Background stamps: part 2

 So I'm enjoying a beautiful cabin porch view in the mountains...ahh!

OK--back to my overly long posting about background stamps.

The background stamp that was my next stamp set to use this summer (going in roughly alphabetical order) was Birch by Stampin' Up!

I did not grow up around birch trees, and I've rarely actually seen them. I've always loved them, though! When I saw the stamp, I of course ended up buying it.

When I sat down to use it, though...

I considered birch trees to have black areas poking through behind the white bark, so I stamped it in several shades of black & gray.

Birch stamp/supplies

I mentioned yesterday that I'd always had trouble stamping background stamps, because I didn't get enough coverage. What was a game-changer for me was to use something with a little "give" under the paper I want to stamp.

This photo shows the stamp case, the actual set itself, and the 3 different images I made--with the ink pads I knew. 

After stamping them, I just didn't know what to do with those backgrounds. Most birch tree images show several birch trees, so it's easy to add wildlife that would be of an appropriate size. This stamp, though, is like a close-up of a single tree's bark. What to do?

Well, when in doubt, looks for ideas! I did an image search for the stamp name and company. I also added background to the search (like this: birch background stampin up). 

I saw a variety of ideas--and found some amazing ones where the stamper had used brown ink. One with brown ink made it seem like brown dirt appearing under snow--they had positioned a deer just right to emphasize this.

I ended up with more images:

Birch stamp by Stampin Up! using different inks

The 2 at the top were done with different brown inks.

I also saw that some stampers seemed to just ignore that it was a part of a tree, and they just used it as an interesting natural background. I even saw one stamped with blue ink!

So think outside the box when you get stumped for ideas. Check online for others' interpretations as a jumping-off point for yourself. It's the stampers' code of CASE (Copy And Share Everything)--just no copying others' artwork to make your own stamps, of course--that's illegal. 

Next time I'll share the card I ended up making with one of the images. The others I'm saving for future use. 

Hope your day is going well!