Hi Friends! I am back with Yupo paper cutouts and I’m going to talk about paper today. I’ve mentioned this a couple of times now- generally when I’ve demonstrated the use of Yupo paper cutouts and stencils and then doing what I call the Distress Oxide resist (even though it’s more of an oxidation than an actual resist), I’m usually using with plain, cheap, whatever I can find cardstock, which is porous, uncoated and therefore very, very absorbent.
I’ll talk about a couple of techniques today including where I mention I’ve taken a Yupo paper cut out/stencil, and used it with pastes and gels to coat the Yupo, but for the most part this video/post will concentrate on using Yupo paper cutouts directly as a mask or a stencil with Distress inks. As a reminder- you can go here to see the original post– the Distress Oxide Resist happened to me as a happy accident when I was using the Distress Oxides soon after I received them, before I knew very much about them. In general I neglect to read instructions, haha. I just dive in and play. And so while trying to cover up something I didn’t like, I serendipitously discovered the interactions between the two types of Distress inks! The first layer in this technique is Distress Oxide- either stamped (blog post here) or over pastes/gels (one of those blog posts here) or sprayed through a mask/stencil directly as in this example today. Then I follow up directly with Distress Spray Stains (not Oxides). You can let the Oxide layer dry, although I usually do not, as in general I tend to run into my craft area when I have spare moments (or inspiration strikes, haha) and play in 5 minute increments. These are what I call Take 5’s and I have these sprinkled through out my blog over the years.
Hint- use the TagĀ or Search feature on the blog to find other Take 5 projects/ideas.
So, normally I do not wait- I just spray š . The Distress Oxide appears to resist the Spray Stains, which is how I named this technique, although the Distress Oxide is, in reality, oxidizing as it was designed to do.
In this post/video, primarily, I wanted to show you the difference between using plain cardstock with the Distress Oxide Resist technique versus the Distress line of cardstocks. In the video I mention I am using Distress heavyweight, which earlier that day in my experimentation I was using, however in the filming I was actually using Distress Watercolor cardstock. The giveaway- it had a smooth and rough side, which the other Distress cardstocks do not š . The Distress inks react very differently on the Distress cardstock- because that was what they were designed to do. So you’ll get slightly different looks doing the Distress Oxide resist on those cardstocks. It is much softer and will react with water and other wet media much more easily than the cheap cardstock. The cheap cardstock will give you a crisper, more defined image, but it is more stubborn when trying to use water to do droplets and lift off ink. You’ll see in the video, also, a difference in color. The cheap cardstock grabs on to the inks (and often won’t let go) so you can get a blotchier look when you use the Distress Spray Stains over the the plain, uncoated cardstock .
I mention in the video that had started to use zig glue on the back of my Yupo cutouts and stencils to make them tacky. If you put it on and let it dry, it becomes repositionable. I found however, that the glue makes storing the stencils/masks a little trickier because they can stick to each other. Also, it reactivates when it gets wet, and then becomes even stickier causing removal of the mask/stencil- especially from uncoated cardstock- more difficult. Since most of my stencils are intricate designs, I don’t do that as much anymore, FYI.
In this video, I use a mask and spray over it with Distress Oxide inks. I’m using Picked Raspberry, and Scattered Straw. Then I remove the mask and spray over that Distress Oxide image in a few colors of Distress Spray Stains. I’m using Shaded Lilac, Salty Ocean (only on the plain cardstock since the sprayer was giving my trouble), and Stormy Sky. I do this first with plain cardstock, and then with Distress Watercolor cardstock (even though I keep saying Distress Heavyweight in the video, LOL), using the same colors. You can see the difference in the crispness of the image and even the colors. The Watercolor will be softer and lighter. There are other examples (actually on Distress Heavyweight) where the masked image is even less detailed so there are even differences among the different Distress cardstocks.
I demonstrate drying with a heat tool with the Distress Watercolor paper example, and there is a slight difference in the look rather than letting it air dry. When I first spray the Distress paper with Spray Stains it looked like a big fat mess, but as the heat tool dried the inks, the image came back into view. With plain cardstock I almost always let it air dry to let the inks do their thing. The inks work their magic on Distress cardstock much quicker and will dry with a heat tool much nicer.
As a side note: I do not keep my heat tools plugged in. I used to teach at a stamping store, and one of the women that I taught with, Karen, (and I can’t remember if it happened to her or a friend of hers) left their heat tool plugged in. Her cat knocked it over, turned it on, and caused a little fire. So ever since then, I do not keep my heat tools plugged in!
I also show the difference trying to lift off the dried inks with water. With plain cardstock it is mostly a no-go but again the Distress cardstocks were designed for this and so they work great! With the plain cardstock sometimes I will spray some Distress Oxides for splatters spots or ink some Distress Oxide ink on top and then spritz that with water to get a spotty look. The watercolor paper with the Distress Oxide Resist technique reminded me of old wallpaper and I love it as a background!
My brain was working overtime that day, so I went off in a stream of consciousness ramble covering other ideas like using Yupo paper cutouts as a stamp onto a background. The Distress Oxides stained the Yupo cutout (even without any coating) and so layered it looked pretty. I also showed how I coated a Yupo paper cutout in Micaceous Iron Oxide paint (my favorite!) and then colored that with Distress Oxide inks. And I showed an example of coloring Yupo paper cut outs with alcohol inks. In the example I showed I had colored the cutout on a plain sheet of Yupo paper, so I got a twofer out of it. With alcohol ink, you don’t need a coating to color it and make the ink stick as you do with the water based inks and sprays. But then you are stuck with the alcohol ink colors and “look”. Since I want flexibilty, I have played around with coating them with many different coatings and you can find those posts sprinkled throughout the blog. My favorites tend to be Golden Light Molding paste and Tim Holtz Distress Texture paste, but I tend to cycle through what I would call my favorite at any time of the week/month/year š . So just a reminder, since it isn’t obvious on my posts/videos that alcohol ink works perfectly fine to color Yupo.
Here are some samples of Yupo colored with alcohol ink:
I finished the video with the different Distress Oxide Resist examples on different papers so you could see the differences. Hopefully this was useful and you’ll try it yourself! Enjoy!
