Watercolor Journey #2: Zig Clean Color Markers

Hello! Here is post number two of my watercolor journey. On this post I will be covering one of my very favorite watercoloring mediums: the Zig Clean Color Markers! I got these markers as a Christmas gift last year from my very sweet mother-in-law (thanks Lori!). She was very generous and got me the set that came with 80 markers and as you can imagen, I was over the moon!

The first thing I did with the Zig Clean Color Markers was create a color chart. This allowed me to see the true color of each marker and how they react with water. Color charts are a very helpful reference that allows you to see and pick the colors that you want for your projects quickly; instead of trying out each color on a piece of paper until you find the one you are looking for (I mean I had 80 markers, this was a must!). See my Color Chart below:

Now on to the markers. These markers are FANTASTIC! They have a real brush tip and the colors are so vibrant even after water is applied. They also layer very nicely on top of each other. I like that these come in so many colors and I can easily take a few of the markers along with a water pen and take my coloring projects on the road!

For my watercoloring project with the Zig Clean Color Markers, I decided I wanted to white heat embossed my floral image. The embossing resists the watercolor ink and stops the color from going outside the lines. If you have never watercolor before or are new to it, I recommend heat embossing your images first! It provides you with more control as to where your color will go.

To color my project, I took the following steps:

• Stamped the large floral image from the Simon Says Stamps “Floral Bliss” clear Stamp set using VersaMark ink.
• White heat embossed the image using WOW! embossing powder Opaque Bright White Super Fine.
• Colored the image using the Zig Clean Color markers and a water pen. Colors used: #31, #30, #51, #33, #70, #68, #53, and #41

To turn my watercolor project into a card, I used items that came in the Simon Says Stamps June 2017 Blissful kit: the “Thank You” sentiment, one of the pattern papers, and the Black color cardstock. Below is the final card:

I absolutely love how this card turned out! My favorite part of the card is the orange and blue color pairings and the overall design.

My last bit of advice to you on this post is to just play with your color mediums. Create color charts or do different coloring exercises to get you used to the medium, see what you like (or don’t like) about them! The best way to learn how various medium work is to use them and get your hands dirty (or inky 🤣).

Have a great day (or night)!

Thanks,

Yami