Guest Designer Spotlight: Monkey Business Cards with Sara Zoppi

Hi crafty friends, Sara here! Totally thrilled to be guesting again for Sunny Studio using one of the stamps of their latest release. And today I have two different inspirations to show you, featuring the Monkey Business stamp set. 

So, let's dive into the first card, which is almost a one layer card! When I was thinking how to use those cute little monkeys, I had the idea to create a giant banana to set up a scene, with monkeys everywhere.

I firstly hand drew the big banana (I am not soo good in drawing, but I searched on Pinterest to find some illustrations and I did my best to create it) and then I stamped all the monkeys I could fit over the scene. I had to do a small masking with the monkey on the left lower corner, because she is sleeping on the small banana. The main protagonists will be the two in the centre, as the sentiment shows. Then I colored everything using my new OLO markers, using the colors listed below:

- Bananas: YG8.6 – YG8.5 – Y0.3 – YO2.2 – Y1.1 – Y2.2 – Y2.0 – YO0.6
- Monkey faces: OR3.4 – O4.3 – O2.1 – O2.0 – O1.0
- Monkey fur combo 1: O7.8 – OR3.8 – O4.6 – OR3.4
- Monkey fur combo 2: O3.8 – O4.6 – O7.5 – OR3.4
- Shadows: W5 – W3 – W1

 
I then cut the panel to 4"x5.25" and I matted it with a slightly larger yellow lime sparkly cardstock. I also stamped the sentiment using a yellow ochre colored ink for the word "bananas". To finish off the card, I added some light olive gems here and there and I matted the whole panel with a 4,5"x5.75" white cardstock. And here's the finished result!

For my second inspiration, I went for a more "graphical" card, but I went totally out of my comfort zone.  

I wanted to create a vertical stripe with monkeys hanging on some lianas in a tropical forests. I firstly decidedhow to arrange the monkeys, I drew the lines and then I stamped the images with Memento Black ink on some white cardstock. I then colored all the monkeys using the same combos of the previous card. But then I had to color all the vegetation behind, which consists of light leaves and flowers on a dark background.

And here's my coming out of the comfort zone: I used Karin Pigment Brush Markers and some Luminance Pencils, which are perfect on dark colors. I firstly filled the whole background with Copics YG99-BG78-G99-G29 and then covered with W8, then I started drawing the leaves and the flowers with Karin (382U-Apple; 109U-Gold; 3825-LushGreen; 1575U-Peach; 397U-LimeGreen). I then added all the details and some smaller dots with coordinated Luminance pencils (181 – 821 – 061 – 015 – 001 – 240 – 255 – 571).

To complete the card, I trimmed the colored panel to a strip of 2.25" of width and I attached it on a A2 white panel. I stamped the main sentiment in vertical, following the strip, then I added the "chimply" word in a different direction, white heat embossing it on some reddish cardstock. I really love how it came out. And here's the finished result!

Thanks for stopping by! I really hope you will like my projects and you will be inspired to create something. And thanks again to Mendi for giving me the opportunity to be here!

Sunny Studio Supplies Used:

Monkey Business Stamps Shop at: Sunny Studio