Frugal Friday

COLORING ON VELLUM

What does this have to do with Frugal Friday? What could be more frugal than a free image! There are free images all over the internet. All you have to do is save them, resize them, print them on copy paper and trace them onto vellum. Look for stained glass patterns and clip art and of course sign up for the free samples from Dover. Here is a clipart site to get you started. On this post you can find a download for a free program to resize your images as well as a tutorial on how to do it.

I made this card with a free parchment craft pattern I got from the internet. You can get the pattern and directions HERE. Instead of using the floral image that came with the pattern I used part of a free image from Dover. As it is from a long time ago I have a download HERE I colored the image on the back with Prismacolor pencils.

The vellum paper I am using is from Pergamano but any cardstock weight vellum would be fine. You can get it at Papertrey Ink. The vellum you generally find at Michaels, Hobby Lobby etc is not heavy enough to take the embossing.

If you just want the soft look of coloring on vellum the lighter weight from the craft store will work. Print or stamp the image on regular printer paper and then trace it onto the vellum. To get the very fine line on the card above I use a mapping pen and white acrylic ink. You can get these in any art department.You can use a white gel pen but you will not get the fine line you get with a mapping pen. Of course you can use any color pen you want to do the tracing or you can trace with a white pencil, color on the back and then erase the pencil mark from the front.

For this card I traced the image onto vellum with a black Micron pen 005 which is a very fine line. Instead of coloring the petals I used a stylus to emboss the petals slightly from the back. The leaves and centers are colored with pencils on the front.

Sorry for the angle of this card but I wanted to show the gold outline. I traced the image with a gold gel pen, you can see the difference in the thickness of the line with a gel pen versus a mapping pen or fine Micron pen. I colored on the back side with colored pencils. You can color on the back or the front but coloring on the back gives a softer look. Both colored pencils and markers work well for coloring.

Have fun with coloring on vellum!