they're so intense and allow you to create the shade you want.  I'm looking forward to getting some more colours and having a mixing session in the lab....lol!!

Elaine x

Sepia Tones - the Poinsettia

I managed to get my hands on some of the new inks from Oak House Studio namely the Pure Colour Chemistry watercolour inks - they are extremely intense so a little goes a long way and they lend themselves to painting, misting, mixing and writing etc etc!

Here I've just used the Sepia tones to show the different products available.

 

 

I started by spraying a sheet of watercolour paper with Vintage Sepia Ink in a Bottle and then overspraying with the Glorious Gold.  If you don't have Ink in a Bottle then why not buy an empty spray bottle and water the Pure Colour down.   I used half the background over stamped with the English Garden Text. The rest I stamped with the Build Your Own Poinsettia set of stamps (3 bracts and a centre) and gold embossed.  The outer leaves I painted with Vintage Sepia Pure Colour Chemistry - a deliciously rich ink I have to say - and then glued it all together with silicone glue to give some height.  I glued beads to the centre too.

 

 I've stamped the Friends Like Fruitcake with Chocolate Pigment Ink and clear embossed, sponged a little Vintage Sepia Ink in a Bottle and then matted this on some card painted with the Pure Colour Chemistry Ink.  To finish I created some stripey ribbon by just dragging a paint brush with the intense ink along one side and heat drying to crinkle.

 

Pop back on Monday for a look through the window using Vintage Blue.  I love all the shades you can get from just one bottle of ink and can't wait to acquire more colours. 

 

Elaine xx