A Blog Named Hero

The official Hero Arts challenge blog!

Can I get a Redo?!

Hey Crafters!

It’s Kelly here to share with you a suggestion from one of our flickr followers. Maria wanted to see some new takes on old cards, a REDO if you will 🙂 so I have 3. I actually have way more but I’m sure you have kids to feed and cards to make so you don’t want to spend all day here with me! lol

So here are the old cards in all their ugly not so pretty glory and the much prettier new and improved version 🙂 I included the links to the old card’s post if you wanted to see how those were created.

This card I didn’t hate I just didn’t *LOVE*. Something about the box shape right in the center. So I changed the box to a banner and flipped it. I feel like a vertical card helps this particular design flow better. I stamped the flower in picked raspberry. For more color I rubbed on ripe persimmon and even more picked raspberry to blend. The banner was created by stamping the flower table cloth in versamark on glossy paper. Once dry I rubbed peacock feathers all over it and buffed off the extra. I still loved the shine of the original flower so I went over the outline with stardust stickles.

Old Card 
Once again it just wasn’t a card I loved. It seemed really dark and plain. I feel like the flower should of popped more and the blue space was too big. I kept the same layout but added a little more interest. I masked the circle and rubbed on some peacock feathers. To create some subtle interest I stamped clouds over the circle also using peacock feathers. The butterfly was stamped on the card base then stamped again and trimmed out. I colored it using ripe persimmon and picked raspberry. Adding the banner and some twine  makes it a much more cohesive focal point, at least to me anyway 🙂
Old Card
Once again I liked the original layout and the fact that the heart had some technique. I did not care for the cut out window with the black circle. I love the bottom piece but it just didn’t seem to go with this card. Nothing on it POPS. I stamped the flower 3 times and colored them with picked raspberry then I used the lattice background stamped with just water to stamp on top. Once again interest but subtle. Instead of cutting the window I added a circle ring colored with ripe persimmon. To give the bottom some texture that didn’t compete with my focal point I used the circle dies fro Simon Says Stamp in white, on white 🙂 
Sometimes with just a few changes you can take blah to Ahhh! hehehe 
I hope you join us for our current challenge, FREESTYLE, which means anything goes. Just a friendly reminder please make sure to read our Terms and Conditions and follow them in order to be eligible to win. We would hate for you to miss out on such a fabulous prize. Speaking of the prize, what can you win?!
How about $25.00 gift certificate to Simon Says Stamp. You could definitely use this to get your hands on some new CHA goodies 🙂 
Thanks for visiting today! 

More Inspired By Cards

Hi everyone!
It’s Cristina here, and today I have a couple of “Inspired by” cards for you. The challenge going on right now here on the blog, it’s all about being inspired by Hero artists, so why don’t you give it a go? Their blog is full of inspiration and you could win a gift certificate for Simon Says Stamp, our sponsor.

First of all I should say that today is my hubby’s birthday, and as he is away  for a couple of months, I decided to make this his birthday post (if you don’t mind ;-)). So the cards I made today are a bit masculine, but not too much, cause he does like cute too!
My first card was inspired by Jennifer McGuire. I love her style and I always love what she creates. I was inspired by this card:

And here is mine:

I decided to go for stars instead of circles and I used her card as a sketch. I just used some distress inks to stamp the stars, and then I tone them down using Antique Linen Distress ink.
For my second card I was inspired by Lucy Abrams. I love what she does with the Hero Arts digikits and her CAS style is just so cute. This is the card that inspired me:

Here is my take:

I decided to make something different with this card, and I cut half of the front off, so the card opens like this:

It’s just something unexpected that makes the card different.
For my last card, I decided to do a birthday card, inspired by Lisa Spangler. She is the Queen of washi tape, and her cards are always colorful and fun. Here is the one that inspired me:

I decided to go for darker colors, and of course, there had to be washi tape:

I just love that little robot, it’s perfect for coloring! 

So, go get inspired by the amazing artists from Hero Arts and make something  today! Thanks for stopping by!

Another Background Gets Stretched

Hello Craft Peeps!

It’s my turn on the blog today and as you know we are all stretching stamps around here 🙂 Today I’m stretching another background stamp! Last month I stretched a floral background (here), this time I wanted to use something a little more graphic.

Chevrons are super trendy right now so I thought maybe I could come up with a few ways to use them. Here we go!

First up: Rainbow Banner

For all of my cards I stamped the chevron in rainbow colors using distress ink. Next up: fussy cutting 🙂 I trimmed out the chevrons to create a rainbow banner. I wanted a more solid chevron so I trimmed out the white space and fit them back together, super simple! 
Like I said Chevrons are trendy. You know what else is trendy right now? ARROWS! I currently don’t own any arrow stamps . . . or maybe I do 😉
For this card I trimmed three 3/4in pieces and lined up my chevrons on top in various patterns to create a fun arrow. I just trimmed off the extra before adhering the strip to my card.
Lastly Create a Chevron pattern . . .with a Chevron 🙂 WHAT?!
I trimmed out some chevrons from my stamped pieces and “wove” them together to create a different chevron pattern. The pattern is horizontal but the woven pieces were actually adhered vertical. Pretty cool aye?
So can you stretch your stamps? If you can you can win a gift card from our super generous sponsors by entering our current challenge. 
Thanks for coming over to visit guys! I can’t wait to see the creative ways you use your stamps 🙂

Using “negative” die cuts

Hi everyone!

It’s Cristina here today, and I have a photo tutorial for my first day on the blog. Here is the card:

I love using die cuts on my cards and sometimes they are too detailed to use as a normal die cut, so then I just use the “negative” side. This technique gives you a perfect CAS card with a striking image as a focal point. Here is how I made it:

1. Get your die cut ready. In my case I used the Silhouette, but normal dies can be used for this technique too.
2. Cut a white piece of cardstock the same size as the front of the card, and color it using Peacock Feathers distress ink and an ink applicator.
3 and 4. Using a cotton bud and the die cut for reference, I mark the placed where I want to apply the other colors of ink.
5. Cut down a piece of foam so it’s easier to apply the ink in small places.
6. Blend different inks, to give the image some depth.

7. Once your colored panel is finished, it won’t look pretty, but it doesn’t matter, cause the die cut will cover it. Take some Perfect Pearls mixed with water, and spray it a couple of times, just so the inks blend a bit, and it gives the paper great shine.
8. Stamp the sentiment onto the die cut piece using Spice Tin ink.
9. Add dimensionals to the back of the die cut. You will need lots of adhesive!
10. Glue the panels together and to the front of a card base, and your card is finished!

Hero Arts has a lot of die cuts for the Silhouette that work perfectly with this technique:

But if you don’t own a Silhouette, there are a lot of dies in the market that you can use too:

I hope you give this technique a try, and don’t forget that we have a challenge going on, so go make a card this weekend and join us, you could win a great prize!
Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend!

Cris

Supplies:

Distress Watercoloring Tutorial with Chari

Hi Everyone, Chari here today to share with you a little tutorial about watercoloring with your distress inks & markers.  Distress inks are one of my favorite supplies but I only recently started watercoloring with them. In this video I will use the inks as well as the markers so no matter which you have in your stash you can use these techniques too.

I will apologize now for the beginning of my video, my phone did some funny stuff to the first few minutes of my recording…but we’re just going to call it super cool effects! 🙂 

Here is a shot of the finished card.  I only colored 2 flowers because I knew I would be cutting them off and wanted to waste as little as possible. The thing I like best about watercoloring is it leaves room for imperfections, and being the perfectionist that I am I need a medium that can be forgiving of my mistakes at times. It’s also easy to add and take away color with watercolor which is a nice feature as well (more wiggle room for correcting mistakes).

FloralHooray

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and it has inspired you to get out your favorite distress inks and some water and play!

SUPPLIES: