Playing with the Big Shot

Yesterday while tidying up my desk to do some work I got sidetracked by the Big Shot, I had only had a little play with it since April, and thought it was time to do some more experimenting, especially as I had been talking about it to Sandy of Dangling By A Thread and we decided we would have a virtual play together :)

This set of three below are from left clockwise:
Cut with Tim Holtz 'Baroque' die



Aluminium foil bonded to grunge paper coloured with alcohol ink, organza applied with Fuse FX and embossed with a Paisley embossing folder, this is gorgeous in real life I just can't capture the colours in the photo.



Aluminium foil bonded to grunge paper with double sided adhesive sheet, coloured with alcohol inks



Metal mesh bonded to pearlescent card with double sided adhesive sheet, think I will give this a rub with Staze-On ink pad as it looks a bit insipid.



The next three are a mixture of materials.
Top left: Pelmet Vilene, coloured with Adirondack Colourwash Spray, embossed with script and white acrylic dry brushed over the surface.
Top right:Gold card,embossed, I was going to rub the sandpaper over the surface, but can't get near my cupboard :)



This is the packaging that the Tim Holtz embossing folders come in,
I saw this tip on Tim Holtz video here
once embossed I coloured it with alcohol inks.



Below are the Spellbinders medallion dies, these dies are thin metal and are meant for cards, I found anything fibrous didn't cut very well, it did cut thin metal, pelmet vilene and grunge paper okay, I added extra shims and put it through a few times turning it each time.
I found that the Lutradur, fibrous paper and watercolour paper didn't cut well
To be fair these are quite intricate dies and I think the Nestabilities they make of frame shapes would do better on the more difficult fabrics.
Left shows the thin adhesive pelmet vilene inked and foiled, you will find how to do this on our free tutorial at Fibre In-Form Foil with Fusible Vilene,
the small medallion below on the right is from a coke can. Right is standard pelmet vilene,



For this one I didn't put the centre in and embossed the finished piece.



I thought I would try out some ordinary metal stencils and one of my home made stencils, this is aluminium foil adhered to cotton wadding, I was surprised how well the home made stencil did.
hard to get a picture of these darn metal effect.









Aluminium foil bonded to grunge paper and a mask was embossed, or I should say de-bossed as the mask is thin it won't push the design through the grunge paper, so you place it on the foil side.
The next one is aluminium foil on grunge paper and TH embossing folder,



I like the way the embossed part goes shiny and the surrounding areas are matt



Very subtle with the mask, maybe if this was backed with cotton wadding it would show up more.



Thought I would show this one, when I first tried the machine in April I cut a scroll in a coke can and some Lutradur



and then found this piece of fabric, it is crumpled aluminium foil painted with alcohol inks, glued to scrim, how to create this fabric can also be found here at Fibre In-Form in A Fascination with Foil free tutorial. the Tim Holtz Scroll die cuts through very easily.



This aluminium foil covered in transfer foil, was put over a Ten Second Studio mould, I had to play around with different plates shims and embossing mats to get it through, don't force the handle.
I think the aluminium foil was too thin to get good image but will try some metal shim, these wonderful moulds are from LB Crafts and they have a sale on at the moment on the moulds.
phew I was only going to put a few photo's to show what I have been up to :)

Little Book

A while ago I showed you this, to save going searching for the pictures I thought I would post them again,



Calico stitched to cotton wadding



Covered in Molding Paste



Black ink and too much bleach



more ink but the bleach kept working



Close up



More black ink and walnut ink



A spritz of Moonshadow Mist Tawny Turquoise.

This piece sat around like this for a while and this week I decided to make a little book.
I painted some pelmet vilene and stitched it to the back of the square, I then folded it in half corner to corner.



In my cupboard was a book on Titian, my son had bought it for me from a second hand bookshop while I was doing C&G as inspiration, It had large colour plates on each page and a description on the reverse, I decided it needed a new lease of life. I cut the pages into squares and gave the back of the page a quick paint with acrylic, ready to be decorated at a later date.



To finish off the pages I carefully burnt the edges with a small T-Light, making sure I had a wet cloth to stop the smouldering pages from burning too much.



I attached the pages with a simple stab stitch trapping a black bead on the outside.

April Postcard

Finally after a few false starts, I finally finished my card for Sandy.
I took a portion of the original picture and printed it onto tyvek.

I then made a little heart out of foiled fusible pelmet vilene, coloured with red ink. and made a pocket on some crystal organza.

I then placed this over the base fabric stitched around the edges and popped the heart in the pocket.It was very difficult to take a picture to capture the colours
Hope you like it Sandy.

Update on recent work

I haven't blogged much lately and that is because the things I have been working on have been for my articles in the new on-line magazine Fibre & Stitch
now that issue 1 is out I can show you my finished articles, the bag and wall hanging are both made with Lutradur, scrim, lace, layers of paint and stitch, the nature of the Lutradur makes the resulting fabric look like aged leather and has a lovely soft feel to it.
Marion ofArtmixter and Dijanne of Musings of a textile itinerant have produced a useful worksheet on using Lutradur, for a free copy e-mail lutradur@tiscali.co.uk

Below this sketchbook is made from Pelmet Vilene,Scrim, UTEE and machine stitch with simple stitched signatures,

Silver layer

I thought I would do a quick update on the torso, as I was waiting for things on another project to dry I decided to start the next layer, I used a silver acrylic, heavier at the bottom, then a dry brush effect nearer the top, as you can see, she has acquired a little friend, this paper-mache torso, has been sitting on the shelf along with a few other things waiting to be transformed.
Click on the picture to get a larger image, you can see the texture much better.

Painted Lady

Remember the torso from a few posts ago, well I finally began the makeover.
I have been busy lately with my articles for Fibre & Stitch, and decided I needed a little play time, so I thought I would make a start on the first layer, I could not find my black acrylic anywhere, so used a new tube of Payne's Grey, I used up the whole tube, even to cutting open the tube to get the last dregs of paint, I also ended up getting it on a lot of other things at the same time.
Once I had finished, I moved some stuff and there was my big tub of black paint
After leaving it to dry, I took a picture and although I could see a few specks of the base colour, I was amazed at how much showed up in the photo.
Whilst I was painting the base, which takes some time on the first coat, I was thinking on what I plan to do in the future, back in February my friend Lynda and I talked about doing an exhibition together later in the year, but with the opportunity of our involvement in Fibre & Stitch suddenly coming up in May, we put our ideas on hold.
I now feel ready to start thinking about what I want to do, I have not worked on a series of work, since City and Guild days, and I am looking forward to doing some research and sampling, and really getting my teeth into something new, ready for the new year.
Well back to the painted lady.

Sketchbook

I decided it was time for a new sketchbook to carry around in my handbag, this one is made out of decorated pelmet vilene, with a simple stab stitch signature, the beauty of this is its very light to carry around in my bag, and when its full, I just change the signature.
The one I use at the moment has had three new signatures I usually change it when I am going on holiday, and even though I still love it, I felt like a change.

Hey I did something unusual today,I had run out of kitchen foil and so, I used baking parchment for cooking, yes, you heard right, cooking.
Its not often that my supplies get used for what they were intended.

Samples Revisited,

I have been busy creating samples for my article in www.fibreandstitch while waiting for things to dry, I had a look through my box of old samples, some of you may remember I have been using a lot of them for postcards,
This little collage was for a sample in C&G, where we had to create a fabric from paper, I did the usual paper patchwork and tissue paper samples bonded to vilene interfacing, and then decided to tear up a selection of pictures I had taken of my garden, and this was the result.

I had just discovered the possibilities of using the computer, and printed the picture onto Silk Organza, I had never heard of freezer paper at the time and taped the Organza to some copy paper,then burnt the edges with a joss stick, yes that's how I burnt everything before I discovered fine tipped soldering irons. I mounted it onto two layers of Crystal Organza and some hand made paper

The picture below, was printed onto a sheet of Acetate, the inks were running out and
it printed up in really vivid colours, shame I could not repeat this effect.
These have been going strong for around 10 years and are holding up really well.

Doos and Windows Challenge

I started work on my doors challenge with Carol T'sgroup Textilechallenge, we have to use paper, fabric and a found object, I did my base a little differently to usual, I bondawebbed tissue paper and scrim to the pelmet vilene, and then randomly stitched to catch the edges of scrim, I have marked on the back were I need to fold it, the work is larger than shown as it wouldn't all fit on the scanner.

I then did a random paint of various greens and maroon paints in a thin wash,

Once this was dry I did a dry brush of gold and maroon over the whole surface.

The final layer was dry brushed with russet and browns again over the whole surface
next stage will be to maybe stamp over the surface, and then stitch to add the detail.Then I need to mooch through my stash for a found object to suit

Padfolio,

This is the Padfolio I made for Dianne (Fairy Di) for a one to one swap,below is a close up of the front, it is made from the Pelmet Vilene I painted up a few weeks ago, that's all of it used up now, the rest went on postcards. Will have to paint up some more, but giving up the hand stitching on it, too much like hard work these days.

This is the Padfolio opened out, I couldn't get the colours right on this one, for some reason

Inside the Padfolio hand dyed cotton.I just need to go and buy a pad for it, I had a new pad with lovely Turquoise pages, but it was larger than normal, and wouldn't fit, and as I wiggled the card backing to see if I could squeeze it in, the pages came away from the covers,and fell on the floor, ah well.

2nd Layer

This layer was a build up of Silver and Copper acrylic, used with a dry brush in thin layers as if your stencilling, allow to dry, this doesn't take long with the thinner layers, the close up (above) always come out darker for some reason.

3rd Layer, (Below) I used Liquitex Maroon Glossies, spreading the paint as far as each brush full will go gives you darker and lighter areas, cover the whole surface,

4th Layer (Below)
For this layer I used Purple System 3 Acrylic, again in a dry brush movement over the whole surface, It may look as if not much is changing, but each layer becomes a richer deeper colour, with glimpses of the underlying colours showing through, will continue the layers tomorrow