Ethereal Slimline Card

  I've painted another slimline card for Art Impressions Watercolour Weekend, this time done horizontally, with an ethereal feel:

I am all about bright colours, so to paint something light and pastel toned, was a real change for me!  I began with the tree image from 5056 - WC Fairy Doors Set, coloured in Tombow #969 Chocolate before stamping it twice onto my Bristol Smooth Cardstock.  I used two of the doors from the stamp set, to add a fairy door to each one.  I sketched in the rest of my scene with a pencil.  With a damp #1 paintbrush, I pulled out the colour from the lines of the trees, leaving a few light, highlight areas, and concentrating the colour in the shaded areas.  I used the greenery image from 4867 - WC Foliage Set 2 and #126 Light Olive to add in the leaves, and after going over them with a damp brush to soften them, I went in a second time to add more leaves with some definition.

I thought a rainbow/sunset sky would work well, so using a lot of water as a wash - the sky was faded from # 565 Deep Blue, down to #725 Rhodamine Red, and finally #991 Light Ochre.  The mountains were painted in shades of #565, keeping the closer hills a bit darker, and the farther hills a little paler.  The hillside was done in a wash of #126, and the stream and lake are in #493 Reflex Blue - where I kept the colour a little stronger at the edges.  I used #126 on the tiny grass image from 4051 - WC Foliage Set 1, which I stamped around the tree roots, and I added flowers with the tiny dot image from 5009 - WC Mini Flower Set using #725 and #623 Purple Sage.  The doors were painted in #493 Reflex Blue and #761 Carnation with #623 on the overhang.  The doors each have a couple of stones in front of them, so I used my paintbrush to add in several more, to create more of a pathway.  To finish my scene off, I picked up #565 from my palette, and added shadows to the tree limbs, around the doors and to the stones.  

I die cut my panel with a pierced edge slimline die, and mounted it with 3D foam tape to my green cardstock base.  I also added Wink of Stella to highlight the greenery and water, so it's got a lovely shimmer across it!