Here's my latest piece--
And let me start off by saying that I am crackle-impaired--you know the kind of crackle that you put on your finished piece and when it's dry, you antique over it and cracks will "magically" appear--they never appeared for me. The only crackle that works for me is the Ranger distress crackle paint. I like it, but it covers up what you have underneath of it. And the Ranger actually has the clear distress paint, but these little bottles of paint are not cheap, and if you wanted to do a complete piece with the clear kind, you'd probably need to use 2 of these pricey bottles, so that wasn't an option.
I've mentioned on my blog a couple of times that I couldn't do regular crackle, so Janine contacted me and told me about Jo Sonja's crackle medium. She said that it always worked for her, so I ordered some from Dick Blick, and then, of course, put it aside.
In the meantime, Cheryl was having the same problem, but was successful after getting help from other bloggers that she noted on this post. One of them was Moriah. Well, Cheryl made a point of contacting me and telling me about Moriah's crackle video on her blog. This is the best video I've seen on how to achieve the crackle technique, and she just happened to be using the Jo Sonja brand.
Let me show you the detail of my piece--
I DID IT!!
In the past with the other crackle products, I always would apply it too thick, and it would never dry, and even when it dried, it didn't crack. So I was a little conservative applying it this time, and I got these tiny cracks, which I like alot. But I really wanted the larger cracks, but it's still okay, because I actually got cracks!
So this is the side piece of the canvas--
You can see that the I have random crackle spots, which I like again, but I really intended for more uniform cracks. I thought I applied the medium evenly, but apparently I didn't. Moriah, if you're reading this, any suggestions on how to get more even coverage? But I still like this look even if I can't get any further with this method, because I got cracks!!
And after I did all of my crackling, I knew that this piece needed a little more to it, so I collaged some bits of paper on it. I was thinking of trying the crackle again, but decided not to.
I think I like it better this way--it seems to add a little more dimension to the piece. Just look at those cracks!!--love em!
You know how we're all told that we're on our own art path, and everyone is at a different place in their journey? Well, these 3 guys are miles ahead of me. I'm the girl running behind them saying--HEY--Wait up! Well, they all stopped on their path to help me along mine, and that's why I say Thank You.
These ladies are soooo good! And if you haven't visited their blogs, you won't be disappointed. You can see Janine's HERE, Cheryl's HERE (check out her extremely cool Picasso chair that she has up on her latest post), and Moriah's HERE.
Just pure inspiration!!
