Tuesday, April 22, 2014

British Royals ATCs

I know next to nothing about British royalty, and pretty much don’t care—except that some very distant relative with the surname Edkins was the official gun-maker to the king—a fact that has no bearing on my ATC-making whatsoever.

One thing I did know was that I didn’t want to get all sentimental, with photos of Princess Diana and images of a candle in the wind. I didn’t want images of the newest royal baby either. I opted to research British royalty, and selected the oddest and most interesting faces. I explored King Edward III; King Edward II; Queen Alexandra, Princess of Wales; Margaret Tudor; Mary Stuart; Queen Elizabeth; King Henry II, King Henry VIII; King John and the homeliest image available of Queen Victoria.
On some, I manipulated the images in Photoshop®, trying different filters and colors. I printed everything out on cardstock, then cut, pasted and puttered with arranging them on my ATC blanks. I fell back on some old favorite techniques: using my white over-stamped painted backgrounds, adding my favorite sheer lace, embellishing with gold dimensional paint dots, and edging with liquid chalk stamp pads.

There were a couple of favorite images that I really liked and made extras on—King Edward III with a gold crown on the background of roses and music, and the pretty Queen Alexandra, Princess of Wales.