Festive Southwest Using Alcohol Markers

One of the things I miss the most about the 2 years we lived in New Mexico is the fall roasting and drying of peppers.  When you Mexican food in New Mexico, they traditionally ask you, "red or green?" to find out what sauce you prefer. If you're like me and you like both, you reply, "Christmas, please." So this card lets me commemorate my favorite season nad the current holiday. 

This card was created using some fun My Heart Stamps For You Southwest Stamps.  The images were all stamped using Memento Tuxedo Black ink on Neenah Classic Crest Solar White cardstock.  The images were colored using Marvy Le Plume Permanent alcohol markers, but Copic Markers can be used to achieve a similar effect.

I stamped a crackle image on the cardstock and then stamped the boot in Memento ink on top.  The crackle isn't that noticable in the end, but does add a touch of texture.  I'd consider it optional.

I added base color using OR827.  All the colors I use on the boot, except the green and yellow, used in later steps, come fomr our Skintones Blending Set.

For my first step in shading, I look for areas that would receive natural shadows and color a line of dark brown OY848 in those areas and to the boot sole and heel.

 Next I blend the shade color with the original base color OR827.  I use a touch of the blending pen to lighten the base color on the toe and top of the boot.  I then added some green G653 to the cactus, yellow Y622 to the sun, warm gray to the buckle and spur and dark brown OY848 for the leather strap.

It was almost what I wanted, but I wanted a little more blending on the leather and slightly more muted colors on the cactus or sun, so I used a tan color to add a few more highlights and blending and tone down the bright colors.

Finally, glued the boot to some chipboard and cut it out and edged the peice with the base color.  I applied a thin layer of glossy accents just so it had a slightly different sheen to it than the rest of the card.

After stamping the image with Memento Ink I colored some tips of the peppers green G653.  Red chilies always start green and redden more as they dry in the sun.  Until they're completely dried, they always show some pretty areas of green.  It always looks very festive to me.

The reds I used are from the Tomoto red blending set.  I colored all the peppers with the lightest color in the set R812 and then add some R815 to the shaded areas of the peppers.  I could have probably skipped right to using R815 as the base.  You'll see in further steps I keep darkening the peppers and then go back to add the highlights with the blender pen white opaque pen.

I added some of the R817 to the darkest areas of the peppers, not yet worrying about blending.

By going back over all the areas of the peppers with the R815 except the green and lightest areas, the red gets blended smoothly with the.

After adding a little more dark red in the shadows and then removing color from the highlighted areas with the blender pen I finish it by adding a few dots and lines of opaque white.  The shinier the surface the more stark white the highlights will show up in sunlight, so the white helps create a shiny texture.  After all the coloring, I added some color using ink on a sponge.  The background was colored with less detail but using similar colors.