Focus on Focals and Embellishments

I find that often I'd rather put a card together than stop to create a focal for it, so sometimes it's nice to create focals (and embellishments) ahead of time.  That's what this post is showcasing.  Most of these were created using dies from Elizabeth Crafts - many of which allow for different positions of these characters which can be fun.  When it was not an Elizabeth Craft die that was used, I'll add that information.

#1 (above): Panda - One of the things I find is that little pieces, like the tongue and pupils of the eyes here, are best die cut from white and then simply colored with markers or ink.  This allowed me to leave a little speck of white uncolored in the dark pupil which makes his eyes sparkle.

#2:

Koala - Isn't he cute?  As you can see, this one is laying on a branch while the one below is climbing a tree.  A hint of ink around the edges helps give some definition. 

#3:

Elephant - This was designed as a tuskless beast, but I used the tail die and cut two pieces out of white - turning the one over isn't ideal, but worked okay - especially since it's partly hidden by the trunk.  Just a note, if you are cutting four legs to make the view above, you need to make sure you are cutting four that all face forward!  This was single-sided paper, so there was no chance of trying to turn them over to show the back side for some of them!  It's really hard to see the shading in this picture, but in real life, this elephant looks cute.

Here I again used the tail die to cut tusks, but this time just one set of feet - facing two different ways worked just fine.  The hammered silver paper didn't allow for much in the way of shading with ink around the edges - I even tried using StazOn, but it didn't work well.  I did get the pink shaded, though that's hard to see in the picture.