Kathy and I are thrilled to bits that the wonderful Michael Demeng has offered to teach another class for us. It will be the intriguing Island of Demented Toys. If you are interested in the details, join SisterArts by clicking the button in the sidebar. Remember we are in Australia, so it could be along way to travel (though that hasn't deterred one very keen new member!).
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Saturday, January 24, 2009
New Piece and Announcement
Still Life
For a while now, I have been wanting to do another canvas using some of the techniques taught by Traci Bautista. I have had the petals cut for quite some time but never managed to get any further. As I had to miss Myday I decided today was the day. I'm unsure about the pink background, but overall, I'm pretty happy with the result.
And now for the announcememt ..........
My sister, Kathy, and I have started a new Yahoo group Sister Arts to promote any workshops we may organise in the future. Last year we organised workshops with Michael Demeng, Ro Bruhn and Judy Wilkenfeld. We like to stay small and only organise a couple of workshops a year, ones we really want to do ourselves.If you would like to join Sister Arts click the button in the sidebar.
I have been so flat chat I haven't written anything about Judy's 2 day workshop here yet. I am a very slack blogger I'm afraid. It doesn't help that my graphics card seems to be cooked. I have had problems for ages but now, the computer crashes continually and I can't really afford to get it fixed, because I am frantically trying to get enough money together for a second trip to Turkey, and then to Greece at the end of May. Anyway, Kathy has done a slide show of the workshop on her blog so if you want to check it out, head over there kattstuff to check it out.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Gaza Ceasefire Petition
There has been too much bloodshed in the Middle East. Sign a petition to be published in the Washington Post, showing that people all over the world demand a comprehensive ceasefire and peace plan which will protect lives on both sides.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Photoshop Art
As I promised myself, I have spent a good part of the day having a good play with Photoshop. I didn't follow any particular course of instruction, but did refer to the beginners' guide of the Focus guides for some help.
I started with an image from a magazine cover (I'm not showing it to you for copyright reasons) and used a lot of cloning, healing and smudging to replace a lot of text and get more of the colours I wanted. I saved that and used it as the basis of a couple of other pieces.
On the first piece, I then added some brushes, creating a different layer for each brush, so I could delete them later on if I wanted to without having to do it all from scratch again. The first brush I used was from 500mlfossils9. I'm not sure where these came from originally. This site says "created by biteintoacloud" but that may have been the package not the brushes.
The next brushes I used were eyes from avh brushes autumn sonnet. (And yes, I know they are different! A job for another day!)
I then opened a pic I had of some branches, desatuated it, upped the contrast and used the magic wand to select the tree, and then cut it. I pasted it onto a new layer with a transparent background, and resized it to where I wanted it. I used a black paint bucket to make it as dark as possible.
Once I had all the layers, I decided I could merge the brushes with the background. I saved all this as a psd file. I used a layer mask to obscure the branch so I could save a copy without it. I then reverted to the old file, went back through the history until I had deleted the mask, merged all the levels and saved it as a jpg.
With the second pic, I duplicated the layer with the eyes on it ( after I had used some of the tools in the "liquify" filter ) so that I could erase bits etc without losing the original background. I noticed that the bit of branch on the right eyebrow looked like a horn, so I decided to move the one on the left and make it look more like that on the right. By playing around with the layers I was able to cut it from where it was, clone some layer underneath, and line it up with the eyebrow. It still didn't look right so I copied the bottom bit of the right "horn", flipped it and pasted it over the left one. With a bit of erasing and healing, I think it turned out OK.
In the final piece I simply added a mouth using a brush from Obsidian Dawn. I'm not sure about this. The mouths available were all bit too voluptuous for what I was aiming at, and as it goes right over where the fossil is situated, I think it looks too pouty. I need to search for some different mouth brushes.
I'm pretty happy with my second Myday. I am learning heaps and loving it. Photoshop is such a brilliant tool. I've gone through what I've done in detail not because I think I've created anything great, but it does show what can be achieved with only a little knowledge and some time to play!
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Second Week of keeping resolution
Yes, I know it is early days and here in Australia many people are still on summer holidays, so the demands are not here yet, but still, I am pleased to announce that it is Wednesday (Myday) and I am doing things creative, as I resolved. It is 10.00am and I am already at the computer. I have made and embedded my play list. It will do for the time being until I learn how to add stuff from my computer, as a lot of what I want to add can't be found on Playlist.com
I haven't made any art so far this week but I have been looking at some of my photos from Italy and thought I might just add a few from time to time for inspiration. I know they certainly inspire me.
This one is from the Venetian island of Burano. I have taken photos that show more, but this just blows me away with the walls of colour. What a colourful, exuberant place. I really want to create when I look at it.
I have numerous photos along the canal, and once again, many are better that this next one, but I love the colour. Venice, truly is magical on many levels and is certainly inspirational ( even if was a killer for my arthritis!)
Here's a shot I took at the Guggenheim Gallery, which is a must on any visit to Venice. I love how this sculpture both merges with and reflects its environment, but also distorts it.
I adore sculpture. If I ever come back, I hope I get to be a sculptor!
That's enough of my photos for now. My plans for the rest of the day are to take a walk, and then continue on my voyage of discovery with Photoshop. I have downloaded a number of tutorials over the past couple of years and bought several Focus Guides, which are pretty easy to follow, but I never made the time to sit down and work with them. That is going to change with Myday
Friday, January 2, 2009
New Year's Resolution
Well it isn't really. I made this resolution in September last year when I decided I was not going to stand again for election to the committee of my branch of University of the Third Age.
I am going to set aside a day of the week to pursue my creative interests. That will go ahead of all else except family emergencies or something I desperately want to do which can be done at no other time. Apart from that, other people's needs/wants will have to wait. My creativity, such as it is, really suffered this year from putting everything else first. I took a couple of classes but had almost no time to practice anything I learned. It felt like I had virtually given up on the one thing I wanted to do most when I retired.
I also hope to be more regular with my blogging, starting with putting up some of my fav photos of our trip- just as soon as I resize them to something manageable on the web.
Some Art at Last!
Happy New Year everyone! I was really chuffed to have the greater part of New Year's Eve and New Year's Day free.
For the first time in a very long time I was completely free to play and leave my mess lying around until I was finished!
I wanted to try Patricia Seggebruch's Alcohol Reduction Technique from the Nov/Dec edition of Cloth Paper Scissors. I was so pleased with my first attempt that I forgot to scan it before I started to collage over the top. Unfortunately I didn't like my next effort nearly as much. I didn't follow the directions properly and it showed! Perhaps it won't be so bad when I do something with it.
Here's my first effort-
Missing You
Technorati Tags: Collage,Alcohol Reduction Technique
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)