Fun with Arts and Crafts

My friend Sue, from Fiber Lingo, and I have begun getting together now and then to learn new techniques that we can both incorporate into our own work. A couple of weeks ago I went over to her house and we made felted miliflori beads drawing from her vast collection of beautifully colored fleece. We started by rolling up individual colors then grouping those together and covering the whole bunch of them with even more wool. At the end of this step our logs looked like this: (mine is the bluer one)

Next we wet them with warm soapy water and began to roll the bejeebers out of them. When we decided that they were compacted tightly enough we put them on the floor and continued to roll them, this time using our feet! If this wasn't enough the next step was to beat them into complete submission:

All of this abuse was well worth the effort when we cut off the ends of our rolls and saw what was inside:

Our final step was to cut a 1/2 inch slice that would become a bead once it, and its sisters, had been carefully soaked in acrylic floor finish to keep them in one piece:

I may end up having to shave my beads as I did not use merino on my outer wrap or, maybe, the acrylic will hold the hairs in - we'll see - it's an adventure!
Thanks to Interweave Felt Magazine and their article by Carol Cypher for the directions for this project.

And speaking of adventures, next time I'll tell you all about our learning to use Sue's enamel kiln! For red-hot glass and metal it is soo cool!!

On The Live Side

This evening I dropped the three prints off at the ACWC for the annual Local Color Members show which opens next Friday, January 15th. Two TtVs and one plain ol' photo. (They don't fit on here very gracefully, but I suppose that a lot of that has to do with my inability to make them conform at this point. Oh, wait, they're looking better!) These prints are not (yet?) available on Etsy but might be at some point if I figure out a better way of getting them printed - I don't want to impose on friends every time I need one. While there will be more work being dropped off the rest of the week, there is a surprising lack of photographic representation this year. On my quick look through the stacks, I didn't see any others though there must be some in there somewhere. There are, however, quite a lot of paintings, pastels and drawings and even a few bits of fiber art floating around. This year is the Arts Council's 35th Anniversary and their theme is Progressions so we'll see how much everyone has progressed! One area I need to work on in order to progress is learning to take better photographs of my photographs - the problem is more than just using a tripod, I'm thinking I need some sort of lighting set-up. That can all wait for now. In their own (here blurry) way I think the two TtVs look pretty good and I like the other but have to stop buying brown frames.

Am I Back Yet?

I think I'm back, just still can't fight that semi-depressed nuh feeling regarding all things photographic. Should probably use this blog for the crafty stuff and start a new one for the photos. It's all getting way too complicated and labor intensive - especially when I'm sooooo nuh.
On the up side: I have three photos ready for the Arts Council for Wyoming County Member's exhibit, Local Color. Barbara, over at Days Light, printed them for me and they look great! I should take pictures of them all framed up before I drop them off tomorrow. that way I can post them some time in the next six months.
I also have a book making class over in Perry in the near future, don't know the dates yet but I'd better get started on ordering supplies.
Back later with actual pictures.

Blog-parison

Wordpress is a cleaner, harder looking site while Blogger is somewhat warm and fuzzy in relation. Blogger seems to have solved some of its earlier problems with photo handling and the like. Right now the thing that is really pushing me toward Blogger is that Wordpress keeps losing my header image and it really pisses me off! Especially when I'm trying to restore it and Safari locks up and the dogs gather round to stare at me whining and looking expectant. Tonight's round goes to Blogger!
   As I am viewing the above little rant that I pasted into Blogger i can't help but notice that the background is white. Where did that come from? I am still giving Blogger a slight edge tonight, through no fault of their own, as the dogs did not find this to be their optimum moment for asking out. Now I must paste this addendum to Wordpress and see what new development turns up there. Tonight I do also like that Wordpress changes whatever font is pasted into the font being used on that post. If I wanted a different font this could be a problem but tonight I just want everything to blend in. Sorry - this will have to be a draw.

Drink Me!

Here's one from yesterday using the magnifier as a frame. Took a lot of spots out of it and kind of like it. Do wonder if I should reverse it to be like real life but think that the looking-glass effect is helpful in removing this place from . . . .  Never-mind - now I have to reverse it just to see.
    Now - - One is as you would see it at the lake - the other is straight from the viewfinder. I like them put together like this. (You'll have to imagine the two right next to each other - I don't know enough to change the layout to get them that way, sorry)Which do you think is an actual place?
   I think I need to make a longer tube in order to get the entire square frame in the shot. Maybe tomorrow or the next day. Then I need to figure out the printing aspect of the process. I also wonder how it would be if I were to slip a little hdr in here too. If you use enough tricks it will have to be good - won't it?
   I need to make a longer tube in order to get the entire square frame in the shot. Maybe tomorrow or the next day. Then I need to figure out the printing part of the process. I also wonder how it would be if I were to slip a little hdr in here too. If you use enough tricks it will have to be good - won't it? We are supposed to have some cloudy, rainy days here for the next week or so. What will happen if I crank on the dynamic range in a monochrome environment using a process that drains the color to begin with? Stay tuned!

TTV + M

This was taken after I made a fixture on which to rest my digital camera on the twin lens. The interior magnifier popped up so this is shot through that with only a small portion of the ground glass visible. The glass and magnifier are both very dirty but I think that could be a slight advantage as I could photoshop random spots out of each image. Or, I could clean it the best I can and leave the spots in every image much as Atget had his consistent negative holder markings. This will work itself out in time.

Blogxperiment!

In starting a blog for the Propanicus Moon Etsy store the question has become whether to use Blogspot/Blogger or Wordpress. I know that there are more options but these are the two I am familiar with. My initial reaction is that Blogspot looks to be the goto site for the artsy-craftsy set and could quite easily generate much more traffic. Wordpress, however, has a much more logical and extensive Dashboard making editing and tracking a breeze. There are more pros and cons for each site and I will get to them as this trial progresses. For now I will be listing the same post on each site and see what floats to the top. Please feel free to comment and throw in your two cents - more opinions are always welcome. Most importantly; if you like what you're seeing Spread The Word!!