Fear the Unknown Altered Book Cover

Welcome back, I am sharing a fun altered book Cover I made for Andy Skinner Altered Book Challenge Made with tons of Creative Embellishment products and I just sat and painted and blended trying to get some relaxation in.

I made a short video of the creative flow of this project, sometimes I don’t ever know where it is going to go. But I first started out with a focal point, which was the face. I did try and find something a little creepy and dark. I love these eyes they are so mysterious.

I have a ton of old books. I love anything old, rugged and worn, I originally started with some white gesso. Once gesso was applied I stamped the background with the Distress Type stamp and the Andy’s cracked up stamp.

I noticed the red of the old ink was bleeding through so I applied a Layer of clear gesso due to the bleeding of the ink from the old cover. Then repainted with white to hopefully stop the bleed.

Using the distress checkered stencil, I add more texture to the background. On the binding of the book I stencilled the Barbed Wire stencil. This helps pull in the frame I decided to use later.

After that was all dry, I started to blend with primary blue, primary yellow and some cobalt teal. Blending until I get a bold background I like.

I added a little crackle to the face, set aside to dry and then started blending some quinnacridone gold on the background to grunge it up some. Then when the face was dried, I added a “dirty wash” to the face to highlight the cracks.

I find the banners out of my stash to add a title and pull the grunge circle frame from CE to frame the face. Using the Quinn Gold, Transparent Yellow Oxide and Burnt Umber to paint the frame.

I dry brush the banners with the rendition stencil. I touch up the white, I know they aren’t straight but I don’t mind. I will just layer them with ribbon, tape, binding, metal chains and old Norwegian paper. Them being offset with be hardly noticeable.

Once the frame is glued on and the layers are glued on, I add some paint to pull the whole over all look together and then glue the frame on. I add twine to the title and adhere them.