Tag Tutorial and June Freebies

Hello everyone and thank you for dropping by here. Today I am sharing the second part of my tutorials for newbies by popular demand, this time altering a tag with a quick step by step. This is what the finished tag looks like:

I have also created some papers you can print. These are specially designed so you can use them for making tags like this. I left the middle part quite blank and light, so there is plenty of space for stamping and adding colour. I don't have a colour printer at the moment, so for my tag I used a paper from Pion Design. Here are the papers which you are free to use for any project you would like. They are designed to print out on 8 x 8 and will work best if you print them on smooth card stock.

Alright, on to my tag, - it started out looking like this, - cut from a 12 by 12 paper using the Tim Holtz large tag die which comes out as a size 8 tag,

My first step was to run the bottom half of the tag through an embossing folder.

I used three different colours of Distress Inks to colour my tag, Scattered Straw, Fossilized Amber and Seedless Preserve, trying to find colours that would match the flowers that were on the paper
Start with the lightest colour and using a blending tool colour lightly around the outside of the tag, working your way slowly towards the centre.

Do a bit of text stamping with the same colour of Distress ink to add a bit more interest to the background.

Deepen the colour with your next darkest ink, again blending carefully from the outside in with small circular movements of your blending tool.

Adding the third colour and some stencilling with the second colour, plus some further background stamping, this time using a swirl stamp. The final step in the colouring process was to go around the outside of the tag with Ground Espresso Distress Ink..

Time to start thinking about embellishments. I used some Ideaology pieces and a fussy cut butterfly, but you can use die cuts, flowers, chipboard of whatever you have in your stash.

Play around with placing them on your tag until you are happy with your composition. I placed mine mainly in the bottom right corner, to balance the flowers at the top left.

Now for the final touches, I often add some shadow around some of my elements to add more depth. I found the best way is togo over the area where you want to add shadow with Ranger Glue 'n Seal. This dries completely mat and clear and then it is easy to blend either a Distress marker or any other marker (Faber Castell Big Brushpens work well for this) or a Stabilo All pencil.

I also highlighted the raised bits of the ornate frame with copper coloured gilding paste to bring out the texture.

A bit more subtle background stamping to fill in some gaps in the background.

A  muse token and some died seam binding in matching colour at the top, and the tag was complete.

Well, I hope this was useful for some of you and that you like the papers. They were definitely inspired by the Pion Papers that I used. My TOU are simple, you can freely use these papers for your projects, you are welcome to sell what you have made with them, all I ask is that you don't sell them as they are. 

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me, I am always happy to answer if I can.

Thanks for your visit like alway as stay inky!

xxx