Learning to use embossing to shade properly is vital if you want to be able to create depth in your parchment craft pictures, and is especially important for making items that are supposed to be 3D, such as flowers or animals.
Special parchment craft ball tools are the most common tools used for creating a shaded effect. They come in a range of different sizes from tiny scribers with a nib only 1/2 mm wide to huge ones 1cm in diameter.
The different sizes have different effects – the smaller the ball the more precise but scratchy the effect, while large tools are more subtle and can be blended smoothly together to create gentle shades.
HOW TO SHADE WITH A BALL TOOL
The first bit of shading you need to master is the ‘flick’, as this is how fur is created in Purely Parchment Craft patterns.
To make a ‘flick’ – press your ball tool into the parchment to make a strongly white spot, then gently flick to one side. Stretching the parchment in the desired direction.
This is a great way to make little flowers, or whiskers on kittens or flashes of light, and can of course just be used as straight forward shading if you line the flicks up so that they make a continuous whole instead of individual marks. If you combine the use of a small ball tool to make the initial flick then use a larger tool over the top you will end up with a very gently graduating flick with a long soft tail.
HOW TO MAKE SMOOTH SHADING WITH A BALL TOOL
For smooth shading you really need to be using the largest ball tool you can find as this allows you to increase the whiteness gently with no scratchy lines forming. Extra care needs to be taken when using the larger tools though, as it can be a little more difficult to keep your embossing within the tracing lines.
Create a smoothly shaded effect by very gently pressing the large or huge ball tool into the parchment and dragging it across the surface with an even pressure. By increasing the number of times you go over the same area you can slowly increase the depth of the white that is created. This is great technique to use when shading large areas or if you want to emboss material items such as ribbons.
Many of the parchment patterns incorporate both the flick technique along with the smooth shading such as the bald eagle, whose feathers are flicked and the beak is smoothed. This is why it is necessary that you become proficient in both and the only way you can do this is by PRACTICE.