Dansnark Art

ATC Shading Tutorial

2008-12-11T22:34:00.001+11:00

I have had a little break from blogging - partly because November is National Novel Writing Month - see the official NaNoWriMo website for more details about that. Suffice it to say that November is a mad month where you write 1667 words of fiction every night until you have a 50,000 word manuscript which becomes the first draft of a novel. This I did, and my sanity was much affected.

But I won. For those interested in the gruesome details, my novel is about Melburnian vampires, and was tremendously fun to write, and most likely incredibly dreary to read. Long may it languish in a drawer.

A little while ago, someone asked for a tutorial on how I shade my ATCs. Here's a step by step guide to how that happens for me. There's lots of ways to achieve this effect, and the more you play around with it, the more you get a feeling for your own style. In the (misquoted) words of Captain Barbossa, these aren't rules, they're more like guidelines.

First of all, cut out your figures and play around with them on the background. Look for interesting crops; set the images off-centre or only use part of it. These backgrounds are made from the newspaper that covers my work mat and gets covered in lots of random colours. When the paper is caked with paint, I stamp randomly all over it with a text stamp. This newspaper is from 2005, that's how long it's been accumulating paint and texture. It's all lovely and nubbly from the layers of colour.

I paste the newspaper over 300gsm watercolour paper with gel medium. Newspaper has some stretch in it, so it moulds around the edges of the card, too. See those little splashes of aqua that have randomly shown through the magenta? I would never create something like that. It has to be a happy accident.

While you at it, sponge the edges of the images with butterscotch ink - it takes away the white outline of the paper the image is printed on and helps it to blend with the backgound better.

When I've decided where the image is going to go, I make a highlighted area, using a sponge and some paint in a complementary colour. At the moment, I'm fond of using stencils to make interesting shapes which the image will lie over.

I've made these stencils by using my shape cutter to cut holes in glossy card. I'm hoping the glossy card will last a bit longer than more porous card, but these are really not permanent fixtures. I'm hoping they last at least as long as my current faddish interest in stencilling does.

While I'm stencilling the shapes, I also sponge around the edge of the card to start building a border of sorts. I'll flesh that border out later with my pastel pencils. I stencil with a latex sponge, and I'm using acrylic paint. This is red-violet acrylic paint, and it's more translucent than most acrylics, but that suits me for now. It's quite violently vibrant, too, but that suits the lavish, faux-Middle Eastern imagery I'm using.

Now I grab a text stamp and stamp with a contrasting, eye-catching colour over the shape. I'm using a Wordsworth stamp, and Galaxy Gold Brilliance ink.

See how I've stamped right over the shape without worrying about the text overlapping? Because it's gold, and fairly transparent, it vanishes into nothing against the mad, multicoloured background. That's sneaky and lazy, but it works better than using a mask, which can leave a little outline around your shape.

Now I grab a magenta pastel pencil, and use it to outline the shape, and the frame of the ATC. This is like using eyeshadow - you start with the lightest colours and move through to the darkest colours. At least that's how I do it. Smudge the pastel colour with your finger or a paper stump, which is one of those nifty little art tools that can save you from wearing out your finger when working over a large area.

Then grab a darker colour - I'm using black because it suits my palette, but you could use brown or navy or something else. Run a line around the edge of your shape to highlight it further and to add dimension.

Now wave good bye to the card with the door-shape, because this is the last you'll see of it. Shortly after this I made a bad artistic decision with a white gel pen, far too shameful to show to the public. The white gel pen is my private shame.

Now it's time to past your image down. See how using half the image is much more effective than putting the whole figure in the centre of the card? If I were making a lot of these for a swap, I'd crop the image before I printed it, to save on ink and paper. There's no sense in printing out her legs twelve times if you're only going to cut them off. Cut them off in the design stage - she won't know anything about it.

So, after looking at the image for a while, I decided that she looked as though she had just gotten out of her beautiful bed, ready for a new and exciting day. So I took my gold gel pen and drew some sun rays coming off the half-circle, and stamped some letters onto thin gold paper. I used the black pencil to give shadow to one side of the sunbeam, too. The shape of the stencil and the woman's figure gave the card a theme. Sometimes this goes very well, and sometimes there is the private shame of the white gel pen.

Last of all, I use my paintbrush to create a thin, raised edge of gold paint - it's not straight or perfect, but it suits the organic colour of the card. You can see that the gold text I stamped on the semi-circle is almost all covered up - that wasn't intentional, but it still has a presence on the card.
And there she is:

My post-box over floweth!

2008-09-04T22:30:00.011+10:00

First, a disclaimer. My spacebar is broken - it fails every third or fourth time, so I'm having to go back and put the missed spaces in manually. Apologies for any words I've run together.

All the following art I've received recently in the mail for various swaps.

Here's the collection of pages for my chunky angel book. I've yet to make a cover for, but I love looking at them en masse like this. What a mountain of inspiration!

In Stamphappy's 1-4-1 ATC raklist:
Vicki Whittington - thank you! It did make me smile.

Carolyn Weiss (the foil background is actually royal purple - the camera sees it as blue, which is very mysterious.)

Lynn Gosney - the beautiful pearlescent finish on this card is also not showing up too well. It's very pretty, though.

Linda Aldred - lovely background made with beadz.

Janet Gardner - a lovely, sparkly flapper.

Melanie Smith - this sweet little girl is called Denice, apparently.

Barb Conroy - I love this gang of cowboys, they look like such rascals.

Look! My mum (Loretta) sent me an ATC, too. It's made with some kind of new magic film stuff that I've never used, but find very fascinating; it has all the colours of an oil slick.

Quilty Conscience postcard from last month's challenge which was painted fabric:

Karin Hutchinson - love those lush, red flowers.

Stephanie's sandy beachscape

Coralee's postcard, which reminds me of a lavish corset. (I'm seeing corsets everywhere, probably because I'm very into this month's theme, which is drawn from the movie Marie Antoinette.)

Debbi Baker's lovely stencilled bird. Another one where I wish the sparkle came through on screen. It shimmers.

Debbi also sent this gorgeous fabric ATC with our postcards. I feel very lucky!

The best thing about being in all these swaps is the gorgeous, gorgeous stuff that appears in my mail box. Yay!

Blog Award!

2008-08-25T12:07:00.005+10:00

I haven't posted for a while! I've been on holiday from work - not with big plans to go anywhere, but taking lots of day trips and overnighters to places. It's been lots of fun, and very relaxing. Also, Daylesford is very, very, VERY cold at this time of year. *shivers* Thank goodness for electric blankets.

I've been very lucky - one of the newest bloggers I'm reading lately has nominated me for a blog award. Thanks Diane!

Here are the rules (or guidelines, as I prefer to think of them):
1. Put the logo on your blog
2. Link to the person who nominated you.
3. Nominate seven blogs you love to read
4. Link to those blogs
5. Let those bloggers know with a comment that they've been nominated.

People I've nominated - please don't feel obliged to do the same. These memes are fun to do, but sometimes they can feel a bit like a chain letter. I can talk for hours about the blogs I love to read and why, but the people I've nominated shouldn't feel pressured to do the same.

Seven blogs I love to read! (Only seven? That's hard.)

The first person has to be Debbi Baker. Her blog got me into blogging about my art, and probably helped me get my feet solidly under myself after my hiatus from art. She's a great insipiration, artistically and as a friend. She's a great Aussie artist, we've been in swaps together for a long time, and I'm really glad to have her blog on my reader. Thanks Debbi!

France Chevalier's blog is fun and entertaining, a bit like an awesome, eclectic cafe that always suprises you with the menu. There's art - at the moment, France is doing some great polymer clay work with jewellery and Krafty Lady molds. Sometimes there's recipes, sometimes there's philosophy, she always has interesting links to places I wouldn't normally come across while browsing. Her blog is a cool, chatty place to hang around.

Julie H makes the most astoundingly gorgeous found object jewellery, actually, her blog is chock full of to-die-for art. I love her blog for the visual inspiration it provides, but also I love her posts about her home and her pets. It's a very grounded place, very inspiring.

Barb P is another friend from the email list days. (Listen to me being all nostalgic when those lists are still going strong!) Barb makes gorgeous cards, loves to try new techniques, and frequently goes travelling on great adventures.

Inspirato is Stacey Apeitos' blog. Stacey is an innovater, no matter what she's working on. She's the organiser of the fabulous Paperific conventions, which are so good that they nudged me out of my hobbit-hole and all the way to Melbourne to attend.

Annette Husband is a phenomenal artist from way, way up north. Her art is lavish and colourful, and she makes wonderful video tutorials to explain some of her really clever techniques. She does amazing things with Opals and beeswax and paint. She's a bit of a crack-up, too, sometimes!

Creativ Spirit is Rob's blog. She's recently taken over as list-owner for my favourite new email-group, Chunky Books. I have one of her pages in my first book from this groups! We follow a lot of the same challenges, I think, like Gothic Arches. I've only recently added Rob's blog to my reader, but I'm already enjoying it.

I have some art to post later but for now, I'm going to be catching up on everyone else's blog - you guys have been so busy!

First time for Gothic Arches

2008-08-13T21:48:00.003+10:00

The Gothic Arches theme this week is 'Crowns'. I've really wanted to make something for this weekly challenge, because the arches I see each week are really beautiful.

Unexpectedly, I made two.

Productivity of this level is a bit shocking, frankly.

Inbox and Outbox

2008-07-30T22:49:00.008+10:00

Point the first: Quilty Conscience postcards are done and posted. The challenge was to use painted fabric. I used vilene that I had dyed and over-painted with acrylic, then stamped, then stenciled with xpandaprint and then embroidered. *falls over exhausted*

Point the second: I've been very lucky, with many gorgeous 1-4-1 ATC swaps arriving in the mail. It's so much fun, and I'm getting to swap with a lot of new people.

From Left to right: Diane Whatford, Roz Veevers and Jude Wagner

Lisa Manyweathers and Janet Hamblin

Roslyn McGechan and Ann Lawton

Point the third: I've made a couple more of my own to send out, using quotes from Peter Pan:

All business now attended to! Now, to watch the opening ceremony of the Olympics!

Skinny Book Swap

2008-07-28T22:29:00.005+10:00

Here are my pages for the skinny book swap - it's been a while since I had to make a large number of anything, and I completely miscalculated the amount of time I needed to get through. But I survived, and I really enjoyed making the pages - I played a lot with my pastels to get the shading on the earthbound angel's halo, and for the edging. It's the first time I've used my own handwriting in my art, too - that was fun and a little bit daring. And Stephanie was invaluable help with trimming edges and cutting things to size. She's a mathematical whiz. *hugs* Thanks, Steph!

The back was just pure collage fun - I got to use some gold paper edging, and a lot of gold paint. Bliss!

I'm really looking forward to the rest of the pages coming in to me - then I can decide how I'm going to bind it, and make some covers.

Debbi and other Quilty Conscience people - I am so, so sorry for holding you up another week - the postcards are all but done, they just need edging. A thousand apologies for being such a slacker.

Treasure from the mail man!

2008-07-16T21:34:00.010+10:00

Treasures and delights have rained down upon my head! I love getting arty mail.

I'm really excited to have the first few pages for the Angelic chunky books swap on [chunkybookartists]. It's the first art-book swap I've gone in for a few years, and I'm really looking forward to it.
From left to right: Teresa Crouch, Ann Spiteri, and Carol Sweeney

Some [Stamphappy] 1-4-1 ATC swaps:
From Gwenyth Zwaan, and in a beautiful envelope with a lovely quote by Goethe.

From Sharon Batchelor, in a beautifully made folder with some German scrap tucked into one pocket.

From the left, cards from Narelle Cox, and two from Kaeren Sutherland

Again from the left: Rikki Showell, Pam Addicott and Julie Price

Here's what I've been up to, in between frantically finishing my Quilty Conscience postcards:
This one was a challenge to myself to make an ATC using only rubber stamps.

Guess what I bought? A white gel pen! Hooray! Let's put it on everything!

I also bought a big wooden box to put my pastels and pencils and watercolour tubes in, so they're all a lot easier to get to now. Hence, there's a lot of pastel shading on these cards. Pastel shading, and more gel pen. (Actually, I had to hide the white gel pen from myself. Seriously, little white dots are even more addictive than Shiva stiks.

These three are studies for what I'm going to be doing on my own chunky book page:

Now! Back to sewing! Sewing, sewing, sewing, because the postcards were due 16 days ago. *hangs head in shame*

TMTA and Inch by Inch

2008-06-27T23:00:00.004+10:00

This is a super quick, middle of the night post, for two challenges that are closing soon.

For the first time, I've been organised enough to get something in for Inchbyinch, where the weekly challenge is Black and White

I would like to note that it was a very hard palette for me to use - I had to drag my hand away from the gold paint. Also, I may be unintentionally breaking the rules by using sepia images. *frets*

Secondly, TMTA's theme is Tickets. I've tucked a ticket under this little girl's arm.

And that's it for me - it's far too late to be up and blogging.

Stamphappy 1-4-1 Swapping

2008-06-26T18:40:00.016+10:00

The 1-4-1 ATC swap on Stamphappy is loads of fun - this week I received a gorgeous card from Val West, with bright colours on gloss cardstock.

It came in the most adorable little folder, which is just the nicest touch to a surprise gift.

I had made some ATCs to send, but Val's little folder made me feel sad about slipping my own cards into an envelope with nothing but a clear plastic slip. So I painted and stamped some library pockets for them.

Last weekend I had a blitz of crafting activity that may or may not have anything to do with the hard drive failure of my laptop. *is shamefaced* There's an amazing amount of time to fill when you don't have that neat little machine sitting right in front of you.

The backgrounds are newspaper, painted and re-painted to get lots of layers and depths and texture.

The stamp for the background is by Stampers Anonymous, one of those big stamps you can't live without for a nice, baroque look.

I've got a bit of a thing going on with flowers right now. And butterflies, which is a natural progression of thought, I suppose. And the moon. And I've never really let go of that fascination with the moon.

I really like doing this messy, wobbly edging with gold paint - it doesn't require great accuracy, and it reminds me of the aged edging you get on some vintage postcards.

Actually, there's quite a lot of ATCs here - it was an extremely satisfying day of work.

Two of these are returns for RAKs sent, and the others are all going out as RAKs for the 1-4-1 swappers. I haven't sent RAKs for a couple of years. It's fun!

This one doesn't really have a spot between her eyebrows. I think it's time to clean the scanner glass. Again.

One of these cards is not like the others... I had this one partially assembled for a long time, and riding the wave of creative energy, I finished it off. He's made from scraps from a zetti swap that I couldn't bear to throw away. Zetti scraps - I suppose you could call that zetti-confetti.

What I got up to last weekend

2008-06-13T11:49:00.011+10:00

And it's taken me so long to post this that it's nearly the weekend again!

First of all, I dyed some painted silk for my Quilty Conscience exchange. I wanted a kind of pale blue, and the label on the packet said "Madonna Blue" which I took to mean a pretty sky-blue. The colour swatch seemed to confirm this.

Really, it was more like indigo. Who knew? The silk looks great, but my paint resist looks very scrappy against such a dark background. I'll have to hunt around for something different.

It wasn't an unmitigated failure, though - I gathered up some tags to dye since I had a pot of dye on the stove, and they came out very nicely. Some are plain, some are stamped with white paint, using one of my hand-carved bird stamps.

And I threw in some muslin scraps, I think they'll be handy, and will look lovely over gold.

And the best thing about dying tags is that in the bottom of the pot, when you tip the dye out, you find a whole lot of those circular hole-protectors that have drifted off the tags in the liquid. They're great for stamping on and attaching to other tags.

I made one of these pin-cushion rings out of the tab you pull from a carton of long life milk. Our tabs don't look like the one in the link, but they worked perfectly well.

I made it, and I admired it, and I left it on the table. In the morning, it was gone. And while I was photographing the replacement that I made last night, a little brown snout crept into frame. I shall be keeping this pin-cushion locked away.

Here is Stephanie modelling the ring. I think it will be very handy - I'm always putting my needle down, or tucking it into my shirt when I'm not using it then forgetting where I put it.

I made some fairy inchies for Inch By Inch, but not in time to make last week's theme. (Sorry for being so hopelessly disorganised, Fiona!) Serendipitously, I had to make a card for a friend who has come out of hospital, so they were put to good use anyway.

The first mailing group I joined once I had discovered papercrafts was Stamphappy, and I'm very fond of it - I've learned so much, and met so many wonderful people from the list. They've started up a one-for-one ATC swap, and I've received my first one, from Linda Aldred. It came in a beautiful hand-made envelope, and was posted in a tiny library pocket, that was the most adorable thing in the mailbox yesterday. The picture doesn't do it credit - foil card looks lovely in person, but is tricky to photograph. Thank you, Linda! It's lovely, and the mesh window is a really clever way to frame an image. I'll be filing that idea away! And I'll be putting something in the mail for you as soon as we're back from Melbourne.

This weekend is going to be much quieter - we'll be in Melbourne while Stephanie does some work-related education. We'll be far away from the craft table, but hopefully we can do some shopping while we're there. And it's sunny this time, too!

One last photo of my catburglar in action, with sports-style notation, because he moves so fast you can barely see him:

TMTA and my weekend

2008-06-04T19:33:00.007+10:00

This weekend was beautiful - there was lots of sun, and we got out in the garden for a bit of winter pruning. The mornings have been icy cold - an indication that it's going to be quite a chilly winter. Here's Chewbacca, soaking up some of the last winter sun we'll probably see for a while.

This week's TMTA theme is Towers and Columns. I think this Collections stamp was one of the first that I ever bought, and it's very useful. (Like most Collections stamps are, I suppose.)

I'm trying to learn to love my colour laser printer, but I don't think we've achieved true harmony yet. I'm printing on the most excellent lightweight brown paper that is used as filler in the delivery boxes at work - we have scads and scads of the stuff, and it takes paint and ink beautifully. The laser toner is apparently a little fragile, though, because it started flaking off my Grecian woman straight away. I've sprayed the rest of my attempts with fixative now, in the hope that they'll be a little more sturdy. They look quite nice though - the brown paper really emphasises the warm tones:

What else did I get up to this weekend? I played with our new Dremel! Nina's workshop made us brave - we drilled glass and dominoes and wooden discs, and I planned out a necklace based on the nursery rhyme The Little Nut Tree:

I had a little nut tree
And nothing would it bear,
But a silver nutmeg,
And a golden pear.

I chose this theme mostly because I saw the nutmegs in the supermarket, and thought they'd be easy to drill through. But the nutmegs look good, all covered in silver leaf and varnished.

Although, en masse, they do look a bit like shiny possum poo.

And I've been embellishing my box with the pieces taken from my burned chiffon sandwich:

Now that I look back on it, it was very busy.

Chiffon sandwich, hold the chiffon

2008-05-29T10:48:00.012+10:00

This instructional post is entirely inspired by Annette Husband, who posted an fantastic tutorial on Inkjet water transfers that I'm planning to try this weekend. I wanted to post my own tutorial on using fabric scraps and a heat gun to make embellishments.

I've been making embellishments from glitzy stuff trapped between layers of chiffon, stitching the layers then burning them back with a heat gun. I've seen this technique in Cloth, Paper, Scissors and in Maggie Grey's books.

This particular sandwich isn't actually chiffon, and I didn't like the way it burned - instead of cracking and shrinking, it went more fluid and blobby. It was an experiment, and I've learned from it. I'll still be using these pieces, in this case, for a 3D fabric box I'm working on, but in the future, I'll stick to chiffon. Or do more test burns.

I iron a layer of vliesofix to each piece of fabric, then sprinkle one side with lots of glitzy stuff. It's the time to dig out all those really garish brightly coloured stuff I love to stash but can never use tastefully: glitter, lurex threads, shimmery fabric scraps, sequins. I especially like to use the big, cheap, multicoloured sequins, because they melt into amorphous jewel-like puddles of colour.

Because the vliesofix is slightly tacky, gold leaf adheres to it pretty well; if it doesn't, a quick whiz with the heat gun will soften the glue enough. This is an extreme close up of what's in this sandwich: snippets of foiled tulle, sparkly yarn, sequins, and red/gold leaf flakes.

Then you press the layers together, and iron them (under a sheet of baking paper), with an iron that's warm enough to seal the vliesofix together, but not so hot that it makes your sheer fabric shrink or buckle. We'll save that fun for later. In this picture, you can see the glitzy stuff trapped between the two layers of sheer fabric.

Then I stitch the layers together - as the fabric shrinks, it clings to the stitching, and leaves an aged, crumbly residue. (Or in this case, slightly blobby.) I've stitched one piece in a grid with a butterscotch-toned variegated cotton thread. The thread needs to be cotton, or something non-synthetic that will stand up to the heat-gun.

And in this section, I've stitched a spoked wheel. I've found that the smaller the gaps between the stitching, the more structure the final piece will have, which is why my wheel has an inner and an outer circle. You could do all sorts of motifs this way, and the best thing is that they look better if you don't stitch nice, tidy lines. (This is good for me, because I'm a wobbly driver on the sewing machine.)

Now, the fun and destructive part. The first thing you need to do is open the doors and windows, because this is like burning plastic; it's smelly and the fumes could be toxic. So, make sure there's lots of ventilation. I heat from the middle of the grid out, holding my heat gun as close as I would for melting UTEE, moving the hottest part around the area I'm heating. You really see the purpose of the grid when the fabric is twisting and melting and pulling away from the lines of stitching: it holds the piece in shape, and ends up as the skeleton of the fabric. Here's my grid melted, with all the shiny treasures revealed:

And in close-up:

And the wheel, still in the framework of supporting stitches:

And all my wheels, snipped away from their frames:

The sheer fabric I used for these didn't shrink as much as chiffon does - if you're using chiffon, you should expect your piece to shrink by a third. As a consequence, my wheels were too big for what I wanted, which was to be medallions on the faces of a five-sided fabric box with a steam-punk theme. Never mind! I'm going to snip out tiny squares from my large grid, and stitch them to my fabric box, and embed lots of multicoloured beads into the gridwork. The wheels will keep for another project. I think they'll look great over black velvet. (Oh, velvet! Why can't I quit you?)

Back from a whirlwind tour

2008-05-28T12:31:00.011+10:00

I'm back from my weekend in Melbourne, and thoroughly recovered. It was great to do a class, let alone one with the amazing Nina Bagley. My hands were very sore after crimping and twisting wire all afternoon, but it was worth it to learn how to drill through those treasure I've been hoarding for years, and how to go about turning them into beautiful jewellry.

It was also great for me and Stephanie to catch up with our tiny quilting group, Quilty Conscience: Debbi Baker, Coralee Barker, Karin Hutchinson and Ruth Kelly (plus assorted friends and family!). We had a great meal, a bit too much wine, and lots of conversation. It was so amazing.

We also swapped postcards, for the last theme, which was "Home".

Here's mine:

It's a fabric paper collage background, with a tiny house made from painted black paper, and itsy little sequins which are imported by , judging from the address on their label, but looking at their site, they appear to be wholesale only. I'm finally getting the hang of the zig-zag edge; this is the first time I've actually been proud of it.

Debbi's

Coralee:

And Karin's, which is just so lovely, I keep stroking the satin slippers. Oh, there's no place like home!

I made a fabric book to keep my postcards in. I really like having them accessible. We don't have much wall space in our ~~livingroom~~ studio, so I worry about keeping them on the table where paint is splashed around. They're nice and safe in this little booklet, and I can keep adding pages at the back as my collection grows.

Here's the inside, with one of Debbi Baker's beautiful postcards.

Treasure at the bottom of the garden

2008-05-09T13:48:00.009+10:00

Neil Gaiman linked to the most amazing photos of fairytale houses, abandoned and intact because they were buried deep in a forest in Russia. I love fairytales with magical things hidden in forests, or even at the back of the garden. Remember Enid Blyton's 'The Wishing Chair'? Magical stuff.

Our garden is pretty wild. There's plenty of treasure to be found, thanks to our relatively lax gardening skills, despite the best efforts of my girlfriend, who is a demon with secateurs and blackberry poison. (That sounds scarier than I meant it to!)

Here are some treasures from our last foray into the tangle:

A tiny nest in a tangle of blackberry canes at the back of my garden:

Stepping stones that lead to nowhere:

A wall of briar roses:

Giant rosehips, big enough to eat:

And our house at the top of the garden:

It seems to be a long, long way away...

Bon Voyage, ATC!

2008-05-08T13:08:00.004+10:00

Here's the ATC that's currently on its way to Domito in France. It's an Autumn themed card.

And this one is made from scraps of crazy quilting that were too good to throw away. It's looking for a home, if anyone is interested in swapping.

I think I prefer photographing my work to scanning it. I really like using my camera, now that I've figured out how to use the macro setting properly, and to switch off the automatic flash. Ten Tastiest Food Photography Tips is a really helpful site for capturing good pics of tiny things like ATCs.

Treasure From Afar

2008-05-06T21:47:00.007+10:00

I've been quite busy with misdaventures at work - a tire detached from a moving car and hit the front door of the shop, smashing the window and bending the front strut out of alignment so that the door no longer closed. Nobody was hurt, and it's all fixed now, but we were quite the buzz in our sleepy country town.

I see that I have a bazillion blog posts to catch up on now - I'll save those for tomorrow at work, but I wanted to post about my exciting presents. I had two lovely surprises in the mail this week - though one was actually hand delivered by my dad.

Firstly, I received this beautiful ATC from Domito. We both agreed to make a fabric ATC for the season, (Spring for her, Autum for me), and this was the lovely result.

And Dad brought presents for me from Mum's holiday in Hong Kong:

Shiny, glitzy fibres

Delicate butterflies made from feathers

Luscious papers

And the most delicate little glass teapot

Thank you everyone for these beautiful presents - I feel very spoilt.

On topic, by a technicality

2008-04-07T22:56:00.004+10:00

This week's theme at Inching Artists is Lace. Mine don't look very lacy, do they? But they have a secret.

These are made from the Lutradur and Lace technique in the first issue of Fibre and Stitch Magazine, and I think I may have buried the lace a little deeply. It is there - scraps of broderie anglaise layered with gauze and painted with acrylic paint and iridescent inks. I was going to burn the layers back with the heat gun, but on sample pieces, the gauze proved extremely heat resistent. I embellished the squares with some varigated thread and a bright bead.

I've also signed up for Joanne's Inchie swap that she runs each month, and this month the theme is Children

I've never gone in an inchie swap before - I'm really looking forward to it.

Carving out some art

2008-04-04T21:42:00.005+11:00

Last month at Green Pepper Press Street Team, Michelle Ward challenged readers to carve stamps. Though I didn't get mine done in time for the deadline, the post for Challenge 18 is a great resource for anyone wanting to get into stamp carving. It made me get out the cutting tools and a sheet of rubber and get to work.

I carved a lot of birds - my NaNo project last year was built up around bird mythology. One day, far off in the future, I'm going to have the time and motivation to stamp my own tarot deck, so in preparation for that wondrous time, I carved out words and symbols for the four suits, and the corresponding astrological symbols. (Can you sense the procrastination in this great project?)

I stamped one of my birds in acrylic paint on a page torn from The Coral Island, and I really like the rough, textural look of the image.

And on one of my favourite stamping lists, Stamphappy, there was a thread about blogs, which gave me a chance to track down a few of my list-mates in the blogosphere. Hi people, if you're dropping by, after I've left manic messages on your blogs.

And lastly, I have beautiful mail, from Debbi Baker. A beautiful green ATC, made to celebrate St Patrick's day, from tissue paper or beautiful serviettes, I think. The photo doesn't do it justice - it really glows.

And because Debbi is an awesome chick, she wrapped the ATC in that gorgeous, filmy lavender ribbon. Thanks Deb!

A busy weekend

2008-03-24T23:24:00.005+11:00

Easter has been fun - despite the heat and humidity and thunder storms and craziness at work, I actually got a lot of work done.

TMTA's theme this week is Texture Effects. I made an ATC made from a background of scrunched up newspaper, lightly covered with gesso for extra texture, and dry brushed with copper and gold acrylic to pick up the shapes and texture of the newspaper.

I used an image of Virginia Woolf, and once it was down on the card, it seemed to need simple embellishment - a black ribbon and an gold charm holding a leaf pressing. I was quite surprised at the way my subconscious constructed this - it wasn't until the leaf was glued down that I realised it was rue, and then I had my theme for the ATC.

This week's Inching Artists theme is Words. These inchies were cut from a very precious piece of scrap paper that I've been using under my craft work for months, letting it accumulate layers and layers of paint in that perfectly random way that can only happen with scrap paper.

And lastly (how productive have I been this weekend? Chocolate is the super-fuel of the creative mind!), I have a fabric ATC that will be zooming over to WA fro a one-on-one exchange with Debbi Baker. It's a piece of velvet (I know! I said I'd never use that stuff again!), with a layer of blue foil netting stitched over the top, and a motif in buttons, beads and sequins set in the middle. It was fantastic fun to make.

Think Monday: Think ATC

2008-03-18T23:37:00.004+11:00

Twice in a row! I'm on fire with the organising and the doing of craft this week.

The theme this week at TMTA is Transparent Art. I took a transparency of an antique daguerreotype of the moon - it's mottled and golden in that beautiful way that daguerreotype photographs are. (I had to use the word twice, to make it worth looking up the spelling.)

The image is over a background of pearly iridescent ink, which of course, doesn't show up in the scan, but makes the image really glow. I took the words from an ancient dictionary.

I love using transparencies, but the hard part is finding original ways to frame the very obvious edge. This time, I put my new sewing machine to the test, and it blitzed through the plastic and card with no problems, even when threaded with horrible, snagging metallic thread. Oh metallic thread! You look so fine, but you are so evil. Same problem that I have with velvet, I think.

Think Monday: Think ATC and Inching Artists

2008-03-15T10:29:00.010+11:00

I managed two challenges this week; I'm quite pleased with myself.

This week's theme at TMTA is Fashion. I went for a playing card type of concept, with a glamorous girl whose waistline fascinates and frightens me. I'm not really one to suffer for beauty, unless the suffering involves glue and scissors.

And for Inching Artists, there's a numerical theme.

I really love these inchies! I love them because I used something from UNDER THE MAT. Under the mat is the place where I shove scraps that are just too good to throw away - but I never use these goodies fast enough, and my mat develops hillocks where the stuff has piled up. That's why it's always cause for celebration when I drag something out and use it. This time, it was the cover page from a sheet of Stampers Anonymous unmounted stamps. I cut the numbers out, lacquered them with Dimensional Magic and stuck them down onto a sheet of scrap paper that I slathered with gold paint.

I really need to seek out some swaps for Inchies - I would like to make more. Any suggestions for Inching communities.

Fabric Postcard

2008-03-12T17:20:00.002+11:00

The theme this time was "Veil". I chose it, and then was spectacularly stumped by what I should make. I fooled around with some chiffon, and made some burnt, embellished sandwiches, and came up with this:

I don't know about it. It's kind of gone beyond my comfort zone. And velvet? Why did I work with velvet? It shrinks and shreds and changes size and it leaves black fluff everywhere and it is completely evil. On the other hand, the postcard is kind of eyecatching. I think I like it. *is confused*

Inching Artists: Holes

2008-02-18T23:05:00.003+11:00

Holes are the theme for this week at Inching Artists. I made an ATC with three inchies, and each inchie has two windows punched into the layers. It's a simple design, but satisfying to execute.

I stepped out for a breath of air...

2008-02-16T21:57:00.003+11:00

And suddenly it was February, 2008. Thanks, Debbi for giving me a gentle poke in the backside, to get me blogging again.

So, what have I been up to? I'm working on my postcards for the February swap, which has veered off-topic severely for me. The theme this month is "Veil", and somewhat ironically, it's a theme I chose. So, I wandered the aisles at Spotlight, selected some likely fabric of a veil-like texture, some cerise chiffon that was lovely and slippery and draped beautifully.

It was too tempting - I had to burn it. I'm starting to wonder if I might have a bit of a problem.

It was amazing fun to fling every shiny scrap into the chiffon sandwich - there's sequins, beads, gold leaf, and some really lurid fibres I would never have otherwise used. Once I'd stitched it and burned, it turned out very pretty, and it looks amazing over black velvet, but it's not exactly veil-like. It's too pretty not to use. I just have to figure out how to work it in to the theme. I can do it.

TMTA: Mosaics

2007-12-15T13:17:00.000+11:00

The theme this week at Think Monday, Think ATC is Mosaics. I took the chance to use up the leftovers from my Christmas card frenzy to make a set of serendipity-style tiles, and it was lots of fun, and quite nostalgic to revisit a technique from time gone by.

Blogger is being a pain with uploading images right now - I have to host this at my Flickr. *waves fist at Blogger*

I am really, really hoping to play with my Lutradur samples that Debbi Baker sent to me. New stuff! I'm going to burn it! (You can't say that about too many things these days!)

Purple, Gold and Black ATCs

2007-12-12T15:08:00.000+11:00

I signed up for an ATC exchange run through Stamphappy, the first crafty mailing list I ever joined. I'm really glad it's still up and going, because it was a great help to me as a beginning stamper, and I've made lots of friends through there.

The theme was 'Purple, Gold and Black', and the brief was to use only those colours, and to make stamping part of the design. This is the card I'm submitting:

I also made a few of these:

I like the contrast between the two - 'Observe' is very old-style for me: neat and precise, with a figure on it, and a well placed word. 'Drama Queen' is more freestyle; the edges are rough, the shape is amorphous and the background is insane. It makes me happy that I don't have to let go of the old style to embrace the new.

Fabric Postcard

2007-12-11T20:57:00.000+11:00

I'm a part of a artist's exchange that swaps fabric postcards - each exchange is based on a chosen technique, and this round was using Beryl Taylor's method for creating a stitchable fabric from collaged papers. It's been a while since I tinkered with a new technique, and I really enjoyed watching my stash of fabric paper build up, then taking to it with scissors and knife.

I used my machine set on a wide zig-zag to edge the postcards - it's the first time I've done that, and I quite like the effect of the brown and tan variegated thread. My machine doesn't sound too good - it's well and truly ready to retire.

And then I posted them to the wrong address. *headdesk*

Oh - and another thing:

I won the battle, but not the war; I've still got half a chapter and an epilogue to wrap up the story. But I'm proud of myself - I wrote 60,000 words in thirty days.

Inchies and Presents

2007-11-12T11:24:00.000+11:00

Ah. I see from Inching Artists I have lost a WHOLE WEEK! I though the theme for this week was Housies, but that was actually last week's challenge.

Well, I had lots of fun making them, anyway:

Oh well, I can get on with the new theme now.

I was very lucky to receive goodies in the mail:

Two fabric postcards from the Quilty Conscience swappers - the one with the hearts is needle felted, and made by Coralie Barker. The dreamy blue and silver one is by Debbi Baker, and is painstiks under organza, and delicately beaded and edged in silver. Very inspiring stuff. Debbi also sent the lush ATC made with painted lutradur, and because she's a lovely person who thinks of these things, she also included some samples of Lutradur to play with. (Thanks, Debbi! I'm really excited about having a go with those soon.) That's Debbi's decorated envelope that the goodies are sitting on.

I've got my own postcards on the boil. This month we're using Beryl Taylor's painted paper fabric technique as the basis for our designs, and I've been trying this and that and think I've landed a design I'm happy with.

And my NaNo effort moves apace:

November is a special time

2007-11-10T12:51:00.000+11:00

November is National Novel Writing Month. (National, I think, refers to the internet nation at large.) Basically, you have thirty days to get fifty thousand words down in some kind of narrative.

For the rest of November, art will be carried out in the odds and ends of moments when I'm not cramming words onto the screen.

I feel like a zombie. I may actually have become a zombie, and not noticed it.

Inching Artists

2007-10-30T22:50:00.000+11:00

This month at Inching Artists the theme was Tryptichs. I've left it to the last minute as usual, despite having a couple of weeks. But it was fun!

Catching up on things

2007-10-29T12:38:00.000+11:00

I have a tiny amount of internet fame: I'm the artist in the spotlight at Stacey Apeitos's website, Go-Make-Art.com

I've also merged my two google IDs, so that I don't have to keep logging in and out of Google to leave comments on blogs and be able to read my Gmail at the same time. This means that the notification on the comments that I read might look slightly different but it's still me. It's going to be so much easier to use just the one ID online.

It's deliciously rainy here! The damns are full, the creeks are running, the grass is green, and we're well positioned to head into the heat of summer.

Check out this creek, snapped at speed from the car window, because it's not a place you can stop and take photos. It's like the chocolate river in Willy Wonka! It's normally a dry bed.:

And this is Lake Colac - see the grass poking up through the water? That's where the water line used to be. That's how much water has flowed into the lake:

This makes for happy cows:

And a happy me.

Tagged!

2007-10-17T16:18:00.000+10:00

I was tagged by Debbi for this meme.

The rules:
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself: some random, some weird.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post and list their names (linking to them).
4. Let them know they've been tagged by leaving a comment at their blogs.

1. My family is almost all Taurean. Four out of the six of us were born between the end of April and the middle of May. Mum claims that the only reason she can cope with four Taureans is because she's a Virgo. I think it's my Taurean tendencies that make me reach for the gold paint nine times out of ten. I like things to look lush.

2. I was a role-player - with the funny-shaped dice and the dragons and so on. This is why I get so carried away with the story-telling aspects of my art. I don't RP so much any more, but I still have those dice. They glow in the dark. I want to use them in an assemblage, as soon as I find the right piece.

3. I can't use microbeads. They swarm all over my mat like bugs and freak me out. I like to look at them when they're used well, but in their little jar, they look like caviar. I can't stand things that swarm. *shudders*

4. A few years before we both got into papercrafts, my mum threw out a box of ratty old photographs. We both mourn this loss terribly. This reinforces my need to hoard everything. HOARD EVERYTHING!

5. Sometimes I worry that I like to paint paper and make backgrounds more than I like to make actual art. I have folders and folders of painted paper that I'll never get rid of, and yet, when I'm starting a new project, the first thing I do is paint a collection of papers for inspiration. Maybe I should give them away?

6. Bury me with Stampington's True Colors. I think it's the most re-read of all my art books, and the one that inspires me the most.

7. When I'm stuck for an idea, I put random terms into Wikipedia and read. Some of my favourite pieces have been inspired by high physics or philosophy.

I don't really know enough bloggers to tag for this, so please feel free to do it if you want to. And link back here, so I can go and learn about you, too.

And now, some random art from the past, a spread in an altered book from a few years ago, demonstrating that the ability to write dodgy haiku is never a waste:

TMTA: Masks

2007-10-15T12:50:00.000+10:00

This week's theme for TMTA was Masks. I was certain that I had some cute baroque-looking mask charms somewhere in the murky depths of our craftroom, but either I imagined buying them in the first place (which is weird, because I'm sure I've used a few), or I put them in a really, really safe and sensible place, which means I won't be seeing them for a few years.

So, I had to improvise.

The face is from a book of Indian clip art, and it's a mask of some kind, though it's uncannily realistic-looking. I cut the body out of card, and the hair out of some bright orange paper. It's a darker themed card than I'm used to making, but I like it.

ETA: And it looks like I was too slow for this theme - that will teach me to get my act together - I've had this card made for a few days and everything. Never mind!

Experimenting with fabric paper

2007-10-11T12:52:00.000+10:00

I'm in a fabric postcard exchange, and this month we're to use Beryl Taylor's technique of making a stitchable fabric with collaged papers. There's instructions for this Cloth Paper Scissors #1.

I've never been good at following instructions.

I forgot the top layer of tissue paper that's supposed to hold everything down, so the paper flaked up once it was dry. It looked good, though, so I stitched it down again with an orange variegated thread.

It's going to be handy for cutting into pieces - I've already made a card from it, for a non-crafting blogger friend.

And I've got a few more pieces done correctly that are drying outside now.

Inching Artists - Rust

2007-10-11T11:41:00.000+10:00

I'm hopelessly behind schedule here, but Inching Artists has miraculously not been updated yet, so I'm going to sneak this one in past-deadline.

I used hand-painted paper with a rusted, corroded look. Actually, it's scrap paper that I've been hoarding, I really liked the random way paint was slopped over it. Also used lead light tape to highlight the words - that tape seems to get mottled and tarnished very easily, but I really like the colour.

Think Monday, Think ATC: Smile

2007-09-30T23:11:00.001+10:00

The theme at TMTA this week was "Smile". I have to confess, I had a sudden attack of anarchy with this one, and couldn't get the image of grumpy children out of my mind.

It's not that I don't feel like smiling. Not at all!

Inchie Challenge: Mirror, Mirror

2007-09-29T21:54:00.000+10:00

This week in Inching Artists, the theme is "Mirror, Mirror". It was a tough one - I had to wrack my brains to find what I wanted to say about that. I chose an image taken from a stained glass window - I like her introspective expression. She's reflecting.

The buttons are battered, but shiny. And one day, I'll remember that gold doesn't scan well, and avoid using it. (Yeah, like that's going to happen. Ever! I love the look of gold too much for that.)

ETA: Why is Blogger suddenly giving me instructions in German? *is puzzled*

The busier one gets, the more one puts things off

2007-09-22T20:15:00.000+10:00

I need to be writing for this fanfic challenge - I foolishly took on a last minute pinch-hit to help the organisers out without really considering that I'd have to write the darn thing in two days. So, naturally I'm posting to my art blog, where they can't see me and know that I'm running around in a bit of a tizz.

I made some ATCs to tuck into cards going out to various friends who are having rough times at the moment - it was so nice to make a few simple cards and decorate envelopes. It's something I had forgotten that I enjoyed so much.

We have a new colour laser printer, and I printed some images onto vellum - they worked out well. It's a huge monster of a printer, though, and we don't have table space for it, so it crouches on the floor like a toad.

Things I'm excited about:
The new Temeraire novel is released soon. The first three were brilliant fun to read - a re-imagining of the Napoleonic War fought with an Aerial Corps of dragons. Very much my cup of tea.

My new lap-top that has been ordered, and should arrive on Tuesday. Until then, I have to perch on the rickety chair in the kitchen to use the desk top.

Thea Gilmore singing 'Bad Moon Rising'. I love her voice.

Dale at the Thread Studio having Hot Textiles in stock before Amazon. Go Aussie suppliers!

I think that's all the excitement I can take. Also, should be writing.

More inchies!

2007-09-14T22:14:00.000+10:00

Thank you to everyone who commented on my ATC - this is the best part about starting a new blog, all the new people I'm getting to meet and the chance to catch up with a few old friends too.

This is a procrastination post - I have a deadline to meet. Is it procrastination if I planned it ahead? I made these inchies earlier in the week, so that I would have something to post when I knew my concentration would be wavering.

This week's theme at Inching Artists is "Under the Sea". Technically, these inchies aren't inspired by things under the sea, but things on the shoreline. I plead artistic licence on that matter.

They're made with scraps of hand-painted paper stamped with a hand-carved spiral stamp that made me think of crashing waves. The gold foil I saved a long time ago, and I'm glad that I could finally use it, because it got a bit crunched up, which in this case, worked well. And the words come from my favourite source of amazing words - a torrid pirate romance novel. It has all the best adjectives. And it is truly, truly hideous reading. When I bought it at the thrift store, I was caught in the act by someone from my tiny town. We chatted politely, but I've always wondered what she thought of me - the cover of the book is exceedingly lurid. It's a real bodice-ripper.

Think Monday - Think ATC (I know, it's Wednesday...)

2007-09-12T20:16:00.001+10:00

I've had a very busy couple of days - a sick girlfriend to take care of, lots of art to do (yay!), and a looming fan-fiction challenge that I'm blithely ignoring. I'm going to be sorry about that last one in a few days when I'm slaving at the keyboard until the wee hours of the morning.

Hey, Scoured! Google Reader for the win! Thank you so much for the tip, I'm cruising along with it now, and it's awesome. And not contributing to me failing to get this fic written, no, not at all.

Think Monday - Think ATC is a weekly challenge to make an artist's trading card to the specified theme, and this week, the challenge was to use a slide mount (the little casing that goes around a photographic slide) in the ATC. This is my first time in this challenge - but oh, I love these weekly challenges already - I can take part or not, as the muse comes and goes, and I'm not letting anyone down if I feel like my work isn't up to showing to anyone.

I'm really happy with this one - I love the texture of acrylic paint when it has bubbled up under the heat gun, and it's always fun to add those wacky triangle embellishments. The face is printed on a transparency, which isn't so obvious in the scan, but the text of the stamp shows through a little.

Yay! I'm so happy to have made something this weekend.

The art is getting smaller

2007-09-10T00:35:00.001+10:00

I'm going to sound like a creaky old woman when I say this: I remember when people started making ATCs, and a canvas of 2.5 by 3.5 inches was so tiny after working on books and cards. An ATC seems like an acreage now that I've worked on my first Inchie.

It's made from a tiny scrap of crazy quilt - I'm making some CQ ATCs right not also. I made it for the Spiral challenge at Inching Artists. I hope it's not hideous, and that I haven't broken some unwritten rule by making mine from fabric, because I'm going to post a link to it at the Inchies challenge.

Here's one of the ATCs - the silk ribbon binding looks terribly wonky in the scan. It's much better in real life. Really.

Getting the hang of Blogger

2007-09-08T11:55:00.000+10:00

It's not too bad, Blogger - I really like the adaptability of the layout, and the ability to drag around components of my blog. I wish Livejournal had that. On the other hand, Livejournal does have a huge networking capacity - and I really miss the friends list aspect of that system. I've created a blogroll, which I can add links to with an applet in my bookmarks folder, and it notifies me when people have updated their blogs. It's not the same as having LJ compile a list of the most up to date posts on my fandom blog, but it will do for now.

So post some art, woman!

I'm posting the alternative header I made on photoshop for Dansnark Art; the one that didn't fit the Blogger proportions. I thought of this as I was picking through collection of samples of Black Phoenix Alchemy perfume oils that I got with my last order, and toyed with the bottle labeled Siren.

The oil was very musky, not the fragrance of an ocean-dwelling Siren, I suspect. So I'm wearing Sudha Segara, which smells like nutmeg and condensed milk - it makes me think of a spice-carrying pirate ship.

2007-09-07T09:11:00.000+10:00

I used Google Images to check what images of me were up online, and happily found only images of my art work. And I have something on the Stampington website, on the ad for Gallery IV: it's halfway down, the mermaid called "Niamh".

It's a page from a tiny booklet that I whipped up the night before the last possible posting date for the Celtic issue, using clip art images that I stamped with Celtic style tattoos. Last minute projects are always so surprising. Sometimes in a good way.

The first post is the hardest.

2007-09-06T11:46:00.000+10:00

I've been on an art hiatus for most of 2007, and now that I'm poking around the arty end of the internet again, I see that art has moved to the blogosphere. I couldn't be happier about that! I'm not so familiar with Blogger, but I hope to be getting the hang of it soon.

So, best to post some art, I think! Apart from making myself a header and user photo on photoshop for this blog, I made an altered book for my Mum's birthday. I'm using photos posted at my new Flickr page - I usually use photobucket, so hopefully they won't be all hugemungous and weird.

The cover was collaged with various papers and coloured with dye inks and paints. I used gesso to soften the intensity of the colour.

This book was a quick and dirty alteration of an old cross stitch pattern book from the seventies. Because I was doing it fast, I only made two spreads, and used the entire book block to make a niche page.

This year, Mum's birthday coincided with the lunar eclipse. In the lead-up to the event, there were reports that the moon would be red in colour, and red tones crept into my work.

Okay, I think I'll hit the post button and see what happens.

ETA: That doesn't look right!
ETA again: Let's try it again!
ETA the third: Third time's a charm...