Distress Oxide Glaze Technique: Black and White

I have a friend who really likes darker, more somber colors. This is the opposite of me! I love rich, jewel tones, but I respect my friend's preferences, so every year I make her a birthday card in black and white.

This year I thought I would try to make her card using black alcohol ink, but I couldn't make it work. When thinned with additional alcohol, the black alcohol ink turns into shades of pink and blue. It's very odd. So I decided to use the Distress Oxide glaze technique instead; which usually ends up looking a little like alcohol ink to me.

You can see my post on how to do the Distress Oxide glaze technique here. For this card, I used only the Black Soot Distress Oxide. I put it on my mat and spritzed it with water and "smooshed" the glossy cardstock into the ink several times; drying in between each smoosh. I intentionally left  a little more white space on this panel that previous ones.

I die cut the glazed panel and also a piece of black cardstock with the MFT-463 Blueprints 13 stitched rectangle die to give them my favorite finished edge. I then cut both pieces at an angle, like the cards in my previous post.

Using a stamp positioner platform, I took a lovely new floral stamp that I recently acquired from Gina K Designs, 4365 "You Make Me Smile" and stamped it simultaneously onto the black and the glazed pieces of cardstock, using Versafine Onyx Black ink.

I embossed the black panel with JudiKins Opaque White embossing powder, and the glazed panel using JudiKins detail clear embossing powder. Although I have learned that inks other that StazOn do not dry properly on the glazed surface, you can emboss your stamping, and it doesn't hurt the surface.

I stamped the sentiment from Savvy Stamps at the top of the black panel, and embossed it with white embossing powder as well. I adhered both panels to a piece of Stardream Silver cardstock and used a small strip of the silver across the seam of the two pieces. I mounted the whole thing onto a card base of Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock.

I hope you like how it turned out, and even more, I hope she did! Before you go, here's a photo (sorry for the quality, it was taken with my phone) of her card from last year. It was a specially made mini masterpiece card. In real life this card turned out very pretty with some silver foil accents. You can see how the mini masterpiece cards are made here, here, and some die cut mini masterpieces here, here, and here. There are more too; just search the blog for mini masterpiece. So fun. 

Products Used (Oxide Glaze card)

Gina K Designs stamp 4365 You Make Me Smile

Savvy Stamp 1425D Best Birthday

Distress Oxide - Black Soot

Distress Glaze Medium

Versamark ink

Versafine Onyx Black ink

JudiKins Clear Detail embossing powder

JudiKins Opaque White embossing powder

Ranger Alcohol Ink cardstock

Papertrey Ink True Black cardstock

Stardream Silver cardstock

Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock

MFT-463 Blueprints 13 die

Distress Oxide Glaze Technique: Two Cards from Each Background

I love the layout I used on these cards because it actually helps stretch the beautiful backgrounds that you have made. Since these cards are cut in half diagonally, you can get two cards with each background panel. To see my post about how to make a panel using the Distress Oxide Glaze technique, please click here. After making multiple panels using this technique, I have been posting cards using them.

I made four cards using this layout and this first one was for my daughter's birthday. The top image is a really lovely stamp from Magenta's 2018 Spring catalog. I stamped it with Hero Arts White Unicorn ink onto Patertrey Ink's True Black cardstock, and colored on top of the white ink with colored pencils. 

Stamping and coloring onto black cardstock using this stamp was inspired by my friend Pam Nelson. She stamped this image onto black cardstock with Versamark ink, embossed it with white embossing powder, and colored with Copic markers. Her cards using this technique are stunning, and I hope soon you will be able to see them on the Magenta blog.

One of the things I discovered early on in working with the Distress Oxide Glazed panels is that ink doesn't dry well on the glaze sealed surface. Happily, I also found that you can put clear embossing powder over your stamping, and it doesn't seem to hurt the surface to heat emboss over it, as I did with my daughter's card.

Another thing you can do is to add a die cut sentiment to the card, and that is what I did with the card above, where I used a Savvy Stacked Happy Birthday sentiment cut from True Black cardstock from Papertrey Ink.

In each of these cards I tried to match the colors of the flowers to the colors on the Oxide panel, and I also tried out two different types of colored pencils. The two cards above are done with Prismacolors.

The card above uses another Savvy birthday die, and I used Polychromos pencils from Faber-Castell. Maybe it's because I'm so much more used to Prismacolor pencils, or maybe it's because I only have 36 colors of the Polychromos, but I have to say that I am still a fan of the Prismacolors. I found the Polychromos pencils harder to blend, although initially they go down more smoothly.

I made these cards mostly Happy Birthday cards because I have a lot of birthdays coming up that I need cards for, but this last one is a "Thinking of You" - another type of card that I like to send.

Both the black panel and glazed panel were cut out using the Die-Namics MFT-463 Blueprints 13 die, which cut them to 5.25" x 4". After coloring the black panels, I cut them and also the Distress Oxide glazed panels at an angle. I pieced them together onto a piece of colored cardstock and added a strip of the same color as the mat to cover the seam between the pieces.  After adding the sentiment to each panel, I adhered them to a base card of Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock.

I will list all of my materials, including the specific mat cardstock, Distress Oxide colors and pencils I used below. There are links to the Magenta website for any Magenta stamps used.

I will have one more card to share with you soon, using this same layout. I think you might find it surprising. After that, I promise I will have some cards using the Distress Oxide Glazed panels that have different layouts.  One of the things that some people have told me is hard for them is to use busy backgrounds like this. These backgrounds are so beautiful, and they remind me of alcohol inked panels. Stay tuned!

Products used for all the cards:

Magenta Floral Burst 14.664.P

Papertrey Ink True Black cardstock

Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock

Hero Arts Unicorn White ink

Distress Glaze Medium

Ranger Alcohol Ink cardstock

MFT-463 Die-namics Blueprints 13 die

Card #1 Happy Birthday Morgan

Additional products used:

Savvy stamp 1425D Best Birthday

Versafine Onyx Black ink

JudiKins clear detail embossing powder

Distress Oxide inks: Worn Lipstick, Picked Raspberry,

Spiced Marmalade, Wild Honey

Prismacolor Pencils: PC917 Sunburst Yellow, PC1002 Yellowed Orange, 

PC921 Pale Vermillion, PC928 Blush Pink, PC029 Pink,

PC994 Process Red, PC1005 Lime peel, PC988 Marine Green

Curious Metallics Super Gold cardstock

Card #2 Stacked Happy Birthday

Additional products used:

Magenta Floral Center 18.089.E

Savvy die #10227 Happy Birthday Stacked

Distress Oxide inks: Lucky Clover, Peacock Feathers, 

Salty Ocean, Worn Lipstick, Wilted Violet,

Squeezed Lemonade

Prismacolor Pencils: PC917 Sunburst Yellow, PC1002 Yellowed Orange, 

PC921 Pale Vermillion, PC992 Light Aqua, PC905 Aquamarine,

PC105 Cobalt Turquoise, PC1005 Lime peel, PC988 Marine Green

So Silk Glamour Green cardstock

Card #3 Script Happy Birthday

Additional products used:

Savvy die #10221 Happy Birthday

Distress Oxide inks: Wilted Violet, Picked Raspberry,

Peacock Feathers, Squeezed Lemonade, Wild Honey

Polychromos Pencils: 168 Earth Green Yellowish, 112 Leaf Green,

107 Cadmium Yellow, 184 Dark Naples Ochre, 249 Mauve, 

133 Magenta, 101 White, 110 Pthalo Blue, 153 Cobalt Turquoise

So Silk Passion Purple cardstock

Card #4 Thinking of You

Additional Products used:

Papertrey Ink die PTD1273 Thinking of You

Distress Oxide inks: Wilted Violet, Spiced Marmalade, 

Wild Honey, mermaid Lagoon, Peeled Paint

Prismacolor Pencils: PC928 Blush Pink, PC029 Pink,

PC994 Process Red, PC917 Sunburst Yellow, PC1002 Yellowed Orange, 

PC921 Pale Vermillion, PC1005 Lime peel, PC988 Marine Green

So Silk Beauty Pink cardstock

Distress Oxide Glaze Technique: Thinking of You

Still playing with the Distress Oxide Glaze technique that I show here. I'm having fun turning these panels into cards, and I will have a couple more posts after this one with some fun things I have done.

This card ended up as a thank you card for someone who has done so much for me. I can't thank her enough.

If you follow the link above, I show how these backgrounds are made. Basically you take glossy cardstock and apply Distress Oxide ink in layers, drying between each layer. At the end you apply Distress Glaze to the front, which brightens the colors and seals your work and makes it permanent.

For this card, I selected a panel on which I had used a variety of Greens and just a little yellow and orange. I die cut this panel using the Lawn Fawn Small Stitched Rectangle Stackables. The largest die in this set cuts a panel to 3.75" x 5" and gives it a nice stitched edge.

When you stamp onto a glazed piece of glossy paper, I have found that the best thing to use is StazOn ink. Nothing else I tried really dried in a reasonable time. I stamped the bottom of this panel several times with a little stamp from Rubbernecker stamps. I also drew on it just a bit to fill in.

I stamped the sentiment at the top using a Simon Says Stamp set called Thoughtful Messages, which I find myself using quite a bit.

The flower petals are from some washi tape I got at Impress Cards and Crafts. This washi is unique in that it comes off the roll in individual petals rather than a straight line of tape. When I was there, they had this in pink and orange, but I really don't know who makes it. They used it on a very cute card where they made a flower like a pansy, using 5 petals. On this card, I only used one petal for each flower, because the lines seemed too small and thin to support a large flower. I kind of think it works; I think they look more like poppies this way.

I matted the panel onto a piece of Stampin' Up Cajun Craze cardstock cut to 4" x 5.25" and then adhered it to a base card of Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock.

I added some crystal iridescent sequins, and I always like to squeeze a little bit of Stickles onto them so the holes don't show.

I hope you like it, and stay tuned, I will have some more examples to show you.

Products Used:

Distress Oxides: Twisted Citron, Squeezed Lemonade, Spiced Marmalade,

Cracked Pistachio, Lucky Clover, Peeled Paint

Ranger Alcohol Ink cardstock

Ranger Glaze medium

Rubbernecker stamp 608-02 Floral #2

Simon Says Stamp SSS101740 Thoughtful Messages

StazOn Jet Black ink

Lawn Fawn LF76f8 Small Stitched Rectangle Stackables

Petal Washi tape from Impress Cards & Crafts

Crystal Iridescent sequins

Crystal Stickles

Stampin' Up Cajun Craze cardstock

Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock

Distress Oxide Glaze Technique: Beautiful Day

I recently had fun playing with the Distress Oxide Glaze technique and made a big pile of backgrounds. To look at my how-to post on the Distress Oxide Glaze technique, click here.

Here are some closeups and Before/After glaze application

Before Glaze

After Glaze

Side by side comparison.

These are SO much fun to make!

There are so many different color combinations. I try to choose colors that will work well together and not make mud.

Over the next few days I will post a few cards that I have made using these backgrounds. Be sure to look at the Christmas ones I made too, by clicking on the link to the how/to post  at the top of this page.

Here's the first card I made, and I love it!

This card was made by taking one of the Distress Oxide Glazed panels and simply stamping with two beautiful Magenta stamps. The stamp with the bird is called Branch Overlook and is from the newest Magenta Spring 2018 release. I absolutely love it. I think you could use this stamp for lots of occasions, including Thinking of You or Sympathy. I sent this card to a friend whose husband is an ornithologist. Doesn't the background really make it pop?

I have to tell you that after experimenting with a couple of different inks (Versafine Onyx Black; Ranger Archival) I came to the conclusion that the best ink to use to stamp onto these glazed backgrounds is StazOn. Even the Archival took forever to dry; the Versafine didn't dry at all, and I had to clear emboss it. Perhaps I was just being impatient!

After stamping, I cut the panel with the largest of the Lawn Fawn LF768 Small Stitched Rectangle Stackables. This die cuts a panel to 3.75" x 5", and I use it quite a bit.

I adhered the stamped panel onto a mat of dark purple cardstock. In real life it picks up some slight purple tones in the panel. For matting, just search your stash for something that picks up a color in your piece. It should not be the predominant colors though, because it should have some contrast.

These pieces were adhered to a base card of Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock and a few iridescent clear sequins were added.

If you're interested in these Magenta stamps, or any of their beautiful stamps including their new Spring collection, you can click on the links below, or go directly to their online store here.

Products Used:

Magenta Branch Overlook 0748.O

Magenta have a Beautiful day! 07.969.F

Distress Oxides inks: Peeled Paint, Twisted Citron, 

Mermaid Lagoon, Evergreen Bough, Salty Ocean, Wilted Violet

StazOn Jet Black ink

Lawn Fawn LF768 Small Stitched Rectangle Stackables

Ranger Alcohol Ink Cardstock

Distress Glaze

Purple cardstock of unknown provenance for mat

Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock

Distress Oxide Glaze Technique: Christmas

At the Creativation show this past January, Tim Holtz introduced a really cool technique you can do with Distress Oxides. He was playing around with different substrates for Distress Oxide, and tried the inks on glossy paper, specifically the Ranger Alcohol Ink Cardstock. It seems like Tim Holtz will try anything with his products, including licking the paper (not recommended). He found that the oxidation of the inks was especially pronounced on the glossy cardstock, (that's when he licked it) and then he tried a product that's been around awhile, Distress Glaze. Distress Glaze is a pretty cool product that will seal a surface and make it permanent (such as sealing Distress inks to protect them from being activated again). It's an almost waxy substance that can be applied with a blending tool, or even with your finger.

I've had a lot of fun playing with this technique, and have made a lot of backgrounds using it. For the purposes of this post, I made two Christmas cards. Since I'm trying to make all of my Christmas cards and tags by October, these are my March cards (still late). I made two versions and couldn't decide which I liked best, so I'm doing half of one and half of the other.

While I was making the backgrounds for these cards, I took a lot of pictures to try and show you how this is done. It's pretty easy and it's fun. Since I wanted blue backgrounds for these cards, I got out all of my blues and a purple in my Oxide inks.

I also used Ranger Alcohol Ink Cardstock, although in the past I have done this technique using other glossy cardstock (including Kromecoat) and it seems to work just as well.

I worked with 3 colors at a time, putting them on my mat, spritzing with water, and also running a brush through them so they wouldn't be such square shapes when I swipe my cardstock through.

Here's the first swipe. I just laid the cardstock onto the colors and I may or may not have moved it around before picking it up.

This is what it looked like after one swipe. After placing it in the colors, then I dried it with a heat tool. I prefer to use the Ranger one for drying because it doesn't distort my cardstock as much.

I ended up using 3 pieces of glossy cardstock for this session. I didn't want to waste the color on the mat, and three seemed to use up most of what I put down each time. It doesn't really soak in to the glossy cardstock much.

I put down 3 more blues and kept swiping the panels into the ink. 

The panels continued to evolve. I dried them after each application of color.

I also spritzed them several times and splattered them with ink that I picked up with my brush.

I kept spritzing, blotting, splatting and drying in between

I also picked up a little ink and touched my brush to the paper in places, and that made nice bubbles.

It was at this point that I thought I wanted it to be a little darker blue. One of the blues I used (Blueprint Sketch?) turned a kind of purple. This is not the Wilted Violet color, as I had not used it yet at this point. I used very little of the Wilted Violet and Cracked Pistachio. The glaze will also darken these colors more.

I added some more Faded Jeans color. It's important to realize that there is no right or wrong here, and that the more layers you add the better it will look in the end. Also, the panels will look very cloudy or chalky when dry. This is how they are supposed to look at this point, but they won't end up that way!

Before adding the glaze, I usually will buff the panel a little with a paper towel. My friend Marj Marion came up with this idea, because when you apply the glaze with your blending tool, quite a bit of color comes off on your sponge. Buffing with the paper towel will take off some of that color in advance.

After buffing with the paper towel, your pieces will already look brighter and start to show some of the layers underneath.

This is what the jar of Distress Glaze looks like. Tim Holtz (being Tim Holtz) designed it so that the round blending tool fits right in. I actually store the sponge applicator that I use right inside the jar. It will eventually get very gunky and you can throw it out and replace with a clean one.

I'm just starting in on a corner here. This is when the magic really starts to happen. One tip is, be sure you like what you have on your panel before you glaze it. Once the glaze is applied, the panel is sealed and permanent.

After you apply glaze to the whole panel (it doesn't take a lot), then you can buff it again with your paper towel. 

Here are the panels before the glaze

And after

They turn so much brighter and more beautiful. It's almost like you can see every layer. (I swear that the Peacock Feathers turns almost green on these). These will turn out differently every time you make them.

Here's my second card.

For the first card, I took a panel of white Core'dinations linen textured cardstock and cut it to 5.25" x 4".  Using my mini MISTI, I lined up a Merry Christmas sentiment from the Papertrey Ink set "Keep it Simple: Christmas" and stamped with Versamark ink. I embossed it with Candy Store Chrome embossing powder.

I then positioned the Memory Box die 99765 Pinpoint Double Frame in the upper center of the panel and cut it out. I then cut the Memory Box die 99503 Fresh Pine Curved Border out of some Neenah Solar White 80# cardstock, and positioned part of the border behind the opening of the frame.

I cut a piece from the Distress Oxide glazed panels I made and positioned it behind the trees. The panel was then adhered to a piece of Malmero Pearl Blue cardstock and mounted to a base card of Neenah Solar White 110# cardstock.

My second card was made in a similar way, except instead of the Memory Box Pinpoint Double Frame die, I used the Die-namics MFT-847 Inside/Outside Stitched Rectangle (3rd from Largest) for the opening, and the Die-namics MFT-463 Blueprints 13 Stitched Rectangle for the panel itself. The stamp is Peace Border F3605 from Hero Arts.

I was having a hard time figuring out which card I liked better. The Peace one shows more of the beautiful background behind, but I think I'm leaning toward the Merry Christmas one. What do you think?

To see a great video of the Distress Oxide Glaze technique by Jennifer McGuire, click here. You can see my post about Distress Oxides in general here, or search my blog for Distress Oxide.

Products Used:

Both Cards:

Distress Oxide inks: Faded Jeans, Salty Ocean, Blueprint Sketch,

Broken China, Mermaid Lagoon Peacock Feathers,

Cracked Pistachio, Wilted Violet

Ranger Alcohol Ink cardstock

Distress Glaze

Memory Box die 99503 Fresh Pine Curved Border

Core'dinations White linen textured cardstock

Neenah Solar White 80# & 110# cardstock

Malmero Pearl Blue cardstock

Versamark ink

Candy Store Chrome embossing powder

Card #1:

Memory Box die 99765 Pinpoint Double Frame

Papertrey Ink Keep it Simple: Christmas stamp set

Card #2

Die-Namics MFT-847 Inside/Outside Stitched Rectangles

Die-Namics MFT-463 Blueprints 13 die set

Hero Arts Peace Border F3605 

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