How to develop an A5 landscape with Encaustic Art
Create and develop an A5 landscape with the Encaustic Art iron onto A5 Painting card. Elaborate it using the Stylus Pro with drawing tip and wire brush head. Scratch off wax colour with the cold metal scribing tool.
Steps
1) Load the top half of the iron with wax colours (set at LOW). First apply white wax as this represents the light and is most important. Use plenty of wax. Then introduce some pastel blue, pink and darker cyan blue at the top.
2) Turn the A5 card to portrait format (short edge closest to you). Put the iron down lightly at the top of the card on the same side as the hand you are using the iron with (right side for right-handed). Without much pressure slide the iron right down and off the card, keeping the flow of wax within that top half (right side) of the card. Smooth this wax gently and look for a pleasing light filled sky. Don’t press hard and don’t overwork this stage. If you have too little wax then add more.
3) With the sky done turn the card round into landscape format (long edge closest to you). Notice which part of the iron will be at the top when you are ready to work across with the curved edge. Turn the base-plate upward keeping it horizontal so that wax does not dribble off. Load it in the curved iron zone with olive green wax. Finally add a line of rust brown wax along the curved edge.
4) Hold the card at the top with your free hand and place the loaded iron onto the right end portion of the card so the curved edge just overlaps the waxed sky area. Slide the iron along the card length in a shallow U shaped movement. Make sure the top iron edge carries wax right across to the far edge of the card, sliding right off if necessary.
5) Add colours that are darker versions of those already used in the sky to the iron. Pink = red violet. Pastel blue = darker cyan blue. Add some green and brown too. Place the iron down over part of the lower green section and lift to create the foliage effect. Iron edge marks will also be created. To avoid this lift the card and use your fingers behind to allow the iron to gently bend the card as it dabs on and off. Quick on-off strokes work well but ensure the iron’s top edge does not make contact with the card. Just use the inner area of the iron to make the foliage effect, then it will look more natural. These colours will harmonise with those in the sky and create a prettier and more naturally balanced feel.
6) Grasses are made by sliding the iron’s edge up through the wax. Run that cleaned edge (clean with tissue wiping) through a block of green wax and then onto the card to create stronger coloured lines. Practise on a spare card, don’t slide sideways and steer the iron like an ice-skate cuts through the ice surface, then you will get the thinnest resulting lines. If you get thick white lives at all it is because the iron is sliding sideways as you move forward, like a snow plough. To avoid this don’t press so hard and practise steering the iron’s edge to cut a line in the direction you want to go, turning to steer gently as you slide and lifting off where the grass line needs to finish.
7) For flowers load the tip with pink and “randomly” dab that tip onto the card, tapping it firmly. And smaller versions of a similar effect give the impression of being further away if placed in the right location. So try some smaller grasses rooted a little higher up the image than the larger ones already there.
- Birds are small spots of wax, carried on the tip, dotted onto the card, then flicked left and right to create wings.
- Polishing at the end with a tissue pad to achieve the beautiful wax sheen that these encaustic art colours offer.
The stylus pro (or stylus with drawing tip) allows input of wax colour in a graphical and controlled manner. The drawing tip melts into the block to load so use the brown wax and load that tip, then begin to create the fence post lines that get closer and smaller as you move deeper into the image. If you wish then use the wire brush head for larger application areas of the big post in the foreground. Work carefully with this wire, especially when loading, to avoid excess pressure on the fragile wires.
The scribing tool is a metal scratching and scraping tool which is useful in this image to create very light sgraffito for fence wires. Work carefully and beware of wax
crumbs that have been scratched off when you get to the polishing stage. It is easy to drag and smear one right across that light filled sky and then very careful polishing is needed to remove such streaks.
The drawing tip in the stylus pro (or stylus) will allow dragonflies to be created and these add life and a decorative aspect to your images. The silver wax is great for wings and these are roughly like double-decker birds, with the angle of the wings a little upturned, like a smiling face rather than a sad one. The dragonfly bodies can be done in coloured wax and if the stroke is slightly curved it give a feeling of livelier movement than a straight line seems to do. Polish the finished card with a tissue pad.
Products used
- Encaustic Art Painting Iron (Art. 99530100)
- Encaustic Art Wax blocks
– White (Art. 99534916)
– Pastel blue (Art. 99534931)
– Pink (Art. 99534924)
– Cyan blue (Art. 99534946)
– Olive green (Art. 99534923)
– Rust brown (Art. 99534913)
– Red violet (Art. 99534912)
– Silver (Art. 99534926) - Encaustic Art A5 painting card – painting is in landscape shape format. The iron is big enough to span the top half of the card in one stroke for a smooth believable sky
- Encaustic Art Stylus Pro with drawing tip (Art. 99530605), and wire brush head (Art. 99530610)
- Encaustic Art Workplace protection paper(Art. 99537010)
- Tissues from the local grocery – large size double ply tissues are ideal
- Protection: Encaustic Art Wax Sealer (Art. 99536001) can be used to give a harder surface coating protection