ICAD 9: Stripes, ICAD 10: Corners, and 30-30-30: DAY 1

Hey all. I'm back with you guys again, this time with a bit of a catch up post. Even though I was still on here yesterday. I'm going to be sharing with you a few things today, and I hope you enjoy today's post. :) The first thing that I am going to share with you guys is my first page for the 30-30-30 Challenge. It is a challenge that prompts you to do 30 art journal pages in 30 days in 30 minutes. It is a little bit more difficult than I had originally thought, but that's okay. A challenge is always good. I did this page fairly quickly; it only took me about 20 minutes.

On this page I used a lot of random bits and pieces that I found on my desk. My desk looked (and still does look) like an extreme pile of crap. But that's okay. It is kind of an interesting way to work, and a lot of people wouldn't be able to do it. I don't know why, but I seem to be encouraged by that type of environment. Unfortunately, my mom doesn't really feel the same way about it. So I do have to clean up sometimes.

Overall, I think I had a pretty good time with Day 1 of today's challenge.

Now HERE is that card that I was telling you about yesterday! I think that I told you guys that I based my card around the prompt "stripes". This card was extremely basic in nature. Really, all I did was to take my Portfolio oil pastels that I purchased at Staples. And then, I just picked up random colors and drew lines on the card. Then I just blended it with my fingers. 

Though the Portfolio oil pastels are water soluble, on this particular card I did not wet them. I kind of wanted the texture and the bold, bright colors that came from going through the process without any water. Then I simply pasted the little piece in the corner. And the card was done!

Now let's get on to TODAY'S index card. The prompt that I used today was "decorate the corners". The instant I read this prompt, this was what came to my mind. Instantly, I thought of something extremely simple, with no complexity to it at all. And I LOVE the way this card came out! I used the Portfolio oil pastels again today as well. Again, I didn't use any water, as I loved the way that yesterday's card came out. So I wanted to replicate this effect.

Once again, I would like to make the statement that, to me, this challenge has absolutely nothing to do with how good the work looks; how complex it is, or how much work I put into it. It has everything to do with the process, and how it is that the work makes me feel. I think I have said before that ICAD is kind of like a warm up to me; it tests my creative muscles and has me thinking in ways that I wouldn't normally think in. Normally, simple isn't my style at all. But I wanted to try it. And this is what the prompt inspired me to do. So I did it. And I love the way it turned out. Chill out. RELAX. It's an index card. It doesn't need to be perfect. It doesn't need to be complex. It just needs to be YOU.

Art Journal Layers

Hey guys! I'm back with a few more art journal pages that I've been adding onto lately. It seems like the more that I work in this journal (the big, fat one that I started first), the more i start to skip around. I'll flip to a random page, and, if it is unfinished, I'll see if I want to add something to it. Maybe some doodles or some paint, or a few pieces of paper as a layer. On this page right here I used some new oil pastels that I bought at Michaels (Cray-Pas) to do some doodling. I used the light blue to do the circles around the punched out papers, and the red lines with the half circles.

This is just a more close up picture of this same page spread. You can see the doodles that I did.

And this pages right here is just another page that I've been working on lately. I had the background here for a while, and then I added int the blue paint, the black crayon swirls, the clock printout, and some sumo ink mixed with water that I sprayed over the page. That's a bit of a new technique that I've been trying to experiment with a little bit. It's still in progress, but I'm starting to try and perfect it. :) Well, that's all that I've got for you guys today, and I guess I'll see you guys tomorrow. Bye!

Oil Pastel Technique

Yes. Yes I do. I just thought that I would share that interesting little tidbit of information with you. I don't know if it would help you guys at all, but these were some of the pens that I got for Christmas in my stocking, and I love them. I've had the blue ones in the past, but the red ones are pretty darn epic, if I do say so myself.

Okay, so let's get to the real "bulk" of today's post. I don't have another tutorial for you guys today, I just have a couple of pages and stuff that I really wanted to share with you guys. The one above is the page on the left hand side. That's the one that I really wanted to focus on. Basically I took a background that I didn't really like, or was just really bland, and I took my Portfolio water soluble oil pastels, and colored the rust, and the light blue all over the entire page. Then I pretty much just blended them together with my fingers. I love the way that the whole page turned out, as it looks really nice looking, as well as looking blended and a bit more messy and grungy, which is totally my style.

I used the same type of technique on this index card, and I actually did this one first as a sort of introduction/sample for this technique. Then I was experimenting with my calligraphy pen on another page, and I saw this; I wanted to know if I could use it on top of oil pastels that weren't wet. As it turns out, it comes out with a very interesting technique. Some of it is black from the ink, and other areas are white, from where the tip of the pen scratched away the pastel. But that's all that I've got for you guys today, and I'll see you tomorrow!

Art Journal Pages/Spread?

Hey guys! I'm back with you guys for the second time in a row, and I'm glad that I'm actually getting around to devoting some time each day to blogging. I think that the whole "new year, new slate" deal has sort of helped me out a lot over the time. So today I was just working on some backgrounds and such, just trying to experiment with some different things on the page. These two pages are right next to each other in the journal, but I don't know if this is going to turn into a spread or not. Sometimes when I start two entirely different pages, they somehow evolve into a spread, even if I didn't initially mean for them to be like that. For some reason, that's what this page is saying to me. Doesn't it sort of look like it might turn into that? Oh well.

So basically what I was doing was some experimentation with Portfolio oil pastels and some paint scraping. On the left side, I wanted to it look like the blue in the corners and the red in the middle were mixing at the overlaps to make purple. It did end up looking somewhat like that, but instead of the two colors mixing like I wanted them to, I had to put some purple crayon where the colors met. Eh. It still works. And I do like it. On the other page, I'm not exactly sure what I did. I think I did some color scraping with a credit card as the base layer, and then added some circles/dots with the oil pastels. After that, I mixed some Mod Podge with water, and spread it over the page. While that was still wet, I added some watercolors into it. Yeah.

I would have had something a bit more awesome for you guys today, but I wasn't close to finishing ANY pages today. I started a bunch of backgrounds, but didn't complete any. Plus, I've been busy stalking the internal workings of the interwebs to find some ideas of what I want to buy at Michaels. For my birthday (Which is today! Yay!! I'm 15!!), I got a $50 gift card. But I don't really know what I want to get. If you have any ideas, leave them in the comments, and if they're not too expensive, I might consider it. I was hoping to go tonight, but I'm still not sure. Crossing my fingers over this way. :) I'll post my finds when I get them. And yeah. That's pretty much all I've got for you guys today. I wish you all the best of luck with your artistic endeavors, and wish you a good night. :D

Layering Experiment

Hey everybody!

Jordan is back with you guys today.

I'm sharing with you a page that I was working on today.

It was sort of a sample/experiment thing that I was doing for my art journaling e-course that I'm working on.

I've already done a couple videos for that course BTW. :)

It's getting so exciting!

I was playing around with different layers and stuff.

I used some markers, gesso, water, and oil pastels.

Not that much into it thus far, but I really liked the way it was turning out.

I randomly picked the beginning colors with my eyes closed.

And they turned out being my favorite colors!

Blue and green.

With blue being my absolute favorite.

Pretty cool huh?

So I hope that you guys liked the video that I posted yesterday, and I'll hopefully be back tomorrow with some more cool stuff to show you.

Painted Papers and a Blotted Paper Towel

Hey everybody. :)

I was working in my studio a bit more today, making some more papers. 

Today I worked with markers and water soluble oil pastels.

I love the way they turned out, and I worked with a plastic sheet this time, so the effects are slightly different. 

Today I did six different pages in several colors.

I did a bunch of things, working with experiments. 

You know the drill.

Another thing that I was working with is coming up with a blotted effect on paper towels.

And I sort of achieved that goal.

You know what I mean. 

I think it's my favorite part.

I did this in different shades of purple using markers.

Yep. 

That lightened version from markers.

You'll see how I did it eventually. 

Mwhahaha. :D

That's all I've got for you guys today, and even though it wasn't that much, it's still something, right?

:) See you guys tomorrow.