Half A Pound of Tuppenny Rice… and a few socks

Posted on 1st November 2015 by perfectly4med

I’m still in making mode for the church Christmas Fayre… and inspired by yet another Facebook shared video, I have three snowmen families gracing my studio table, one of which has chosen this as their official Christmas card. Nobody mentioned that sports socks are now rarely just white, seemingly requiring colour splashes to be able to match them up when mixed in the gym bag. Good old George at Asda came up trumps though 🙂

And prices have gone up since rice was tuppenny… with each family weighing in at 1333g of Basics rice, that’s more like 3lbs of rice for £1. Doesn’t quite have the same ring to it.

And the pompoms, despite a wonderful gizmo to help, still took an hour to make and sew on. I think it was worth it though for the finishing sparkling touch.

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Perfect Packaging III: Time & Technology Key Fobs

Posted on 31st October 2015 by perfectly4med

I’ve made a few key fobs over the last couple of days (yet more to fit on my table for the church Christmas Fayre), using a ‘steampunk’ antique brass pendant with quite a deep bezel. I’ve added a layer of Pebeo Prisme Fantasy Paint first, and allowed that to dry before starting to layer pieces of old computers and watch mechanisms. I used Lisa Pavelka’s Magic Glos UV hardening resin, which is crystal clear and sets within minutes in my Imagepac UV box, allowing layering of the encapsulated items. After a final brim-full top up with resin and a long harden under the lamps, I added an antique brass split ring to complete the key fob.

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From the archive: ‘Autumn’ mixed media canvas

Posted on 28th October 2015 by perfectly4med

I’ve been clearing out the detritus that was my study, and found a 16MB flash card – that shows how long the pile has been sitting there as my smallest now is 16GB! On it were a few photos of this project. This is one of my first mixed media pieces – I made it at least 8 years ago. Combining acrylics, UTEE, Liquid Pearls, Stickles, gliding foil (back when it was in sheets not tubs), die cut or punched Bazzil card stock, translucent plastic, and distress inks. I added words later, such as ‘autumn’, ‘fall’ and ‘leaves’. Perfect piece to share at this time of year. As Albert Camus said ‘autumn is the second spring, when every leaf is a flower’.

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The Art of Liquefaction

Posted on 8th October 2015 by perfectly4med

There’s always that moment when you see something on Facebook or Pinterest that you think – I could do that. This project was one of those – a link to a YouTube video that popped up on my timeline (sorry – haven’t found it since). It was in German, and seemed to be 20 minutes of the two presenters describing – but not actually doing – the process to make these cast concrete votives.

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Not all wax crayons are created equal

Posted on 6th October 2015 by perfectly4med

It’s amazing how much one can achieve when the computer isn’t accessible. Until after lunch yesterday, I was upgrading the operating system which meant Facebook wasn’t a constant presence, my current shopping list wasn’t visible, and the radio was off.

Instead, I painted six blackboards, tidied the studio after creating a bomb site making samples for Craftwork Cards, prepared for last night’s art journaling session, dealt with a duplicate order delivery, crocheted a sampler panel for a scarf, and had a go at some crayon art (pictured above). Now then – all the pictures of similar projects on the internet show nice long dribbles of shiny molten wax. My pound-shop crayons boiled and became an immobile gloopy mess more reminiscent of glutinous bread dough than freely flowing molten wax. The resultant solidified mass is actually quite brittle, and as it is on stretched canvas, is easy to crack. Polishing makes no difference. Which leads me to wonder – are they made of some strange plastic?

And it leaves another conundrum – do I leave the space empty at the bottom, or find suitable text or carefully place some oil paint as faux wax stalagmites underneath the drips?

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The Apothecary: Sign writing and Vignettes

Posted on 15th September 2015 by perfectly4med

I posted a week or so ago the start of an assemblage in a printer’s tray – The Apothecary. Over the last few days I have been making a sign for the top, building it from foamcore board, and coating it with several layers of paint to try and match the colour of the tray. Eventually, I ended up brushing on some tan wax shoe polish and buffing it back, and adding a small amount to the wood exterior of the tray. I think it warmed up the wood and helped make the both seem a whole. The inlay ‘brass’ line is Letraset metallic tape, and the lettering and logo are cut from 160gsm card, layered four deep and then painted with Treasure Gold Liquid Leaf Florentine and then a quick layer of Classic Gold.

I’ve also taken the photos into Photoshop and added vintage effects.

Now I’ve been looking at it from the photos, and getting a little distance on it, I’m wondering if the answer to making the bottles both accessible and not able to fall out is to make a glass door and change it into a cabinet?

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The Apothecary: an assemblage

Posted on 7th September 2015 by perfectly4med

This is very much a work in progress, but since progress seems to be going smoothly and fairly quickly, I’ve something to share mid-way. I was sorting out the sheds on Saturday and came across this printer’s half-tray that had been tucked away. I have a feeling it’s another save from my grandfather’s outhouse.

I brushed it down, glued it back together, and then lined it with Tim Holtz French Industrial papers with Walnut Stain distress ink to blend it all in. I then set about finding all my little bottles that I’ve accumulated – a combination of Tim Holtz and Woodware. They looked a little too clean, so I’ve added Latte and Mushroom alcohol inks to give them an aged/nicotine stained look.

I raided the kitchen for every spice and herb I could get into the bottles and decided to leave one shelf free to hang some bay leaves in, and to make a mini-pestle and mortar to fit. Now all I needed was some labels, so I have spent the afternoon making my own in Illustrator and cutting them out on the Silhouette Cameo before ageing with distress inks and water. Next was working out how to get a liquid appearance in the tall bottles without it actually being liquid. UTEE came to the rescue, and I think it turned out ok – although there was some shrinkage as it cooled, so that might not remain the case. Here’s what it looks like now:

I’ve had a lot of fun with the labels, finding the latin names for everything, including the silver balls, tapioca and hundreds and thousands. The shelf is ready for the leaves and pestle and mortar and I think a couple more adverts as well. I’m not too sure if I should stick the bottles in place, or keep them loose so that they can be pulled out… or fall off when on the wall…

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Zenspired Monograms

Posted on 14th August 2015 by perfectly4med

At the beginning of the year I decided to join in one of these ‘pay it forward’ type of messages that flew round Facebook during January. I don’t know if any of the five that are about to receive the actual versions of the following works follow my blog – if they do, their surprise will be lessened, but hopefully the anticipation heightened! I’ve spent roughly 2-3 hours on each of the Strathmore Tiles 4″X4″(Toned Gray), drawing each with Pigma Micron pens, Signo white gel pens and shading with Stabilo Aquarellable white and black pencils. The style was inspired by the book, Zenspirations by Joanne Fink.

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Make your own custom wax seal

Posted on 13th August 2015 by perfectly4med

Last weekend I went to a craft show, and amongst the ridiculous amounts of dies I noticed a dip pen and wax seal stand. Wax seals have a sense of class, of authenticity, of originality, even in the electronic age. And I’ve wanted my own for ages (my faux ones still didn’t quite hit the mark), along with some of the gorgeous pens. But where would be the originality be in a mass produced metal wax seal stamp? It was at that point I thought – I could make my own, couldn’t I? Thus started another steep learning curve (in between doing all the glass etching).

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Glass Etching with Armour Etch

Posted on 12th August 2015 by perfectly4med

I have learnt three things on this little project:

Etching glass with Armour Etch through a vinyl stencil that I cut on my Silhouette Cameo is quick, simple and delightfully effective. This inexpensive Ikea glass is now carrying the branding that I use for my studio.
Photographing glass, like mirrors, is incredibly tricky! I spent roughly 15 minutes etching the glass, and then the next hour learning how to take the photograph! I ended up lighting it from beneath with a small LED push-light with a sheet of paper between it and the glass to dim it slightly. All of this was in a blackout tent, with a small amount of light from above, and poking my phone through a small slit in the tent. The first attempts had so much reflection of both the lighting and the surroundings, the etching wasn’t visible.
Cleaning the glass digitally was so much more effective than in real life. I’d done my best using alcohol and non-shedding cloths, but the pesky dust specks really showed up despite my best efforts. The Spot Healing Brush in Photoshop really came to the fore to remove them. Though not perfect, I think as a bit of amateur product photography I can get away with it 😉

All that’s left to do is the rest of my glasses!

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