Masking Today

 Today's commercial card copies are one layer cards but they involve a lot of masking. It was fun to make them and see what I had in my supplies to create the copies.
First card up is the pretty butterfly card. I really liked the background and vibrant colors of the butterflies.

So  I pulled out some stamp sets and started with a piece of Sahara Sand cardstock. First I stamped the large center butterfly using Pacific Point, Pear Pizzazz, and Watermelon Wonder.  I made a mask of the butterfly by stamping onto copy paper and then fussy cut that out. I placed that mask over the stamped butterfly and then stamped the flower using Pear Pizzazz ink. Then I used my Chalk Pen to color the open spaces on the flower. I really liked how this turned out... going to have to do some more. Then I stamped my smaller butterflies. I used Pear Pizzazz and Soft Suede on the lower one and Delightful Dijon, Calypso Coral and Watermelon Wonder on the top butterfly. I cut masks of the flower and small butterfly and covered them so that I could stamp the swirl with Versamark ink. Then with the masks still in place I sponged color on the background using Calypso Coral, Marina Mist, Pear Pizzazz and Watermelon Wonder. Once the background was done I stamped the body and antenna for the large butterfly in Basic Black and the body and antenna of the small butterflies in Soft Suede.  Then I layered on Whisper White card base... I guess technically this isn't a one layer card. This card was a lot of work but I love how it turned out!

The second commercial card that also inspired one layer stamping required the use of mask again so that the lacy edge would be underneath the flower image.

Here's my card. I couldn't really find a floral stamp in my collection that was the look I wanted. I finally decided to use Bloom with Hope set and combined two images to make this larger flower. I used my markers to color the stamp with Garden Green and Watermelon Wonder on Pistachio Pudding cardstock. Then I colored in the flower and leaves with the fine tip of Watermelon Wonder, Garden Green and Old Olive markers. I used my white gel pen to add more lines to the flowers. Then I made a mask for that little flower so I could stamp the white border. If I hadn't had the commercial card as an example I probably would have thought this card was in need of something more.  I learned that some blank space is okay, it's all in positioning the elements.