Using a Brayer

I bought myself a brayer earlier this year and have been playing around with it from time to time. Originally I wanted it to do the Crayon Resist technique - as an alternative to sponging. It gave a completely different result and I was really pleased with it. But it's not an item that I get out everyday. But I've started using it again lately, and wanted to show you a card that I made last night.

Firstly let me say that Brayering is not an exact science. Which means that you are likely to get a different result every time, and probably not what you expect. But that's exactly what makes it exciting.

My favourite thing to do with a brayer is to create backgrounds, and as you can see here, the backgrounds created are absolutely beautiful. For some reason the results are very atmospheric, which I just love. Certainly if you have mastered some of the more basic stamping techniques, you will find brayering a great next step, and a great way to get some really artistic results. I've used just two colours on this Background - Bashful Blue and Brocade Blue, and then I've stamped the tree stamp from "Lovely as A Tree" over afterwards. Really easy to do. Once I had stamped the trees, I felt that the colour needed to be moved around a little, and so I did that with my aquapainter to create a "halo effect" around the tops of the trees. I think it makes it look kind of misty. But after all this, I have to say that this card looks better in real life. :-) I will show you some other ones that I did soon.

Enjoy!