I've always loved books and those long binge-reading sessions where you disappear into an entirely different world for hours on end. I've also been very passionate about art, and have loved to paint scenic landscapes and environments.

I combined my love for books and my passion for painting by making a scenic, handpainted bookmark.

This bookmark is not only a great way to personalize your book and to make it stand out from everyone else's, but it's also a very thoughtful gift for friends and family who love reading or constantly fold the corners of pages to remember where they left off.

This instructable shows step-by-step how to make an incredible bookmark, that not only serves its purpose but also stands as a piece of art in itself.

Here's what you're gonna need to get started:

Supplies

2 bowls for water: One for cleaning dark paints and one for cleaning lighter paints
Masking tape: Make sure you have good masking tape, as you don't want the water and paint to be absorbed by the tape. Preferably find painter's tape, or masking tape that has a thin plastic coating on top which stops water from being absorbed.
Ruler
Tissue paper
Cotton paper: I used 100% cotton, watercolor paper since they are quite thick and also absorb watercolor paints quite nicely.
Pencil
Eraser
Pen: I used a black ballpoint pen for some of the smaller details that would be harder to do with a brush, but a fine liner or a felt-tip pen will also work perfectly fine.
Marker (black)
Watercolor paints: I used watercolor cakes by Camel. I've had these for a while now and they are perfect for small paint projects where you don't need much paint.
Paint brushes: I used a larger, number 16 brush for the water coat on the paper, and then the number 9 and 10 brushes for painting and coloring the smaller details and colors.

Step 1: Preparation

First, you want to cut out a 6cm by 12cm (2.5 inches x 5 inches) rectangle of paper from the cotton watercolor paper. You want to make sure that you carefully measure the sides and ensure that the sides are parallel to each other. This affects the outcome and quality of the bookmark at the end.

After measuring and cutting out the rectangle, you want to measure a 0.5cm border along all the sides of the paper, and just make sure that it is visible by lighting drawing a line where you can easily erase it at the end, but still dark enough so that you can see where you drew the line.

Then, you want to grab your masking tape and tear off 4 pieces (2 short and 2 long) that fit the sides of the bookmark paper, and you want to tape over the border, meaning that when you paint, the tape covers the 0.5cm border that we drew before. (Check the last image to see how that looks)

I would recommend taping it onto a flat surface that you don't mind getting dirty while painting, and one that you can clean easily. The reason I don't recommend putting down a newspaper or something of the sort is because the paper can move around while you're painting and it can get annoying while you are trying to paint something carefully.

Additionally, now is a good time to get your water bowls filled up and grab some tissues to clean and dry your brushes with. I taped down a folded pile of tissues onto the table so that they wouldn't move around, but it's not necessary to do the same.

Step 2: Painting the Background

First, choose the colors you want to work with for the project. I chose to paint a sunset background, with bright red and orange colors that dissolve into a warmer yellow color towards the bottom. You can choose to paint a night-time scenery, or perhaps even a space view with stars and galaxies. The choice is yours. Just make sure that you know which colors you are going to be painting with, because the next couple steps are going to be quick and you won't have much time to stop and make decisions.

Now, you want to get your large brush, wet it a little, and apply a layer of water onto the paper. This will make the paper soggy and the surface should be pretty wet. The reason for this is to ensure that the watercolors spread evenly and blend throughout the surface of the paper. Don't be shy with how much water you use, since there won't be a big issue if you use slightly too much or too little. Just don't flood the paper.

Then, you are quickly going to grab a smaller brush that you picked out for painting the bookmark, and you want to wet it a little bit and use the water that is stored in the brush to wetten the paint you are going to use. Make sure that there isn't too much water soaked into your brush, and to check, you can tap the bristles slightly onto the tissue paper you kept to the side. When you are confident that there isn't too much water on the brush, you want to apply water to the first color that you are going to paint with. I chose to start with the red paint since it is the brightest and darkest color that I picked out for my bookmark. Typically, you want to use a darker color at the top of the paper and lighten it down as you paint towards the bottom of the bookmark.

I made sure that I had absorbed a good amount of red paint in my brush, and I lightly applied it onto the wet paper, allowing the paints to flow around as they touched the paper. This is the reason we wetted the paper as it allows the paints to spread freely around the bookmark, and it gives a bit of uncertainty to how your bookmark is going to look, but in the end, it always looks good since the colors mix and absorb naturally, and it gives a sense of realism to the art.

Now, you want to continue painting like this with all the colors you have chosen, and I highly recommend that you work your way from the top to the bottom, using the darker colors towards the top, and slowly shifting to lighter ones as you go down the paper.

As you can see with both the colored bookmarks I have above, I started with darker shades of red and purple, and as I felt that there was enough of the certain color on the paper, I switched to a lighter color and continued moving downwards. It is important to work fast because the first layer of water you applied on the paper is absorbed quite quickly, so you only have a minute or two to get all the paint on the paper. You can't reapply a layer of water on the paper because it will remove the paint that is currently on the surface, so make sure that you don't introduce more water to the bookmark after the first coat. Instead, try to wet your colors and bring more colored water with the brush so that the surface of the bookmark doesn't lose saturation.

When you have all the colors on the paper, you'll notice that they mix and create a really beautiful background for the bookmark. You can further this process by adding more color, or then identifying the places that lack color and introducing more color to those areas.

This process of painting is quite uncontrollable and it's hard to give direct steps that one can follow, but by using your intuition and making sure to don't over-paint or under-paint certain areas, you will almost always achieve a beautiful result no matter how you paint it.

Now, for the hardest part of this project...waiting for the paint to dry.

Step 3: Sketching the Silhouette

Once the paint has dried, you want to make sure you have your ruler, pencil, and eraser since we are going to sketch the outlines and the general shape of the foreground for the bookmark. I chose to create a silhouetted foreground, meaning that the objects that are in front of the background are fully black. I chose this because the black paint creates a stunning contrast with the colorful background. If you want, you can also paint with white, but I would recommend using a different colored paper in that instance since the silhouette will blend with the borders of the paper that are going to remain white. You can also use some other darker colors for the silhouette, but I will get into that later once we are done with the sketch.

First, I started by drawing a treeline near the bottom of the paper by keeping the weight on my pencil very light and letting my hand shake slightly as I drew the outlines for the leaves and foliage. This allowed it to look natural, and not something that I purposely created, but rather something that just happened as it does in nature. The same was done for the trunk and the branches. I let my hand be free and lightly drew treetrunks near the center of each tree. There is no practical reason for drawing the tree trunks as they are all going to be painted black, so you won't be able to identify the difference between the leaves and the trunk, but I drew it so that you can get an idea for how to style the leaves and to ensure that certain areas are fully painted such as the trunks and areas close to the trunk.

Once the treeline is ready, you want to draw an electrical line/electrical pole. I took a reference picture of a simple electrical pole, but you can draw yours however you like. Another option could be to draw mountains or hills in the foreground, but in the end, it comes down to your preference and what you would like on your bookmark. Your imagination is the only limitation here. If you want inspiration, you can find some silhouette paintings online and try to recreate one that you fancy the most.

To connect the wires, I put two dots on the paper where I assumed the consecutive light poles would be (meaning the light pole ahead of the one in the sketch, and the one behind it) and I connected them to points on the light pole that we drew. I chose 3 points on top of the pole to connect to the dots. The reason the dots aren't in a straight line is because I wanted to make something that looked interesting and not simple such as a straight line of electrical poles. But in the end, it was just a stylistic choice that I made, and am quite happy with how it turned out. You may notice that I didn't give the wires any slack as the reference photo that I included has because I realized that from such a low perspective it's hard to distinguish a difference between a straight line and a line that is looser. Also for the sake of making this easy to reproduce, I just drew straight lines from the points on the masking tape to the points on the electrical pole. Personally, it turned out quite nice, and it looks quite realistic as it creates a scenic foreground with trees and an electrical line. But you are more than welcome to change this in ways you prefer. Ultimately, this is going to be something that you like and something that speaks about your personality, so whatever you want to put on there will work perfectly fine.

Step 4: Painting the Silhouette

Now it's time to paint the silhouette.

You want to grab your black paint, preferably watercolor because it's easier to control how dark and light you make the paint. You could also use a black permanent marker or pen to color in the area of the trees and telephone line, but for the trees, I decided to use paint and brush since it's a relatively large area that is easier to fill in with a brush rather than a marker or pen. But for the telephone line, which has very thin and precise lines that need to be straight and delicate, I used a black pen to fill in the area that we sketched in the previous step.

You want to make sure when you start painting with the black paint, it's not too watered down. To make sure it is dark enough, you want to let the brush absorb a little bit of water in the bristles, but not too much as that will lighten the shade of the color. You want to mix the water around in the watercolor pallette so that it absorbs a lot of the black color, and then with a steady hand, you want to start painting in the leaves of the trees. I left some little see-through areas in the foliage of the trees because there are going to be small spots where the background will shine through. Make sure that you don't get too much paint on the masking tape as the color can seep through on the paper, but luckily that didn't occur with my bookmark and it shouldn't with yours either. Now, just let the paint dry and then you can move on to coloring in the telephone line.

Once dried, use a black pen (it can be a fine-liner, felt-tip, or ballpoint pen) and start going over the sketched parts of the telephone pole. This part is quite easy as you are just filling in an area that you already sketched out. Just make sure that you don't go over the lines as it is hard to fix mistakes later on. Just work on it slowly and carefully, and don't let the pen go outside the areas that you sketched.

For the electrical wires, use a ruler and trace over the sketched lines from before. This will make sure that you have perfectly straight lines and it will make the final product look extremely high quality.

Step 5: Done!

Once you are sure all the paint has fully dried, VERY CAREFULLY remove the tape from the paper. Do not pull it off quickly, as that will most likely cause the paper to rip off with it. I recommend heating it with a hairdryer so that the glue on the tape softens a little bit allowing the tape to come off easier.

Once the tape is off, there is a chance that some of the paint leaked through masking tape and covered a small part of the border, but don't worry, there is a quick fix. Just take some white acrylic paint or white-out that you might have lying around, and cover up the little splotches that might be covering the white border.

Erase the visible guidelines we used in some of the earlier steps, and you should be done!

The end product is quite stunning, and I hope you enjoyed making it.

Thanks for reading :)