Make Christmas Cards of Candles & Snowmen
Everyone loves the festive season and the giving and receiving of cards. But making your own is so much more personal and something the whole family can enjoy together. Candles are faster to create with the iron than you might imagine! Snowmen are fun characters to make. They can be decorated in so many ways. With encaustic art you can start simply and develop as your imagination gets more and more excited. You can also produce the cards in small (or larger) batches. Get everyone involved and have some Christmas fun long before the big day itself comes.
Approaches & steps - see website for text [www.encausticart.com/learning/ ]
• CANDLES
The method for making candles is quite simple but will require a bit of practise to become fluid in their creation. If you use a card for practising then you will learn faster. Practise until your results are consistent.
• Begin with an A6 white painting card and a block of red wax (No. 43 Bright Red is fine, or No.01 Crimson perhaps).
• Set the regular LOW working temperature on your painting iron, then turn it around so that the square end is at the top and the pointed end is closest to you. Tilt the iron handle inwards toward your other hand so that the straight edge is the only part that will touch when the iron is lowered.
• With the wax block flat on the work surface, run that straight edge across the wax block, melting colour onto the edge as you do so.
• Place the wax covered edge of the iron down onto the A6 card being careful to align the straight edge with the card’s straight side edge. The iron edge should now be resting on the card and parallel to the card’s edge. This ensures your candle will end up being vertical!
• Look at the farthest part of the resting edge, where the square corner of the iron’s base-plate is visible. To create the candle stroke, move the whole edge in parallel, watching that top corner, so that is describes an elliptical shape, returning back to the starting point to complete the stroke.
• That’s it. This should result in a candle “tube” shape that looks to be vertical and upright on the card. Watch the video and practise this until it is reliably repeatable. Try different widths, different shapes ellipses and also some overlapping. Let the iron move fairly slowly and carefully, but inflowing and steady manner. When this is “in your hands” then you have done the hard part
• GROUP of CANDLES - see website for text [www.encausticart.com/learning/ ]
• WHITE CANDLE ON BLACK CARD - see website for text [www.encausticart.com/learning/ ]
• SNOWMEN
Another great subject for Christmas is snowmen. Loved by children and most adults alike, these are fun to create in encaustic art and not too difficult. Something for a special card!
• Load the iron with Cyan blue (46), Indigo (47) and some Black (15). Spread this onto an A6 white card until you have created a pleasing dark background which still has a good coating of wax.
• Use the iron's front curved edge and tip to create some hills type structures through the wax, making the lower third of the card lighter, but leaving the upper area dark and still with a good coating of wax.
• Take the metal scribing tool and draw in the outlines of your snowmen. Perhaps one larger and one smaller. Round heads and egg shaped bodies.
• Carefully scrape away the wax from inside these body shapes and wipe off the wax crumbs when you are finished.
• Twist a tissue into a hard pointed end and use this to rub away any remaining wax inside the body areas and also soften the overall look and feel of these main shapes. Ideally they will merge at their base, into the white snowy foreground.
• Use the Stylus or Stylus Pro with drawing tip fitted, to add clothing and features - scarves, eyes, nose, mouth, buttons, hats, gloves, anything you wish.
... the remainder of the instructions in text are on the website page for this video : [www.encausticart.com/learning/ ]
Products Used
• Encaustic Art Painting Iron (EU plug: Art.99530100) (BS-UK plug: Art.99530102)
• Encaustic Art A6 painting card (Art. 99537100)
• Encaustic Art A5 Black card (cut in half to A6 by hand) (Art. 99538511)
• Encaustic Art Metal Scribing Tool (Art. 99531015)
• Stylus Pro (Art. 99530400) (EU plug Art. 99530400) (BS plug Art. 99530402)
• Brushes - Assortment (Art. 99534000)
• Workplace Paper (Art. 99537010)
• Encaustic Art Wax blocks
- Orange (Art. 99534903)
- Black (Art. 99534915)
- White (Art. 99534916) * this turns any translucent colour into an opaque tint.
- Silver (Art. 99534926)
- Bright Red (Art. 99534943)
- Mid Yellow (Art. 99534944)
- Cyan Blue (Art. 99534946)
- Sage Green (Art. 995349)
- Indigo (Art. 99534947)
• Tissues from the local grocery - large size double ply tissues are ideal.
For the complete video text and lots more about Encaustic Art please visit the main website www.encausticart.com/