3D Projects
College – Term 5 – Final Major Project – another paper craft light shade

Posted on 8th April 2013 by Neil

Well after a flurry of activity over the last two weeks watching my new studio get installed, and then decorating it, constructing furniture and moving in – as well as emptying out and putting back to right the dining room, conservatory and some of the craft room – I have my first ‘working’ day in the studio.

Of the various things I have to catch up with, college work is one priority as I have a mid-way assessment tomorrow. Consequently, I have taken pics of my latest light shade in my series. This one features one of the patterns I gleaned from a visit to the Islamic artefacts at the British Museum, drawn into Illustrator, adapted for the round and then screenprinted in opaque white ink onto thick tracing paper, and then constructed onto a card frame. As with the previous post, here are photos of the shade in daylight, and internally lit at night.

3D Projects
Bottle Cap Memories

Posted on 6th April 2013 by Neil

It’s Altered or Recycled theme this month over at the WOW! Embossing Powder Challenge blog. This is what I came up with for my design team submission. I need to make an admission – my intention was to use recycled beer bottle caps for this project, but I’ve not had bottled beer for a little while and ran out of time to collect any from the pub… So the project has switched from ‘recycled’ to ‘altered’!

Do you find pouring resin too expensive? Or takes too long to set? Me too, so I came up with an alternative: I’ve used molten WOW! Clear Gloss Ultra High to create the domed glazing in each of the bottle cap frames, and WOW! Earthtones to colour the stamped lettering. Hope you like it, and more details on how to make your own are here.

I’m also happy to accept commission requests if anyone would like one made – all you’d need to do is provide the digital photos/scans. Email me if you’re interested.

Card Craft
Blue Hues in a Can

Posted on 27th March 2013 by Neil

It’s a ‘Favourite Colour’ theme over at The Crafting Cafe, and I decided my favourite colour this month is blue, and used the fabulous Floral Watering Can from their sponsor Delicious Doodles for my base image. I recently fell in love with Letraset AquaMarkers, bought the entire set, and played with them some more for this card.

I started by printing two copies of the image onto 90gsm watercolour paper using my laser B&W printer. I added AquaMarkers to the crosshatched areas of the design (as these will be the darkest) and dragged the colour across the rest of the space with a waterbrush pen. I added extra layers of colour where needed by allowing the first layers to dry before painting on colour picked up from a palette (draw on a plastic sheet with the AquaMarker). That’s how I built up the mottled watercolour effect on the can and the shadow.

For added depth (not easily seen on the pic) I coloured in the second copy and cut out selected items, edged them in black and layered them decoupage stye onto the flowers. Try to choose things that aren’t overlapped by anything else and you’ll get the foreground elements perfectly.

Pens used:
Can – Pebble Grey
Flowers – Deep Sapphire/Storm Blue/Vintage Blue/Mediterranean
Background – Pebble Grey/Frost Blue

Mounted on black card over Bazzil on 14x14cm ‘linen’ style card. The metallic strip at the bottom is by Letraset and helps ground the image.

Let me know if you’d like a more in-depth/video tutorial on using AquaMarkers. I think they’re fab!

About me
Demo’ing again – NEC 23rd-24th March

Posted on 18th March 2013 by Neil

Hi all – I’m demo’ing again for WOW! Embossing Powders on their stand at the Hobbycrafts exhibition at the NEC this coming weekend. I’ll be there on Saturday and Sunday either on the demonstration table or leading the classes, so do come and say hello. Here are three samples of techniques I’ll be demo’ing – and apparently there will be new moulds to demonstrate too!

3D Projects
I’m a Certified Powertex Trainer!

Posted on 18th March 2013 by Neil

Yesterday, I had a very pleasant day workshop with Brit from Powertex British Isles. Powertex is a range of products based round a liquid fabric hardener. Having completed the workshop, I’m now certified to train you how to make figurines such as these:

They are 19 inches high, and constructed from wood and plaster formers, foil, masking tape, pressed mulberry fibres and old t-shirts all coated with Powertex and pigments. Let me know if you’re up for a training session in my new studio later in the year!

3D Projects
College – Term 5 – Final Major Project – Paper crafted light shades

Posted on 11th March 2013 by Neil

It’s already March, and only two weeks before we finish Term 5. One more term to go, and that’s my college course done and dusted. If it weren’t for my new studio to look forward to working in, and the list of jobs to do in the house, I know I would be dreading the end of college. Though I was unwell last week, I did carry on with my final major project. It’s grown out of looking at Islamic geometric patterns – I’ve learnt to construct geometric shapes with a compass and ruler, transferring them into Illustrator, and then finally applying them to 3D polyhedra. I settled on a truncated cuboctohedron as my main construction, and played about with various construction techniques.

Here are just four of the anticipated dozen final pieces. Some are uninspiring in daylight, but come alive when internally lit. Others inspire in both lights. I can tell you that I got a blood blister in my finger tip from all the scoring of folds. I can reveal that the shadowfold light required 360 separate knots. And that I stuck down each of the 400 petals on the frilly one! All are handcrafted (though I did use the Cricut machine to cut out the shapes to my design!) and nothing more than fabric or paper and glue. They are roughly 6-7 inches in diameter and designed to sit over an inexpensive battery powered LED light (£1 for two in Poundland!).

Tangle Patterns
Nabu – tangle pattern

Posted on 9th March 2013 by Neil

This is the last tangle pattern I’ve based on Islamic art pieces in the British Museum and the Victoria & Albert Museum. This originally appeared on a glazed terracotta tile in the Nabu Temple, Borsippa (near Babylon) in around 600-500 BC. It seems that all the doodles we do were being done since way way back when! I found it easier to do the teardrops in the border starting in each corner and looping toward the centre circle, rotating the page for each corner.

Continue reading →

3D Projects
Arabian-style Lantern

Posted on 6th March 2013 by Neil

I’ve created this Arabian-style lantern from scratch – paper crafting at its most time-consuming! For this version, I’ve used WOW! Embossing Powders to coat most of the surfaces and more pictures and instructions are here. A template for those brave enough to do the cutting is here.

Tangle Patterns
Throne Room – tangle pattern

Posted on 2nd March 2013 by Neil

The third of four tangle patterns based on items of Islamic art in the British Museum and Victoria & Albert Museum. This one is based on glazed tile decoration in the throne room of Nebuchadnezzar II in Babylon, around 605-562 BC. The colour scheme is white daisies on a royal blue background with orange highlights and the centre diamonds in a pale blue. This pattern will repeat well as a border, or keep repeating the diamonds to fill in an area.

Continue reading →

Card Craft
Tattered Flowers in a Paper Vase

Posted on 28th February 2013 by Neil

I’ve taken a bit of time out from designing for my college course to make this canvas featuring a paper craft vase and paper craft, die cut, hand coloured and constructed flowers. I’ll be entering it into Tim Holtz’s Tattered Floral Challenge as it is his Tattered Floral die that I used to cut the flowers from 160gsm thin card. The vase is made from the same card to my own design – SVG file available if anyone would like it…

Each flower layer was wrinkle free distressed in first a layer of Fired Brick and Festive Berries both sides, dried and then wrinkle free distressed in a layer of Fired Brick with Ripe Persimmon. They were then dried before being spritzed and flicked with water and left to dry naturally. The centres were punched and then sprayed with Dylusions Granite spray. The flowers were assembled onto florists wire and stuck together with matt multi medium and left to dry over night before being glued into the vase and onto the canvas background.

Here’s the inspiration pic, a vase of flowers in our lounge: