Wyrdsmithing

Entangled in 3D…

Angela Porter2 Comments

Angela Porter Entangled Tetrahedron 1_19th Sept 2017

I’ve had an idea rattling around the old brainbox for a while – to use 3D nets and entangle them to form a 3D entangled drawing.

Ok, the patterns don’t wrap around all of the edges, however, on all but one the patterns kind of match up even though they’re not the same.

I’ve not coloured or added shading to the drawing (which I scanned and printed out so I could keep the original for future use) as I just wanted to see if it was something that would work.

I think it does work.  I suspect my yuletide decorations may be made from such things, with plenty of sparkle and glimmer!  Not to mention the more spooky ones for Hallowe’en…

Fancy having some to colour and construct?  Let me know!

Autumnly Entangled 5 and 6

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AutumnlyEntangled5and6_AngelaPorter_18Sept2017

Last two of the six Distress Oxide coloured 14 x 10 cm sheets of paper.

Autumnly Entangled 2

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AutumnlyEntangled2_AngelaPorter_14Sept2017

This morning, I spent time with pens and paper coloured with Distress Oxides, and this entangled creation appeared.  I may need to add some shading to it … but that can wait as I think I have a big vector drawing to do and that will take all of my concentration.

Autumnly Entangled 1

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AutumnlyEntangled1_AngelaPorter_14Sept2018

I’ve had a busy couple of days with this and that and the other.

Yesterday and today it’s been learning about vector files, images, graphics and how to get my artwork done as that kind of file and to a maker so she can use them to laser etch her products – more about this when I have photos of the projects!

Lots of head scratching, googling, and finally settling on downloading a program that works in vector graphics.  So, a lot of learning to do with that, but it’s easy, intuitive and makes a lot more sense than Adobe Illustrator; I chose Serif’s Affinity Designer.  I don’t know if it is as sophisticated as Illustrator, but I can’t see me wanting to get to that kind of level – I love Autodesk Sketchbook Pro way too much for that!

Certainly a different skill set is needed, but I’ll get there as I usually do.

After all the time on the ‘puter, I had the need to return to traditional media, and the photo above is what I’ve spent my evening doing.

First, the paper (approx. 14cm x 21cm), along with a few other sheets, was coloured with distress oxide inks.  Then I drew on it using a mixture of pens.

It was really nice to do, the colours of all the sheets are rather autumnal, and I’m looking forward to drawing on the others over the coming days.

Inspired by Charles Rennie Mackintosh

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Angela_8Sept2017

I do enjoy exploring different genres of art, and the Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau styles of art are ones that resonate with me.

I’ve loved the work of Charles Rennie Mackintosh for a very long time, but never really took time to explore the work and to use it as an inspiration for my own work.

I sketched the outline design on paper, then edited and tidied it up in Autodesk Sketchbook Pro.  I have used a mixture of gradient fills and colouring as if I was using a pencil or marker in other areas.  I’m now adding some typically ‘Angela’ intricate patterns to various areas, so this isn’t finished.

I really do tend to gravitate towards creating digitally these days, and loving it too I am, though I still like to sketch the bones of my idea out on paper, scan it in and then use that as a guide; I’ve still not got my head around the size on the page and the real size of the art that will result.

 

Autumn is on the way!

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Autumn Mandala 01Coloured Angela Porter

Autumn is nigh and it’s a lot more glorious because…

September has arrived at long last, along with the promise of the fiery blaze of glory that is autumn in a few weeks time.

Cooler mornings and evenings along with warm enough days, the quality of sunlight is softer, more golden too.

I really love this time of year, it’s my favourite!

Even more so that I no longer have the long fear/anxiety of returning to school as a teacher.

I don’t miss teaching one little bit!  I miss friends I had. I miss the more social interaction I had and the fun and laughter I had with colleagues and pupils.  What I don’t really miss is the constant fear, anxiety, worry, stress, pressure, bad attitudes, poor behaviour and constantly being looked at and assessed. All the things that led me to some very dark places that I found difficult to get out of.  No, it’s not ‘I don’t really miss’ these things – I really don’t miss these things, though I still get moments anxiety verging on panic when memories of various situations arise from the depths of my subconscious.

Arty pursuits

I’ve finished all the black and white line art for Eerily Entangled – my latest colouring book for Dover Publications.  I have two more to colour in for the book, but I’ll wait to see what my editor and her design team would like me to colour – there are so very many, if not all, I’d love to colour!

As well as this, I’ve spent quite a bit of time starting to organise my ‘pattern library’.  It’s something I like to do when I’m too tired to do anything else, when I’m feeling down and need a comforting not challenging activity, and when I’m lacking in inspiration; sometimes the patterns bring the inspiration I’m searching for, sometimes they just allow stuff to well up to the surface of my subconscious mind where my conscious mind can grab them and make use of them.

As a change of focus, I decided to draw some autumn themed mandalas, the one at the top of this blog entry being the first.

I’m a bit rusty at creating them after focusing on other things for a while, but the skills soon come back, often with new ideas or twists to old ideas, as well as new skills learned by my use of Autodesk Sketchbook Pro with my Microsoft Surface Book, which I used to create this mandala.

Playing with colour

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Angela Porter 29 August 2017Angela Porter 29 August 2018 A

I’ve been quiet around ‘tinternet for a couple of weeks – problems with my mood, instead of starting many new things I’ve been spending time organising a reference collection of my favourite patterns and designs of things like fungi and buildings and creatures and so on and its very much a work in progress!  The process of going through the familiar and organising them is comforting to me …

I have done some new drawings for the Eerie project for Dover – not many left to do for the book, then the hard work is deciding which two I would like to colour in the most, always a problem.

Plans are afoot for a change in my online presence too … more as that happens!

The above images show one artwork I started last night and finished this morning.  Most probably about 8 or 10 hours of work.  Distress Oxides, Cosmic Shimmer watercolours and a Sakura Glaze pen were used. When light strikes the artwork at just the right angle, the metallics and iridescents bring the artwork to life; it’s like it lights up all by itself.  A joyful feeling for sure as I look at it.

It was nice to work with colour and the more traditional media rather than digital art, though, yet again, I noticed how drawing with the Surface Pen on my Microsoft Surface Book are having an effect on my work on paper.

One thing I did enjoy was adding the sparkle and shimmer to the artwork, something I’ve not found out how to do digitally (or even if you can!).

So, I now have satisfied a need in me to work with colour and pen and I can turn my attention back to the illustrations for the Eerie book, and on to other things after that is done.

For today, I head off soon for counselling/EMDR, and to have my acrylic nails removed once again as they really do get in the way of me typing, art-ing, using my phone…and no doubt I’ll do some drawing while I have a late lunch between nail removing and counselling.

Cirque-doodle

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AngelaPorter_17Aug2017_ZenCircle01

This is what I’ve done with one of the Distress Oxide coloured circles I blogged yesterday.

It’s essentially finished, though I may add a few metallic highlights, and maybe some drops of 3D Crystal Glaze.

The Distress Oxides give a lovely soft feel to the paper and it is lovely to draw on.  The mixed media paper on it’s own is quite hard and bumpy and not a surface I enjoy working on with pen; the Distress Oxides and water spray have changed that.

I still have a few circles to draw on, but shortly I need to turn my attention back to things of an eerie nature.

New Distress Oxide Colours – I finally have them!

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I finally got my happy hands on the new Distress Oxide colours today!  I had enough time between appointments to have a quick play, so four sheets of mixed media paper, some circle and tag dies and my Sizzix Big Shot as well as 1″ and 3/4″ square paper punches this is what I’ve ended up with.

The colours are lovely, different, kind of, to the original Distress Inks, but lovely.

So, I now have a lot of bits to doodle and draw on!

Today’s Entangled doodle

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This is today’s little piece of art; it’s 14cm x 10cm, drawn on natural coloured mixed media paper from Claire Fontaine.  I used a mixture of Sakura Micron and Uniball UniPin pens, along with a white Sakura Gelly Roll pen, a brown Kuretake Zig Clean Colour Brush Pen with a damp paint brush, and some dots of metallic copper paint.