Today I’m Tipping-In

What is a Tip-In you may ask? A tip-in is a page or set of pages created outside a book, to be attached into it later.

Tip-Ins aren’t something invented by altered book artists, sorry to say but they’ve been around for a long, long time. Pick up any magazine and you’ll find examples of tip-ins; they’re extra features or adverts that are attached into a magazine after it has been bound, and they’re often designed so they can easily be removed.

They’ve been adapted by art journalists and other artists to include in their art work.  Tip-Ins can be glued into the spine, hinged onto a page, Washi taped and even stapled in. 

Whatever way they are used, I love using tip-ins. They add interest and a certain element of mystery to art journal pages.

So, here are a few examples of Tip-Ins I have used in my art journaling. This background was done with Water Colour on the Gell plate and the tip in is the mop up or the ghost print.  Its been very carefully glued into the spine.

Below is an acetate tip in where I used Washi Tape on the top. I love how the different colours from the background page show through the acetate.

Below is a hinged tip-in.  One side of the hinge is glued to the page and the other side glued to the tip-in. There is journaling behind the tip in.

So the reason behind me tipping-in today, is that a while back I was trying out a technique for a future project and this left over tag has been hanging around my craft desk ever since.

I really like it and wanted to use it on an art journal.  I will tell you about the background technique in a later post, but the stamp I used is a Paper Artsy Hot Picks HP1305EZ stamp. I inked it up with Olive Green Archival Ink, then wiped most of the text away with a wet wipe then stamped and coloured the image using Ranger Markers.  I love how it looks against the streaky background.  As usual I swiped my Ground Espresso Ink pad around the edges.

So, to stray a little, when I create backgrounds using spray inks, sometimes I mop up extra left over ink onto blank pages in my art journal.  However, what happens is that I end up with two or more pages with the same colour ink, and not only that but the same stencils and if I don’t think about things the pages also follow one another, which is what happened with the two pages I used for my tip-in today.

I carefully tore one background page out of my journal, cut it to just a little bigger than the tag. I lined the two outer edges of the pages together, being careful to leave a very small gap between them and used Ranger Washi tape to attach them. I first taped the Washi Tape onto my craft mat and coloured it with Tim Holtz Mustard Seed and Picked Raspberry Distress ink using a foam applicator. It’s best to make sure that your Washi Tape is equal on both pages but I couldn't do it this time.

Okay one tip-in done [well almost] and one to go.  I lined up the tag onto the left side of the Tip-In but couldn’t use the half and half rule because the stamping was a little close to the edge. I used Ranger Washi Tape to tape the Tip-In page and the tag together . I flipped the tag open and taped the other side as well.

Now to be honest I chose a quote from the Tim Holtz Cling Rubber Stamps URBAN TAPESTRY Stampers Anonymous CMS061 set, inked it up with Black Archival Ink and stamped the Tip-In. It looked really horrible. It was too close to the left edge and then I made it worse by drawing a squiggly line around the text. More horrible!!!!!

I closed the flap and using it as a guide, drew a border on the background Tip-In using a Black Posca Pen. Applied two coats of Gesso with a palette knife and left it to dry, and then I stamped the image again. Much better, but it was a little light so I used a 0.1 Uni-Pin fine line pen to go over the text, and stamped just the word creative onto a bit of scrap, fussy cut it and glued it on.  I used a stamp from the Dylusions “Bordering on the Edge” stamp set to stamp a border with Black Archival Ink.

The back of the tag wasn’t looking very pretty so I applied Dylusions Yellow Zest, Pure Sunshine and Bubblegum paint with a wet wipe. Before it dried I used a stencil and wiped back some of the paint. I used the left over paint on the wet wipe to colour the Washi tape.

Last but not least I printed out the words” Create Art Everyday”  and stuck only the left edges onto the card, so that I would still be able to flip it open.

Looking at the Tip-In I felt that the original page in the journal also needed a border, so I stamped a border using a stamp from the Dylusions Clearly Borders stamp set. I will do something on the original background page at some stage, but for now I’m done.

Thanks for stopping by.  See you next time!

Supplies:

Paper Artsy Hot Picks HP1305EZ stamp
Olive Green and Black Archival Ink Pad
Picked Raspberry, Salty Ocean, Peeled Paint Ranger Markers
Ranger Washi Tape
Dylusions Yellow Zest, Pure Sunshine and Bubblegum paint
Wet Wipes
Tim Holtz Cling Rubber Stamps URBAN TAPESTRY Stampers Anonymous CMS061 set
Dylusions “Bordering on the Edge” stamp set
Dylusions Clearly Borders stamp set
Tim Holtz Mustard Seed and Picked Raspberry Distress ink
Ranger Foam Applicator
1 Uni-Pin fine line pen
White and Black Posca Pen