How to make gelli print with art anthology by kathy adams

If you haven't tried the Gelli Arts Printing Plate, you are missing out! They come in many sizes, but for this project, I used the 8"x10" plate. Grab a brayer and a stack of paper and lets go!

I thought I should show you what I made with all of the prints I made: Journals that are 5" x 7" and embellished with things I already had. This project has lots of steps, so go get a cup o' coffee!

Remove the protective plastic from the Gelli Plate and place on a flat surface. Place dollops of paint onto the surface. I used 3 colors. Less paint is better, especially when working in layers.

Spread out the paint on the Plate using a brayer. The three colors that I used are Tango, Buttercream and Mayan Gold. I keep scrap paper nearby to clean the paint off of the brayer.

I like to use two brayers; one to spread the paint and a clean one to smooth the paper onto the plate to make sure the paint makes contact with the paper.

Carefully pull the paper off of the Plate. The paper should stick slightly. This is the first layer.

Next, place small dollops of Truffle and Kenyan Copper onto the plate and smooth out with the brayer. It is not necessary to clean the plate off in between layers as long as the colors are similar.

Place the Chasing Butterflies, and Take Flight stencils down onto the plate.

Take the print you just made and place it carefully down onto the plate, taking care not to move it around. Use the brayer to smooth the paper down and ensure even contact.

My favorite part is "pulling the print". It's a surprise every time and very addictive! This one turned out beautiful! Just 60 more to go!

Remove the stencils from the plate and place another paper onto the Plate. This is called the "ghost print", or the second print. Sometimes I like the second print better than the first.

For the next print, I cleaned off the Plate with a baby wipe and added Ferrari and Mayan Gold. I placed the triangle and circle stencils down onto the plate and then removed them.

The stencils removed the paint from the plate to create a pattern. Do this if you want overall color and subtle pattern.

Surprise! I love the subtle pattern and color in this print.

Rubber stamps are perfect to use on the Gelli Plate. For the next print I used a large medalion stamp and the Doily stencil.

I like when a print has some white space with no paint, especially if I am using the prints for journals.

For the next print, I used a large background stamp and repeated it, turning it 45 degrees to add interest to the print.

There are no rules. Experiment and find out what you like.

This large stamp is perfect to use on the Gelli Plate. This time I mixed three different colors and stamped into the plate in the same direction, but altering the height of the flowers.

These colors together are magic! Sunshine, Mi Bella, and Tango.

When using similar colors, brayer the remaining paint on the Plate to remove the previous pattern instead of cleaning it. This time I wanted to see how Minx Inks worked on the plate.

I added Coral and Sunshine and rolled it out. Then I added a few drops of Indulgence (orange) and rolled that out.

I pressed a large butterfly stamp into the Plate, repeating the pattern a few times.

I also pressed a stencil randomly around the butterfly pattern to add interest to the print.

As you can see, adding the Minx Inks resulted in a much wetter print and the pattern does not show up as well. I wasn't crazy about the results, but stay tuned for how I used the Minx later.

I found this chipboard piece that I thought would be fun to use. I spread Ferrari and Drab Sorbets on the plate then placed the chipboard on top.

Then placed some smaller stencil circles on top of the chipboard and pressed them against the plate by rolling the brayer over the whole thing. Remove the stencils but leave the chipboard.

The result was interesting but lacking something.

So I added some Allure Minx Ink to the circles and found that the Sorbet acts as a resist. Yes! I want to do more of this!

So I played with this technique some more. This time I placed the twilight stencil down over Lemon Tart Velvet and Vegas Gold Sorbet and removed the paint from the stars using a baby wipe.

I placed the stencil on the other side of the plate and left it in place when I printed the paper.

For this technique, I used a thicker, better quality paper made for mixed media art. The cheaper card stock does not hold up to very wet media. Let this print dry before the next step.

Spray the print generously with water.

Drop Panache and Stargazer Minx Inks on the print and brush it around.

Remove excess with paper towel, dry with heat gun, or allow to air dry. The paint acts as a resist and the Minx Inks stain the unpainted paper, resulting in a beautiful, subtle background color.

I repeated the technique using gesso, the Chasing Butterflies stencil, and Panache, Enchanting, and Stargazer Minx Inks.

For the next technique, I used the Catalyst tool to make lines in Ferrari paint.

Then I pressed this plastic clock sticker into the lined pattern on the plate. Look around your house for different things to use on the Gelli Plate. Bubble wrap, string, combs, leaves, lids.....

The lines I created with the Catalyst tool will be great for journaling.

The next technique will blow your mind. Take a canvas panel similar to the size of your Gelli Plate. Since I have the 8" x 10" Plate, I used a 9"x by 12" canvas panel.

Take a stencil that will fit on top of the panel ( I used a 12x12 size stencil that I had in my stash) and add a thick layer of Mud to the canvas panel through the stencil. Let dry completely.

Use the panel to make a pattern on the Gelli Plate. Did I blow your mind?! Imagine the possibilities!

Look at how cool this print is! I have to tell you that when I get out my Gelli Plate, I have to have a large block of time. It is so addictive!

There are an infinite number of techniques, I could go on and on. But I will show you one more. Rubbing plates can be purchased at art supply stores and are perfect with Gelli Plate printing.

Just lay down paint, press the rubbing plate into the Gelli Plate to create the pattern and print. Rubbing plates come in lots of different patterns.

I continued to make prints using all of the techniques I shared with you until I had a whole stack of painted card stock.

I even sprayed some Colorations spray onto the Plate. This is my favorite new color, Siesta Key.

Isn't it a beautiful color!

In the end, the best results are using stencils, rubber stamps, rubbing plates and Velvet and Sorbet paints. The Minx and Colorations sprays are better for embellishing finished prints.

And layering the prints makes for interesting results.

Varying the size and shape of the patterns bring the best results when layering prints.

I trimmed each print down to 10" x 7" and folded them in half. I layered the prints according to color and pattern, six prints per journal, resulting in 12 pages each when folded in half.

For the covers, I used the marbling technique that I demonstrated in my last blog post when I created the Happy New Year sign. I used mixed media paper, which is more sturdy.

I gathered die-cuts, tags, ribbon, stamps and chipboard embellishments and went to work sewing, glueing, stamping and individualizing each journal. I used my sewing machine to bind the pages.

I used some of the prints that I didn't like to die-cut circles and tags and glued or sewed them into the books. Each journal is totally different.

With all of my Gelli prints, I made 8 journals, each one a different color scheme.

Here are the blue, orange and red journals. A few of them have the leftover prints that didn't have a place in the colored journals. They are just as pretty!

This one has neutral black, white and gray with some aqua for contrast. I love how whimsical the cover turned out.

This one is cool colors; blues, greens, and some yellow thrown in to brighten it up. It was fun using up old supplies that I hoarded!

My favorite color scheme: Blue, turquoise and red.

Purple, pink, red, and blue with black for contrast.

This was a long project, but it was so much fun to customize every journal. On the back, I placed a "handmade" stamp and signed and dated each one. Hope you enjoyed this long tutorial!