Tuesday, December 19, 2017

Dies Go CAS: Forget Everything I Said Yesterday

While yesterday's advice to keep scenes small and backgrounds white certainly worked for that fabulous bee card, today's card violates both of those suggestions...and I love it.



Note that the background is not white, but it's still very light, which minimizes the appearance of the white outline around the die cuts.

So why did I color the background? Well, the card looked rather stark and jarring with a simple, white background, especially given the incredible detail of the multi-step stamped images. Furthermore, the three images seemed a bit unrelated to each other. The scene needed a setting, much more so than yesterday's subject matter did.

Also, the scene is rather large compared to yesterday's card, but that's okay. The background is extremely simple...just hints of color, really...and no detail to distract from the extremely detailed seahorse and shells. That seahorse is pretty big, too, unlike yesterday's bees, and it looked crowded on a smaller panel. That level of detail on the seahorse in particular required some space around it, or the whole card would look busier than it is.

Note finally how clean the card feels when you look at it. Three images, a sandy-bottom ocean floor, and nothing more.

*happy sigh*

To add interest, I popped the top half of the seahorse and left side of the brown shell, while gluing down the bottom of the seahorse and the right side of the shell.




I didn't want anything to distract from the serenity of the seahorse and shells, so the sentiment is inside the card.




So don't necessarily forget what I said yesterday. Just know that every new design has a different set of rules that work for it. Be flexible!

Which reminds me of an old Air Force aviator saying. "Flexibility is the key to air power. Indecision is the key to flexibility. Therefore, indecision is the key to air power."

Which doesn't apply here at all, but it makes me laugh.

Peace, hope, love, and joy,
Susan

Supplies
stamps: Hero Arts Color Layering Seahorse, Papertrey Birthday Basics
ink: Memento cantaloupe; Hero Arts orange soda, dark quartz, cup o' Joe, wet cement, soft wheat; Ancient Page neptune, henna; Archival monarch orange
paper: Papertrey white
accessories: post-it for mask, inking tool, dimensionals, coordinating dies


4 comments:

  1. How did you color the softly muted background colors, Susan? It nicely highlights the detailed images.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I used very light inks and Tim Holtz inking tools...the small round ones.

      Delete
  2. Your simple background sets the scene beautifully!

    ReplyDelete

Thank you so much for taking time to comment!