SplatteRings Galore

     Lockdown has had two benefits for me, a little more time to craft, bake and garden, plus some really good demo videos on Facebook and You Tube. This project was inspired by Eileen Godwin's video on Facebook, using some stamps from Visible Image.

      Not being much of a painter this is something I might not have tried, but this is using paint to create a background, not a picture.....that I can manage.
      In the video Eileen used a white card tag backed with greyboard for stability, I have used a piece of mountboard which is nice and strong with a smooth surface.
      Eileen uses small amounts of acrylic paint, any brand as it doesn't have to be the expensive type, and spreads it on thinly with an old plastic loyalty card. It didn't look anything special but it doesn't have to, it's just a background.

      I did make a mountboard tag to start with, then started thinking about a larger project. How could I get a larger splat ring than the Visible Image one?......Ah ha....What about the Inkylicious splatter stamp?
      I have both the large and the small Inkylicious splatter, they are amazingly useful for backgrounds, for this I have used the smaller one.
      Using a circle die I cut a mask from Stix2 Masking Sheet, worked out where my splatter would go and then masked what would be the middle. This is the beauty of using a stamp press, you can line everything up with ease.

       I inked my stamp with Versafine Onyx Black and stamped onto the board, it looked good but another coat made it look better. I carefully peeled off the mask and used it again further up the board.
      Then using the Visible Image splatter I stamped with the same ink in three other places. The ink took a long time to dry, in the end I put it on the window sill in full sun and left it there while I collected all the other bits I would need.

     Using a white gel pen I added circles to the inside of the splatters, I noticed that my circle dies had tiny notches at each quarter, this proved very useful when adding the white lines through each circle.
     For the most part the lines and circles are almost spot on, there is one that is not but it's not glaringly obvious so I think it will be fine.
     I also found a stencil that has circles of increasing size so that came in handy too. I used another stamp from Visible Image to add circles of tiny dots in silver ink, they are not bold but as the board is tilted they appear. The final touch was to find something shiny to go in the middle of the large circles, the stickers I found have been in my stash for years! The small circles looked a bit empty so I added small stickers to them.
      I think it would be very easy to keep adding bits to this but I chose to stop after the stickers, I am happy with how this looks now. As to what I'm going to do with it, well I think it will probably make a book cover as it's approximately 7.5 x 5.5 inches.
     I loved what Eileen had made and once I had tried it I wanted to make more, the challenge of finding something to make a larger splatter really got me thinking. Being home with my stash has got me trying all sorts of things, all I have bought in the last eight weeks is some foam tape and a few plastic hair clips for birds feet.

I would like to enter this project in the following challenges:

Arty Divas - Anything Goes
Through The Craft Room Door - Anything Goes

A Place To Start - Create A Custom Background
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends - Anything Goes