Helpful Tips for Water-coloring With Re-inkers

It seems that whenever I post a creation that shows water-coloring I get nice comments (thank you for that!)  and a lot of questions asking how to achieve good results, what supplies am I using, etc... While I was busy water-coloring a set of cards last week using Secret Garden & Summer Afternoon I decided to take some step by step photos to show how I color my images.

For me I find it easiest to use my Aqua Painter and Classic Ink. I like to squeeze a little re-inker in the lid of my ink pad or simply squeeze the ink pad to leave extra ink on the lid and I pick up the color with my brush and away I go. I use Stazon Ink to get a nice crisp image that will not bleed. While water color paper is certainly a good option, I tend to mostly just use Whisper White or Very Vanilla card stock.

Here's my image stamped in Black Stazon on Whisper White. Make sure to have paper towel handy to blot any excess water that may flow through the Aqua painter. For this reason I have found it best to only fill the barrel about half full. Don't squeeze because you don't need a lot of water.

I pick up some ink with my brush and start painting where I want the darkest parts to be. In the case of this flower the insides of the petals at the edges where the petals meet and where a petal might have a slight fold or bend, would be the darkest areas.

Make sure to leave some light, white areas as you are coloring. Allow the colors to blend and fade before reloading your brush with more color. You can always add more color...but once it's there you cannot take it away. When you re-load your brush with color add it to the areas you want darkest, or blot off excess color onto scrap if you are done with the darkest areas.

I went back and darkened up petals in above photo and was ready to add some contrasting color. I started with the center, as I wanted that the darkest.

See how the bottom part of the center is a little darker and I worked my way up to the top center as the color started to fade? This makes it appear to have a highlight on the center. I decided to add the Rich Razzleberry color I used here to the petals as well.

This tied in with the color scheme of my finished card. I could have also used a darker blue at this time or any other contrasting color to get a totally different look. Here is the flower on my finished card.

My top 3 tips:

• Don't use too much water...otherwise colors will get too light and paper can become pilled/over worked.
• Make sure to leave very light, even white areas for highlights
• Practice! The more you practice the better you will become! 

Hope this helps!