Backgrounds for a future journal

On and off for a while now I have been prepping an XL Moleskine Cahier with blank paper to become one of my future journals. I only work in it very sporadically so it may yet be a while before it gets used, but it's nice to have a book where the biggest thing you have to do is just make it ready for use, instead of working on a finished product or drawing or something.

Here are some of the spreads in this journal that I have prepped so far.

All the pages were first painted with gesso to get them a little sturdier, since the paper in the Moleskine cahiers is ... um... not all that great. After the gesso I used cheap pan gouache to add some colour. The technique is quite simple: just add wet paint in diffferent strokes and colours, close the pages so they print on each other, open them again and presto! If you want to know more about this technique (and others) I have several tutorials in my tutorial section on preparing journals and/or backgrounds, so you can take a look over there.

Now I don't always prep my journals, but I do like variety in my journals and it's nice to have some colour to work on sometimes and know that there will be book ready when inspiration strikes.


The preparation for this one isn't finished yet (I'm about halfway) and I have no idea when I will put this book to use, but that's okay, sooner or later it will get its turn.That's pretty much how I work with everything, I like to have options. ;-)

As soon as this journal is put to actual use as a journal I will of course share some of its finished spreads with you. Until then I wish you a wonderful and artsy day!