Lavinia Stamps - Northern Lights Sky - Step by Step photo tutorial

I have had a fabulous response to my "Northern Lights" card using Lavinia Stamps, with some asking for a step by step guide.  I am no photographer, but have made a duplicate card this evening with a photo step by step, so hope to show how to create the colourful skyscape.

These are the products that I used to create the card.

I started by using a blending tool and Distress Oxides.  The first shade I used was Spiced Marmalade, then Crushed Olive, Picked Raspberry and Peacock Feathers.  Finally, I used Wilted Violet to colour in the remaining areas.

I then added Chipped Sapphire over some of the Wilted Violet area.  I popped a mask of torn card to create the landscape just below the colours and dragged the Black Soot Distress Oxide downwards from the mask, which in turn creates the landscape.

I folded a piece of kitchen roll into four and dampened the inner corner (you could also use an ear bud or a sheet of wet wipe to do the same), and lifted some of the colour by lightly dragging the damp corner across the sky.  This makes the colours in the sky appear more vibrant.

I lay a sheet of copy paper over the land area of the card and using a fan shaped paint brush, dipped into water, splattered droplets on to the sky area.  I then blotted with a piece of kitchen paper.  This produces a bleached effect where the water has been, leaving lighter spots which mimic stars.

At this stage, I moved onto stamping.  When I stamp, I use a Misti platform, other makes work just as well.  This allows you to re-stamp in the exact same position, which is quite hard to do if just using a normal stamp block.

Using Lavinia Stamps "Spring Trees" and "Star Gazing" I used two shades of Versafine Clair ink.  Morning Mist for more distant stamping and Nocturne for closer stamping.  

I then added some Distress Oxide in the shade of "Chipped Sapphire" around the edge of the card and also between some of the colours in the sky (use the edge of the blending tool between the colours as you don't need a solid area of colour).  This seems to make the colours pop more.

Now it's time to create the landscape around the stamped images.  Again I used a mask of torn card and Distress Oxide ink in the shade of Black Soot.  For the landscape right at the front, I used Versafine Clair "Nocturne" ink.

I then stamped the Lavinia Stamps "Mini Slender Mushrooms", again in Versafine Clair, Nocturne.

Finally, using a white Posca pen, I added some stars to the sky and some highlighted areas to the mushrooms.

I hope this has helped you to attempt a similar sky.  Any questions, just leave a message in the comments.  Sam x