Chess Collage Card

Hi there all.  This is a card I made recently for a masculine birthday in the family, in fact a cousin of mine.  I saw a similar card which had been made by Asha who is a design team member over at Chocolate Baroque and you can find the card on her own blog here.  I decided to use a set of chess stamps from Chocolate Baroque called The Art of Chess for my version.  The technique is called partial retiform which is something I have not heard of before.  I looked up retiform in the dictionary and it means 'netlike', and I suppose if you think of a fishing net or a wire netting fence, it is made up of holes of a similar shape and size, and although my segments are not all uniform they are shapes made using inks and stamping into each masked shape, and you end up with a sort of collage effect.

I decided to use a piece of white card the same size as the base card to stamp on to and starting from the lower edge I used a piece of copy paper to mask the bottom half of the card and placed the first edge using Stormy Sky Distress Ink sponging with a piece of blending foam.  I then did  the same at the top left hand corner, then the top right hand corner, but using some post it notes to mask to avoid marking the white space where the line intersects the first line, and so I gradually made all the cells.  I then masked off each cell at a a time and built the colour up around all the edges also adding some Mustard Seed DI.  I then took the main image of the set and using small parts of the stamp made three images in one of the segments keeping the masks in place to avoid stamping outside the cell.  As you can see I gradually built up the different segments using different stamps and then coloured all the images with turquoise and yellow Spectrum Noir Pencils.  I accentuated the edges of each segment with a dark grey pencil to give a more solid line.

I finished by adding a sentiment and some numbers in Black Archival Ink.  I then attached this to the white base card.  You could of course stamp straight on to the card but in case of mistakes and rather than waste a card I preferred to adhere when finished.

Before I go I would like to introduce a new follower called Florence Bernier who I'm afraid I can't introduce properly because I don't have the relevant information.  If you get back to me Florence with some details, if you have a blog, I will pass the information on.

Thank you for stopping by today.  I really appreciate all your interest.

Pat  x

I would like to enter the following challenges:

Penny Black and More Challenge - Birthdays.
Simon Says Wednesday Challenge - Make Your Own Background.
Stamps and Stencils - Anything Goes.  This is a totally new challenge.