Pan Pastels

"Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die,

Life is a broken winged bird that cannot fly"

                                                                    Langston Hughes

 Yay, finally had a chance to play with the Pan Pastels that I bought at the start of the summer.

They are sooo... easy to work with, and not nearly as messy as ink.

Gaynor asked if I would demo them at Craftworlds demo weekend, which this year is on the 29th & 30th of September.

So down went the decorating tools and out came the pastels and sponges.

What a fab medium to work in. Unfortunately the light wasn't so good by the time I came to photograph it.

 



 

I decided that for a first attempt I would keep to the basics and only use a couple of colours, (Yellow Ochre and Red Iron Oxide).

The cardstock I used was Southfield High White 290gsm, and although it feels smooth to touch, it worked really well with the pastels. One load of the sponge, with Yellow Ochre, was all it took to give beautiful, even coverage over the tag, without the dreaded lines or splodges. Not at all like using chalks, (or inks). It seems almost creamy in texture but there is no drying time and little or no dust.

Versamark ink was applied through the Crafters Workshop stencil using a piece of Ranger Cut and Dry foam. After the stencil was removed more Yellow Ochre was applied this time using the knife tool with the oval cover. The tools allow for  easy and accurate placement of the pastel on the inked areas.

 

Although covered with Yellow Ochre, the stencilled circles remained tacky enough to accept the Red Iron Oxide, which I applied and blended with the same tool.

The numbers are another Crafters Workshop stencil, through which the Yellow Ochre was sponged using the round Angle Slice art sponge.

A flick of Titanium White was added to highlight the circles. Any mistakes can be easily remedied by using an ordinary eraser. As the pastels are not permanent, they need to be "fixed" using a pastel fixative. You can also use hairspray, but some of these can leave a sticky residue and alter the colour slightly.

I then added some script to add yet a little more depth to the background. You could use a coloured ink, but I chose to ink the stamp with Versamark and apply some Phthalo Blue pastel on top.

The tag was then lightly sprayed with fixative before stamping the main images in Black Archival ink. If you don't fix the pastel before stamping the main images, they tend to turn out patchy as the pastel sticks to the stamp and lifts off of the tag.

The stamps are all Tim Holtz and the photo corner is a Sizzlits die.

Findings courtesey of Primark!

Another couple of practice pieces.

I especially love all the layers on this one.

All that and clean hands too!!!

Time for a rest in front of the telly methinks.

Thanks for looking

Big hugs

Karen