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How to Seal PanPastels with a Gel Press Plate

How to Seal PanPastels with a Gel Press Plate on a Steampunk stenciled art journal page!

Building an art journal page with PanPastels is instant gratification.   No pesky waiting for the color dry.  But how do I seal PanPastels so they don’t smear and can pass a white glove test?  One way is with a gel printing plate!

In the video, you’ll see how I built this steampunk page by combining pieces and parts of several stencils from StencilGirl and then how to quickly seal them!

Watch How to stencil and seal PanPastels in an art journal on YouTube.

I had the rainbow of PanPastels out for me to play with but only orange and magenta called to me today.  Never fear the rest of the rainbow…I’ll use you next time!

The steampunk vibe of the Gears and Machinations stencils called for words. Not just any words but words to fit the colorful factory found on the page.

Adding text to my art journal pages lets me customize each and every page.  Having a stencil loaded with a variety of words to choose from means I can find just the right words for each page.

How to Seal PanPastels with a Gel Press Plate on a Steampunk stenciled art journal page!

I used the 3×5 size of Gel Press Plate but you can use any size you have.  This just happened to be the one closest to me at the moment.  Why PPA matte by US ArtQuest?  Because of how wonderfully matte it is and it is artist grade so it won’t yellow over time.

Are you new to gel printing?  You can see another way these mono printing plates can be used in this playful blog post.

How to Seal PanPastels with a Gel Press Plate on a Steampunk stenciled art journal page!

Here are the supplies I used. Some of these links are affiliate links which means I get a small percentage. It doesn’t cost you anything extra and you are helping me keep this blog and my videos ad free! Thank you- I don’t like ads any more than you do!


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  • Marva October 27, 2016, 10:44 pm

    How cool! I’m going to have to get some PPA and try this!

  • Susan Skipper October 28, 2016, 6:38 am

    I have everything on the shopping list (or its equivalent here in the UK). I love the end result. Great piece of inspiration.

  • lisa October 28, 2016, 9:30 pm

    such inspiration .love your blog x

  • Charity V October 29, 2016, 2:14 am

    This is awesome. I can’t wait to get a gelli plate to play with. 🙂

  • Maggie Morris October 31, 2016, 4:06 am

    I used stencils on a canvas and covered quite a large area with Pan Pastels. I didn’t seal them, but carefully painted over the design with acrylic paint. I think it was a lucky piece of work as I’m pleased with the result. Yes I did manage to rub off some of the chalky texture whilst painting, but it was a quick way to create a design. If I seal my next attempt, would I be able to paint over it, as that would save me having very colourful designs on the sleeves of my clothes !!!!!

  • Jill Kuhn February 2, 2020, 11:44 pm

    I am new to your videos. This one was awesome! Thank you for the tips on sealing pan pastels and cleaning the Gelli-plate with tape. ??

  • Melissa Dare March 11, 2021, 3:18 pm

    Thank you so much as I am brand new to the whole Gelli plate medium and have pan pastels and now know how to use them with my Gelli plate and PVA glue which I bought for this purpose. I was wondering, do you ever recommend Krylon Fixative to spray over the pan pastel paper instead or is it better to use the glue in this instance?

    Thanks so much for everything!
    Melissa