Distress inks are a great way to great your own back grounds - you can be as bright and contemporary or as muted and vintage as you want. And it is a really easy technique to master - if i can do it anyone can!!
You need a few basic items to start:-
- distress inks (although you can also try airondack inks)
- cut and dry foam, or a blending tool and the foam pads, or brushes
- smooth cardstock
I used smooth cardstock and cut a tag. I love my blending tool, and the foam pads are re-useable, just wash them clean after use.
The inks I used for this tag were Vcitorian Velvet, vintage photo, frayed burlap and faded jeans.
I started with the VIctorian Velvet and inked up the foam pad. In order to get a softer look, start circling the ink on youtr craft mat, working onto the cardstock. You get a much smoother look by circling, and as some of the ink is taken off you get a softer look.
You continue building up the colour, moving round the tag, and going over the areas you have covered until you get the depth of colour you want.
I made the corners and bottom darker than the middle of the tag.
I then took the faded jeans pad, and repeated the process, focussing on the top of the tag. Again, I started circling the blending tool on the craft mat to make sure I didn't get blotches of colour.
You will find that you leave finger marks on the ink when you are turning the tag - to prevent this use a peice of card and put it over the ink and hold the tag down - if that makes sense!
So here is the tag, having been distressed .
Now i wnt to make the edges darker, so I repeated the process using vintage photo ink, just round the edges, repeating over the parts I wanted darker.
You can see how I have circled the tool, so I get a blended edge to the colours.
You can dry the inks off between colours using a heat gun. I personally prefer to leave them wet as you get a smoother blending of colours in my opinion. And remember they will dry slightly lighter than they look when you first put them on.
I finished the tag off by stamping Visible Image butterflies and vintage photo and victorian velvet, and Visible Image tall grass in frayed burlap.