Hello, I’m back on the Heffy Doodle blog today sharing this handmade card featuring one of the latest sets, You Go, Gull. My CAS (Clean and Simple) style often rotates around creating focal points in the centre of the card. Today, I’ve created a custom Copic-coloured background for my chilling gulls!

The first step was to tape a card panel to the Circle Masquerade stencil. The laser-edged notches on the stencil allow you to get a nicely-aligned circle towards the top of your card.

Next came the stamping and masking. Normally, you want to stamp out the elements that are in the foreground (closest to you) first, which in this case are the seagulls, then the wooden logs. I stamped it the other way around in this case as I wanted to make sure the logs were aligned within the circle. The gulls’ feet are relatively small so it is not noticeable in this case.

The next stage was to start building up the background. With a pencil, I used the Head in the Clouds stencil to lightly mark some clouds in the sky. I made sure to overlap them with the seagulls so the background elements aren’t isolated. Make sure your lines are really light as they will get trapped under the alcohol ink later.

To finish the background, I used the Tiny Waves stencil and some light pencil lines to add in the sea and some waves.

Next came the colouring! Background scenes like this are easy if you break them down into smaller chunks. I started with the waves, using a series of blue-green markers, starting with the darkest colour at the bottom of the waves and moving up to the lighter colours.

For the sky, I used some lighter blue-green markers, adding in some light blue and blue-violet markers for the clouds.

Then came the logs, using brighter and reddier browns to make the colours pop into the foreground. I used some cool greys for the seagulls’ feathers.

A few lines with a white gel pen adds some highlights and frothiness to the waves!

The final touch was to add a sentiment stamped from the Bold Banner Sentiment set and attach it with some foam tape under the guls.

Try out creating your own scene using the stamps and stencils!

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