Pairing the New Hummingbird Nectar Plate with Artistry’s Watercolor Tubes! | Watercolor Painting Ideas

Hi, friends! Emily Midgett here today, with some watercolor painting ideas and inspiration with the absolutely stunning press plates from Altenew: Hummingbird Nectar and Billowing Flower.

These press plates are incredible by themselves due to the intricate details that can be achieved with the letterpress technique, but pair them with watercolor, and you've got an incredibly impressive (see what I did there?) card that is both elegant and luxurious.

I paired two different press plates with the newer Artistry By Altenew Palette Perfection Watercolor Tubes to create this lovely, muted, but still colorful, card.

Let's get started with the details!

Fun Watercolor Painting Ideas with Hummingbird Nectar and Billowing Flower Press Plates

I started by arranging the bird and floral images from the Hummingbird Nectar and Billowing Flower Press Plate sets onto my Better Press's magnetic platen, creating a little garden in which my hummingbird could zip around.

I then used the black ink included with the BetterPress machine to impress the image onto some Artistry by Altenew Hot Press Watercolor Paper. This luxurious and thick 140 lb watercolor paper is perfect for use with the Better Press plates and system, even if you don't intend to watercolor. It picked up the details beautifully!

After impressing my images onto the watercolor panel, I used the Artistry By Altenew Palette Perfection Watercolor Tubes to add soft watercoloring to the images, taking full advantage of the vivid jewel tones in the Palette Perfection set to create a shimmering hummingbird and vibrant flowers.

The 5″ x 7″ size of the watercolor paper allowed me plenty of room to create my little scene without crowding the images and making it look too busy. Moreover, because I had taped the paper down with Satin Masking Tape, I was able to minimize the warping created by using lots of water to create the super subtle sky with washes of diluted blue paint.

I allowed the entire panel to dry while taped to my watercolor board, then added some sparkling accents to the wings of the hummingbird and petals on the flowers using the white shimmer pan from the Metallic Watercolor Pan Set.

After I had finished watercoloring and allowed the entire panel to dry completely, I trimmed the watercolored piece down and matted it with an ever-so-slightly larger panel of black cardstock to coordinate with the crisp black letterpress lines of the images.

Then, I matted that framed piece on a full-size A7 deep teal card front, which coordinated nicely with the teal on the hummingbird and the blue-green tones in the foliage on the flora.

I added a greeting created using the Classical Sentiments Press Plates and die cut with the Classical Sentiments Press Plates-Coordinating Die. Finally, I added a few shimmering gems for one added element of sparkle!

And that's it for my project today. I would love to try this product combination using my hot foil machine, as well — I love that the Press Plates have the option to be used for letterpress or for foiling! That would make for some more fun watercolor painting ideas in the future. :)

Thanks so much for reading, and have a marvelous day!

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