Harvey's Helpful Hints
February 2008
Keep your mind open and learn from other people and the world around you. Push yourself to learn new ideas and techniques. Try to do a project in 30 minutes several times a week.
Flourish letters at the beginning and end of text, but NOT Roman, Foundational or Carolingian hands...it just doesn't work!
Attach colored adhesive dots on clear plastic tools to make them easier to find in your tool drawer.
You can reconstitute dry felt pens easily. There usually is a cap on top of the barrel which is removable. Use an eyedropper or syringe filled with ink into the open barrel. Let it sit awhile so that the “felt” inside the barrel can absorb the ink.
Pelikan Blue-Black 4001 ink is legal document ink. In time it will turn black and is permanent. It can be dipped or used in fountain pens – just a good all purpose ink.
If you are stuck on an approach to a piece here are 7 potential answers:
- Embossing or debossing
- Resist with masking fluid
- Color blending (blending colors within words or letters)
- Gilding
- Double or multiple stroke letters
- White or light writing working on dark backgrounds
- Colored pencil work
To get a truer color picture to your work have an incandescent “daylight” light bulb shining on your work area. Fluorescent bulbs have a tendency to produce greenish casts and some incandescent bulbs have an “orange” cast.
Have some of your rubber stamps gotten hard? Try smearing on Paul Mitchell's Super-charged Conditioner Super Moisturizer for hair on the rubber stamp. Let this sit overnight...you'll find the rubber to be soft and pliable again.
A couple quotes from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet:
Good night, good night!
Parting is such sweet sorrow,
That I shall say good night/ 'til it be morrow.
My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite.
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