Kim Collister is our guest poster today, with a project that uses Marabu’s Graphix products.  Remember, Aqua Ink, Aqua Pens, and Fineliners are all on sale at 50% off.  Click here to see Aqua Inks or click here to see the Aqua Pens and Fineliners.

I am here to share with you today my disc bound journal from Joggles and the Aqua watercolor pens by Marabu. If you love to journal like I do, then I think you will find the disc bound watercolor journals as exciting as I did. I was thrilled to have the capability of popping out the pages to be able to work on them completely flat without messing up my other pages in the journal and easily being able to pop them back in the journal in any order I chose to place the pages.

If that wasn’t exciting enough, I was over the moon using the Graphic Aqua Watercolor Pens and Inks for the first time by Marabu. Watercolor can be a bit intimidating sometimes, but not here. The Marabu Aqua watercolor pens worked flawlessly. There is a flexible brush on one end with color and a contour watercolor pen for more definition on the other end. Like the pens, the watercolor inks are intense and bright and are extremely easy to spread and blend. I was instantly hooked. I have since used them on project after project and they are still preforming like a charm.

Here are some of the pages I created for the journal using Marabu Graphic Aqua Watercolor Pens and Inks. I truly have no watercolor experience to speak of, so that just tells you how easy these Graphix Aqua Watercolor Pens and Inks are to work with.

The background on both of these pages were done by adding some of the Marabu Graphix Aqua Inks on the pages, and then using a light water mister and a mini brayer to blend the colors. The butterfly is one of Joggles Art Parts on watercolor paper. I stamped the butterfly first and then added watercolor using one of the aqua watercolor pens. Then I attached it to the page using matte medium gel allowing the wings to extend a little over the page.

I worked on each of the pages separately using the aqua pens and or aqua inks and a water brush to blend and move the color around. I then set them aside to dry until all the pages were finished back and front.

I used the Aqua Pen brush end on this page and then a water brush. I used the same color on the edge with less water and then added writing with a black PITT pen when the paper was dry.

The Marabu Graphix Aqua Watercolor pens live up to their name, they are very intense and fluid. So, I decided to experiment with some of the Marabu Graphix Aqua Watercolor Inks by placing a small amount of the Sunshine Yellow ink on the watercolor paper and then using a brush to water it down and spread it out. On top of the yellow, I added a small amount of the orange ink and used a mini brayer much like you would on a Gel Press Plate. I love the distressed results I got using the brayer to layer the colors. On top of the red circles, I used a white pastel crayon.

These two pages were created using the Graphix Aqua inks on the backgrounds and then the Aqua watercolor pens to layer color, add marks and outline. The writing was also done with the black aqua watercolor pen.  The white circles and doodling were made with a white Posca Paint Pen over the color when it was dry.

I am a big fan the black aqua watercolor pen, it is very opaque like a marker and yet can be thinned down to a light gray for shading.

On this page, I added blotches of color from the watercolor pens and then sprayed my page with water and let it run. I used my heat gun lightly to dry the page and then I used the gray watercolor pen to add marks and my flower design.

On these two pages, I am just playing with the watercolor pens and applying a water brush to the initial marks, watering down the edges and spreading out the color.

Both of these pages were made using on the Graphix Aqua Watercolor Pens, Posca Paint Pen, and black PITT Pen when the pages were dry. You can see how nicely the colors blend without showing the original markings.

Here, I used the Graphix Aqua Inks on the back ground and a mini brayer, then I layered the Aqua Pens on top of it when it was dry and use the pens to draw the crosses.

For this one, I used the Aqua Pen on the background, thinning it out with a water brush. Then using the gray watercolor pen, I drew my design and made marks with the black watercolor pen. After that was dry, I dipped a paint dobber into some of the Aqua Ink and pounced it on the paper to make the splash marks.

More Graphix Aqua Inks and playing with the mini brayer for backgrounds. The inks are light fast and a dream to use.

On this page I used the Aqua Pens, both ends: the brush and pen.

Here I used the Aqua Inks with out the water brush. I put some ink on the paper, yellow first, and used the mini brayer and then added the green using the brayer. When that was dry, I used the Aqua Pens.

I was very surprised how well the Aqua Inks blended with a brayer. I used a small water mister to blend this background, but it wasn’t really necessary, it blends well without using a mister.