Product Review: Masking Fluid Pen

One of the new products that Artistcellar added to the shelves is the Fineline Masking Fluid Pen. Even though it's a bottle, it's called a pen because it has a very fine (20 gauge) wire tip, so it's pretty easy to "write" with it. And to prevent it from clogging, it has a pretty cool cap, with a needle that fits in the hollow wire tip, screw it on, and you're good. (Make sure you have your reading glasses handy though! LOL)

I saw a similar project like this on Pinterest and thought I'd try making one. I did this in my Strathmore Visual Journal. This is the completed page.

First thing you do is just write what you want to say on the blank page. I didn't gesso it or prepare it any way, just the naked paper.

It takes a little practice to squeeze and write at the same time. Have a scrap paper or tissue ready for any blobs that may appear at the tip. But... if you do make a mistake (or a mess) just wait a minute for it to dry, and rub off with your finger, and have another go at it! Easy Peasy. After I was satisfied with my writing, I let it sit and cry for about an hour. Then I got out the Distress Stains and Twinkling H2O's. You can also use Dylusions Sprays or Dye-Na-Flow. Get your soft watercolor brush nice and juicy and just start painting over everything. For this one, I used Distress Stains with a few splooshes of Twinkling H2O's to give it some sparkle. After the paint was dry, I splattered some black india ink over the whole thing.

I would suggest letting it air dry for a few hours at least. I did try using a heat gun, but it started shooting sparks and blew up. But then I wasn't sure if the heat gun would have softened the masking fluid or made it harder to remove. Once your page is thoroughly dry, take your finger and rub off the masking fluid to reveal the nice bright lettering. It's like magic :-)

Here are a few others I did. This one I used Dylusions Sprays in my spray box.

It was nice and wet and the ink pooled around the masking fluid and ran through the letters.

The next one I did was using only Twinkling H2O's. When it was really wet, I let it drip a bit to the bottom. It's nice and shimmery in real life, hard to capture on camera.

Since I made three of these, I'm going to give one away to someone who comments on this post. The one in my journal you can't have, but I will give one lucky winner the choice of the Twinks one or the BeYOUtiful one. I'll use a random number generator and pick one winner out of all the comments. Because this is a new blog, your chances might be pretty good! So tell me what you think about this project and what word or saying you would want to use in a page. I'll pick next week... let's say Wednesday.

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