And as personal referrals are the best I thought I would do a little share with you of some of my current favourite art and craft products. I last did a Favourite Products share back in January in time for all the trade shows and you can hop on over to that blog post, 'My Favorite Art And Craft Products Before Creativation, Creativeworld And Stitches Really Get Going' if you missed it.
So what have I been working with since my last fave products run down?
Shall we start with some colour?
[There are some affiliate links in this blog post, so if you buy through them I do get a small amount of money at no extra cost to yourself. Thanks for your support!]
1. PaperMate Flair Felt Tip Pens
I am pretty smitten with the PaperMate Flair pens at the moment, I can not stop using them. The colours are bright and yummy and they are a waterbased, acid-free ink that drys quickly.
The bumf says they are designed not to bleed through paper but really it depends what paper you are using and how often you go over the same spot but they are doing pretty well in the Seawhite sketchbooks I talked about in my last favourite product blog post.
I've linked to them on Amazon for if you are looking for an online supplier but do shop around as I have seen these pens on sale and actually got my set in a discount bin in a Staples store, so it is worth checking those bins!
Go checkout my Instagram feed if you want to see these pens in action!
2. Bristol Board
If we are going to talk pens then it seems only natural to talk paper next. Paper does feature heavily in my favourite products lists as I use and have tried an awful lot of it. Last time I shared some of my favourite sketchbooks and watercolour papers. This time I'm going more towards the illustrative and drawing end of the paper spectrum with Bristol Board..
Bristol Board tends to be a heavier weight, super-smooth, crisp white paper and is perfect for precise pen work as the surface is so smooth the pen glides over it and won't snag on the texture. Someone who knows more about these things than me can correct me if I am wrong but as far as I know you can find Bristol board in different paper weights, I have two such pictured above one at 190gsm and the other at 250gsm.
But if you are in the US then you can also find it with different surfaces - Smooth and Vellum, which has more texture. For the work I have been doing recently, that needs precise clean lines, the smooth version is the one I am recommending today.
Bristol board is also great for stamping and colouring on but as it is quite expensive I generally use cheaper smooth paper for stamping and colouring.
3. StencilGirl Stencils
The next group of products on my list are the StencilGirl Stencils. I've been having lots of fun with these as you might have seen in my Art Slice Video a couple of weeks back and in the project video I made for the PaperArtsy/ StencilGirl blog hop in December last year. They are back on my desk at the moment and I've been using them for a whole range of different projects, one you will see first on my YouTube channel at 1pm today, don't forget to subscribe, or later on my Instagram feed *wink!
What I particularly like about the StencilGirl stencils is the sizes. So you can get some gorgeous large and small stencils but you can get some pretty awesome very large stencils and I love the 9" x 12" sizes which is just a little bit bigger than A4 size.
4. Synthetic Gel Monoprinting Plates
As we are talking about stencils one fun thing to do with stencils is to use them with Gelli plates. Now I held out a long, long time before I bought one of the synthetic gel monoprinting plates that hit the market a few years back. I used my own homemade Gelatine plates, and I still do as there are techniques I can do with a gelatine plate that just work better than with the synthetic plates and vice versa actually. But boy are the Gelli plates super-convenient! They really are great for a quick, no fuss, print session.
There are a few different ones on the market now since Gelli Arts bought out the Gelli plate. There is the Gel Press, from Gel Press and SpeedBall also has a gel plate now too. I've only used the Gelli Arts Gelli plate so if you have used the others I would love to know how they compare so do tell!
If you are still not sure if you want to invest in them then do go check out my blog post 'Monoprinting - Old School Style' on the home made version, there is the recipe and instructions on how to make it there.
5. PaperArtsy Eclectica³ {Kim Dellow} Stamps And Stencils
And I can't really do a favourite product list without shamelessly plugging the new stamp and stencil release I designed for PaperArtsy now can I? I mean it is true I have been using these products a lot since I last listed favorite products, so I could not really leave them off the list!
If you missed the release then you can catch up with it, plus a list of where to get them from, over on my release blog post from February.
So your turn - what are your current favourite art and craft products? What is getting you all excited and creative at the moment?
Kim
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Great in-depth write up Kim. Love stencils of course , they always feature somewhere in my work so loved to see these. The pens look very interesting and I love the colours. Thanks for taking the time to do the blog post. Tracy x
ReplyDeleteThanks Tracy :) Stencils are always on our list aren't they ;) How about the Distress Oxides? Are they on your fave list at the moment?
DeleteHi Jennifer, Fab product list! You know you aren't the only one who has a hit and miss relationship with stamps LOL! I'm a big fan of positioning tools where I can re-stamp easily if the first impression didn't quite work out! :D
ReplyDelete