ACRYLIC INK TECHNIQUES

 I have a sizeable collection of acrylic inks and have done a few techniques with them, but there are so many different ways to use them so thought I'd try out a few more. These ATCs are all very different from each other which shows just how versatile a product that acrylic inks can be. My favourite thing about them is the fact they are permanent when dry so you can easily do an underpainting, let it dry, then use other acrylic inks or watercolours or acrylic markers over the top and the bottom colours won't shift.

"The roots are memory"


"Thoughts you can see"

"The wrong day"

"Nature"
(I've used some granulating medium with
the brown ink in this one, this shows up as little
speckles in the top right area of the ink on
this atc.)

"Live your dream"

"Bloom with grace"

GRANULATED WATERCOLOUR

I have done the technique before where you sprinkle either rock salt or plain table salt over wet watercolour where the salt soaks up some of the liquid to leave you with lighter areas where the salt was.  This is a variation on that theme but you mix table salt with water in a spritz bottle and spray onto the wet watercolour instead.  After reading several articles about properties of watercolours including the difference between student quality and artist quality, it became obvious that certain colours granulated more than others.  

This is another of those techniques that you need to just play with to see what works and what doesn't.  Even the ones that don't work as well as you'd like, you will still end up with a useable watercoloured background.  My ratio of mix was 1tspn salt to 6tspns of water, but you can certainly play around with those quantities to see what works for you.  Besides my atc samples below I have posted my unadorned samples so you can see the granulation better.  You can also buy granulating liquid for watercolours but I wanted to try the cheaper (and at hand!) alternative of salt and water spritz.  

"Black"...  

(this started out with a layer of gold first,

the added a layer of black over it before

spritzing with the salt spray.  The little

black & white skulls are nail art!)

"Edgy Chic"... 

(this is burgundy and black with gold over 

the top section and dripped down)

"Be quiet'...

(only one colour, pale blue)

This is the "edgy chic" before adding the rest.

Pink, Purple and Gold.

Purple and pale blue.

This is the "be quiet" pale blue before adding anything.

Love the striations and granulation in this one!

Blue, rust and a bit of black.

Blue and teal.

Olive and navy.

Green and black.