Shrinking Ian tutorial

I love the Ian and Anya stamps from The Greeting Farm. They are just too cute and it doesn't hurt that my son's name is Ian. When I saw skater Ian I immediately thought of the sweeping platforms used in competitions. I wanted to make a card based on this theme but Ian was so big I would have had to make a 3 foot card. So I shrunk him! This is my very first tutorial on my very new blog. Please let me know if this was helpful. Thanks for visiting!

Supplies

Shrink plastic

Prismacolor pencils (not watercolor)

Permanent Ink (I like Stazon)

Stamps of your choice but big enough so that they don't disappear once shrunk

Eraser

I got my shrink plastic from Darcie's Country Folk. It is made for inkjet printers but works fine. It is ready to use - no sanding necessary. If you have some that is shiny you will have to sand it with a fine grit sandpaper in order for the coloring to really cling to the image. I like using the pencils to color my images especially because you can erase mistakes (not that I make them LOL) but permanent markers also work fine.

Stamp your image carefully on the shrink plastic. Try for a steady hand since the plastic is a little slick.

I use the prismas with their blending pencil. I usually use oderless mineral spirits when using these pencils to color stamps on paper but you don't want to catch your house on fire. I have found that the blending pencil works really well on the shrink plastic.

Working in circular motions I colored the outer portion of the hat. I also added some shading on top of that with a darker color at the very edges. When using the blender pencil, I found that this method works better than doing the layers separately.
Again, working in a circular motion, I pulled the color into the center of the hat rim. The nice thing about shrinking your image is that you don't have to be too careful in your coloring technique. When the image shrinks it hides alot of flaws. Also the color deepens quite a bit so take that into consideration when making color choices.

As I mentioned, it is very easy to erase. When coloring, I went over the lines of the hat, so I simply erased what I didn't want.

Time to cut that cutie pie out!

Into the toaster oven he goes. Follow the manufacturers instructions for shrinking your image. I like using a toaster oven (designated for crafts only - no food allowed) but you can use a heat gun or regular oven.

And there you have mini-me Ian. Could he be any more cute?


I finished him off with a coat of glossy varnish and he is ready to roll!





I made this into a roller card so that Ian could skate his little heart out.


Ian was so tiny I couldn't use the penny method for making the roller card so I devised a different method. I'll show you how I did it next time.