Dreamland Eco-dye

My friend Nancy Dawes came to visit and we played with her eco-dye papers. I LOVE the papers, I find them challenging to work with and the results are always unexpected, as if they were part of some crazy dreamland.

I pulled out some bijou cards (learn more about my Bijou Raffle lesson) to help me work on the eco-dyed paper, this is the line-up:

The first thing I did was to apply some watercolors over the eco-dyed paper, you can see my Peerless watercolors next to the work in progress. Then, Nancy showed me how to create a Celtic knot using a template that she created, very fun. I love how the knot was drawn behind the main features of the paper.

Next, I used the prompts I pulled out and added some line-art, tangling with a brown Micro Sakura pen. I tend to tangle around the shapes and leaves, I feel like I don't want to cover them too much, love the texture that the leaves bring to the piece.

Next, I applied shading with the watercolors, and added more tangling with a 05 white gel pen. This is when things got a little dreamy, I felt like the picture was taking a life of its own.

I think it was really lucky that the prompts called for Surface Texture and microtangling, which encouraged me to add more tiny details and texture everywhere with some lighter colored fine-liners (Arteza and Stabilo). I simply love the final picture, it looks like some underwater dreamland.

Here is another picture including the materials:

Here is one more picture with the prompts:

And finally, here's a picture with all the information for you pin or share:

If you would like to learn how to create watercolor shading over ecodyed papers, then send me an email and vote for a lesson here.

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