At the Beach Canvas

Hi everyone!  Leigh Ann here today for Gypsy Soul Laser Cuts with a tutorial for a beach theme canvas.  My family recently took a trip to Myrtle Beach, SC so I used several shells I found, and a little sand from the beach in this project.

 I started by giving my canvas a coat of gesso to prime it, and then adhered my distressed pieces of paper to the canvas with soft matte gel.

Once the gel dried I whitewashed the canvas, my die cut wood pieces, and the net with gesso.

While the gesso dried I covered the pieces from the beach shape set with pumice stone effect paste.  I would suggest priming them with gesso first, but they turned out fine without it.  It just made them soft and harder to work with while the paste was drying. 

Once the canvas was dry, I used my Life Changing Brush to apply Chipped Sapphire Oxide to the sides and the edges of the front of the canvas.  

After applying the ink, I went back over it with more white gesso to blend the oxide ink more and give it a weathered look.

I then used a stencil to apply Light and Fluffy modeling paste to three sections of the canvas.  I also used a pallet knife to apply the modeling paste to the edges of the canvas.

While the canvas dried I embossed these pieces from the Acorn Border set with an Earth tone powder and a gold metallic powder.  The two smaller pieces are from the long border piece cut in half.

I embossed the largest piece from the seahorse set with the earth tone powder as well. 

Next I assembled all of the main pieces.  I like to keep my chipboard trash and use it to give pieces dimension in my mixed media projects.  I have plain chipboard glued under the wood planks, the large shell, and the seahorse to lift them off of the canvas.

Then I added some smaller shells and embellishments as well as art stones and glass glitter.

I gave the finished canvas some whitewashing with gesso and then used antique gold and copper waxes by Prima to highlight the embellishments. 

Thanks for stopping by!  I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial.  I used the following sets from Gypsy Soul Laser Cuts to create this piece:

Acorn Border Set

Sea Horse Shape Set

Beach Shape Set