31 Days of Halloween

Hi, everyone! It is already October, I can't believe it and yet it's here anyway. For us, it will be orchestra concerts and school carnivals, plus a few extra days off of school for the kids which I'm sure they are going to love that free time. Heehee, if only they knew what was coming. 

Another activity is happening, but it is actually here in the blogosphere. The team at Stampendous has taken the challenge to post 31 Days of Halloween. If you are a fan, why wouldn't you be, you may already be hopping here on the 4th day of the hop, but if it's all new to you, then hop on over to the Stampendous blog and there will be details you'll want to know about, (whispering: "There are prizes..."). 

Today is my day to try and spook you with a project, lol, it's the best I can do since I personally can't sleep a wink if it's anything spookier than watching the Peanuts gang waiting for the Great Pumpkin.

So I went the technique route on my card and tried making cardstock planks of wood that shield a mysterious set of eyes. Who would dare to enter!

The inside opens up to a very chilling image! Precisely! The stamp is called Chilling! The image is stamped with the Memento Tuxedo Black onto white cardstock, but to make it extra black I used my MISTI tool and repeated the stamping until it was opaque.

I used Copic markers to color the face (E30, E31, E42), eyes (BG70, BG72) and lips (R56, R59), then switched to an airbrush tool for the background with BV23 around the face, BV02, then BV04 until dark and mysterious level. I did go back and added eye color/shadow with the background color to tie it all in.

To make sure I knew where I was airbrushing I put a piece of tracing paper over the face area and drew the outline of it in pencil, then cut it out with scissors. Here's some hindsight advice for you, tear along your lines instead because a cut edge produces a sharp line and that means more tricky airbrushing.

If you don't have an airbrush tool like the Copic system, Craftwell ebrush tool, or the Color Spritzer, then you could easily use an ink pad and sponge the color around the face.

For the planks of old weathered wood, I stamped Wood Background with gray ink onto gray cardstock again using the MISTI tool, so I could go back a second or third time with a gray Graphic Art Twin Marker to get darker tones in the grain. I did use a brown  Graphic Art Twin Marker on some of the planks. You get three planks out of one stamped image so repeat this a few times, cut them out with scissors and then do this trick, Get out your stylus and foam mat to burnish the long edges of the plank so the will bend and look dimensional. I did a few with thick ends as well.

Oh, the assembly is the toughest part and I hope that someone will come up with an easier way to do this. I aligned all the planks over the face where I wanted them and then taped them down to my work surface. A few iterations later of gluing, bending and making sure I didn't get any glue on the stamped image, I was able to hinge the planks away from the face and right below it was the folded card base, so I could begin to glue the planks to the card front. I used a cutting mat and craft knife to make the chink in the boarded planks and then glued the image to the inside of the card.

The nails, that's what they are supposed to be anyway, are two hole punch chads glued together and painted black with Media Carbon Black, then rubbed with silver, then copper Metallic Lustre. Those were glued on and painted with a little bit of Quinacridone Gold and Patina Green Antiquing cream to make them look weathered.

I opted out of a sentiment because well, where do I put it after all that work. LOL

Thanks for stopping by today and hope you continue on the hop today on the Stampendous blog. Oh, one more small thing, this card is also for the Stampendous weekly theme, A Chill In The Air, you can go to Monday's post or wait until Wednesday for a round up of the links so far this week.

Details:
Stamps: Chilling, Wood Background (Stampendous)
Paper: Mixed Media White Paper (Stampendous), Gray (Wausau)
Ink: Memento Black Tuxedo (Tsukineko), Copic Markers (E30, E31, E42, BG70, BG72, R56, R59, BV23, BV02, BV04)
Accessories: MISTI Tool (My Sweet Petunia), Carbon Black, Quinacridone Gold Media™ Fluid Paint and Patina Green Antiquing Cream, Silver and Copper Metallic Lustre Wax (DecoArt), 3D Foam Squares (Scrapbook Adhesives by 3L), Mono Liquid Glue (Tombow), sponge, Crop-a-dile hole punch (WRMK), Airbrush Tool (Craftwell USA)