Tickinghearts' Art

SO YOU WANT TO DO PAPER CUTOUT ART

PART 3: GLUING AND FINISHING

(PART 1) (PART 2)

You have your idea, and the pieces for it all cutout and ready. Now? It is time to glue it all together.

1. So I broke out my glue and started putting the background pieces together first, layer by layer. I tend to put the entire piece under something heavy and flat with each layer to make sure the glue dries out flat. (Picture 2) (picture 3) I used one of my PVA glues for this project and the glue went straight from the nozzle to the paper for these since I am missing my microspatula. When I do have my microspatula, I tend to have a pile of glue on scrap paper to the side that I scoop up and spread thinly on the paper.
2. I went ahead and glue the foliage/frosting to the trees, and then started gluing the trees straight to the background where I want them to end up. (picture 4) When I glued them all on, I trimmed the loose edges down, and then scanned it.
3. Once scanned, I tweaked it in photoshop, adjusting the levels and saturation to get my final piece. (picture 5)
4. At the same time as the car piece, I was working on the logo that will be on the back of these cards, a little “self-portrait” head. I had a drawin, and traced off the shapes like with the trees. This tracing paper was the same one I was doing my nutcracker puppets with, so around the newer traced images where the swords I had drawn out to transfer. (picture 6)
5. I didn’t take as many pictures as I worked on this, but I transfers and cut out the pieces pretty much the same way as the card. I also cut out two versions of the scarf for this: one on the green paper, and one on the gray. Then I cut up the green scarf into strips and glued every other one onto the gray scarf. (picture 7)
6. I used gouache again for some details on this little logo, doing and outline on the hair and painting details into the ears and nose, and later on the eyes and “teeth” with my initials and the year. (picture 8)
7.  And with the final glue together, I had my logo/self portrait done! Gluing was tougher without my microspatula- putting the glue on straight from the nozzle had me over gluing instead of spreading a smaller amount of glue on, but I used tweezers and other tools to clean up glue that seeped out from underneath the layers (picture 9). Once it dried, I scanned and cleaned it up into this image. 

TLDR: Break out the glue, and piece things together one by one, let dry, and voila! NOW YOU HAVE PAPER CUTOUT ART.

I hope this tutorial was helpful for people and if you have any questions on paper cutouts, feel free to ask! My Ask Box is open.