Swan pics and Photoshop

I have used my swan photos to produce one work which is in the Analogue:Digital exhibition.

It looks great on the computer monitor.  However, I had a bit of trouble printing it out.  I used treated cotton and our inkjet printer.  It came out much lighter than I had expected.  It was also A4, something I had not thought about.  So it was altogether too small. Back to the drawing board (the computer in this case).

I used the Distort - Wave - Square filter to break up a photo of the swans.

Then I cut and pasted some parts of other photos and placed them into some of the dark and boring spots. I copied and pasted parts of the image to put them into new files that would print on A4.  I even remembered to leave an overlap where they would need to be sewn together.

I tried bumping up the intensity of colour through the hue and saturation and it came out a bit green.  I decided not to worry about it, just play around with it.

Because the pieces were sewn together, I decided to just sew along some of the lines in the image when I was quilting it.

More digital printing

The work I have in the Analogue:Digital exhibition is another combination of digital photos I took overseas.  I started to work on another 12" square quilt for the online group but got sidetracked by the exhibition.  I used photos I took a few years ago in Scotland.
I found is fascinating to see white swans that were swimming around in icy water. It reminded me of my many readings of The Ugly Duckling and how it was affected by the snow and ice - we rarely get frozen water here in Melbourne.
It was amusing to see the swans having to swim in line in the unfrozen water and to see them sitting on the ice. They must have fabulous insulation.

So I had a few photos taken around Stirling Castle.  We also don't have white swans here, so that was part of the fascination too.
Then, last  year, I was lucky enough to be walking around Hyde Park in London when there was a photo shoot to promote the all male Swan Lake ballet.
(I had posted one of these photos before and when I looked for it I found that I had yet another picture of a white swan.)

I decided to play around with those images and see what I came up with. You'll have to wait with bated breath for the next post.

Analogue:Digital exhibition

The exhibition opened tonight and runs from tomorrow (the 14th of March) till the 24th of March. I have  a piece in it but found it a hard theme to work to.  It was good to catch up with other students, maybe for the last time.  The exhibition is sponsored by RMIT Arts and Culture and is for current and recently graduated students of the textile and fashion courses.  It is part of the L'Oreal Melbourne Fashion Festival. It was a chance for a few of us to take advantage of the chance to be in an exhibition.
I took a few photos, of the work of people I knew and who gave permission for photos.

Mary-Jane Walker, Butterfly Effect 

View of one of the rooms, mine is the small piece on the wall.

Linda Finger, Tumbleweed

Suellen Entwistle, Boro

As I said, the theme was Analogue:Digital and I found it hard, I don't think I do all that much that is digital.  Many of the works obviously had digital processes involved while others, like mine, used digital and then reverted to analogue techniques.  The melding of analogue and digital technologies was very interesting to see.

Actually, this exhibition is what has inspired me to play around with digital images and my home printer. There will be more posts about my adventures with digital printing. I have already posted a few, here and here.

Using Photoshop and printing onto fabric

I have been playing around with trying to get images onto fabric, using the bubble jet printer and some of my photos.  This has been partly inspired by the AusNZ Art Quilt online group's challenge, which is to make 12" square art quilts designed with a country other than Australia in mind.  The challenge will be on show at the Australian Quilt Convention soon.
I am not sure I am going to get my work done in time but I have been quite inspired to look at some of my photos and think about how I could use them.

I tried using treated cotton and that turned out ok, a bit duller than I had hoped.  I played around with two photos I had, one from France and one playing around with the shutter speed and making the lights blur.

Here is one version.  Unfortunately, I didn't realise that the purple colour was on a separate layer and it didn't print.  As the fabric is not that cheap, and I didn't have much, I decided not to worry.  I just used the one I printed out.

I used the Liquefy tool (under Filter) to play around with the lights.

I spent so much time getting the layers right and trying to intensify the colours that I forgot all I know about quilting and didn't make the quilt top the correct size.  So I have been fiddling around trying to make it 12" square.  Using an A4 printer makes it tricky getting the image large enough. 

Due to my somewhat messy file saving, I can't find the actual image I printed.  But here is a photo of the finished product.   As you can see, the colours are quite muted compared to the photos.  A problem with printing on fabric that has such a different texture to paper - and to the monitor.  Something I will have to adjust to I suppose.

I was looking up how to spell gryphon and found that I wanted to type in griffin.  Strange, I had been writing gryphon but just had to type griffin.  Both seem to be correct. 

Almost There

I have been working more diligently on my tapestry for the last few days.  I want to get it finished.  Once I get this close I start to get impatient.  I have finished the actual weaving, now I just have to do the hitching off, sewing of slits (yes, I could have done them as I went but I find that I tangle the threads), the tidying of the back, etc.  That will take a few more hours and I am over it for today.
I started the sewing of the slits and am not sure which is worse, doing it as I go or doing it afterwards.
I think it helped a little with the ripple but has not quite got rid of it.  I will see how it looks once I loosen the tension and take it off the loom.  Here's hoping it is not too distorted.
Because I might try to make an animation of the growing tapestry, I have been taking photos as I have worked.  I usually took photos using the automatic setting (I thought that would give me better continuity with colours) but I forgot once or twice.  The difference in settings is quite marked.

automatic setting

automatic with flash

not automatic, probably depth of field setting

 After discussions with a couple of people, I decided that my ripple, clearly seen above, was probably due to a combination of issues.  One is that I may have too much weft in the weaving, from not pulling hard enough when I turn back to finish a pass (I was trying NOT to pull too hard!).  The other thing is that I probably had looser tension in part of the warp.  I tried to overcome this by putting paper under the warp threads.  It did seem to lessen the ripple but didn't eliminate it completely.

One thing I have improved on is the sides, they are fairly straight- very pleasing.

Rug illusion

As I have mentioned before, I am interested in optical illusions and I have a site that comes automatically to my home page.  This one was of particular interest. It is of a rug that has been woven to look as if it has a lower level.
Maybe I should put the link on my sidebar.

March ATASDA meeting

Our meeting was amazing today.  Members of the national committee were down for a working weekend and attended our monthly meeting.  They all had samples of their work to show and tell.  What was especially interesting was the variation in techniques and outcomes.

Each presenter had wonderful work to show us.
We were also encouraged to keep meeting, running workshops, etc.  It took other branches time to get going and we need to be patient, as well as to keep working at it. We also heard about the different challenges each state faces due to various geographic issues.

It was encouraging to see so many local members there today. The next meeting will have a beading workshop as well as the meeting.  It will be on the second Saturday of the month as the first will be Easter.

Mariejka gave a talk about her resin work. She didn't demonstrate as the resin takes so long to set and it is not particularly easy to transport unset.  She was very informative and had some lovely samples to show us. I was too busy taking notes to take any photos.

Some of our local members also had show and tell.  The day was full from go to whoa.  I was getting a bit overwhelmed by the end, with all the wonderful ideas and examples.