Bowdacious

That is the title of This Thursday's challenge and I have had some fun with this today.

I have re-discovered my vintage collection of images and photos.

This image I have coloured with water colour pencils with the aim to make it look like a dress designer's sketch.

I added some different samples of satin ribbon at the bottom - so you can choose a colour variation if you want it made up! (Joke).

Altered CD Christmas

A very traditional Christmas - Victorian Style - Altered Art CD





This took hours of work over several days - so I am keeping it for myself for this year

Gothic Arch for Mandy's Swap

Postage Stamp ATC - 'Catherine of Arogan'

I had fun doing Catherine of Arogan - I just wish I had all six of Henry VIII's wives. Still she was the first and didn't lose her head!

The backing I have made into a mirror image of the postage stamp, water coloured it, white washed it, then gave it two coats of varnish to make it look like one of those old oil paintings you see in stately homes in the UK.

Sadly the scanned image does not show the effect

The Theme for November is the colour Green

These are for an ATC swap on Zuzu's forum. We do a different colour each month - and this one is green.

I scanned these into the computer - but I am not keen on scanning as it magnifies the image so that it is bigger than in reality - and so you get a different perspective than you would with the naked eye. The colours are sharper and darker and smoother not 'coloured in' looking as the scan makes them look

I coloured photo paper card with alchohol inks and when dry I stamped on the butterfly image and cut it out.

The backing card is green too although the scan makes it look cream. It
has been stamped, and I have painted colour on the flowers and leaves.

All the edges are painted lime green as a frame - but for some reason the scan hasn't picked up some of them!





For the above I have stamped the butterfly directly onto the card and also the flowers and foliage which I painted as above.

One more to do - might do a totally different medium for that - just waiting for some inspiration to kick in.

Indigo Swap - Zuzu's Forum

I remember seeing the film 'The Color Purple' and being moved by it - so this is what I was thinking of when I made this - from a stamped image Kath sent me - for which I am very grateful It took ages to colour in with watercolour pencils and gold pen, and then I went over the black areas, and coloured the white mounting surround black. The textured backing card I have stamped.


I was thinking of Zuzu, for whose forum I was making these ATCs. She is getting married today - and is wearing a gorgeous deep red corset - alas the colour scheme for this swap is Indigo. I added some texture with the different shades of purple threads, and in reality it is deeper shades of purples, and the background is inked with silver penwork by me.


The Warrior - a stamped image from my friend Kath, which I have coloured in different shades of purple.

I was try to show her strength by drawing in the 'Auras' around her!

I am not sure if these are good enough to enter - but I did have a happy four hours making them today.

Architecture Swap - For Mandy

This one was made on white card, with a rich cream backing paper which I stamped with Latin text. I carefully inked around the edges to try to give it an 'aged' look with the addition of distressed embossing powder. This I carried across to the architecture to link it all together - and to give the feel and impression of stonework. I gilded the fairy wings to give a focal point.




Black and white study on a black card which has been embossed with a black shiny powder to give the effect of pebble dashing. There is embossing on the building which highlights the fancy brickwork,arch and door.



A black and white work, with a soft white stamped background, the silver on the foreground images looks smooth and dull silver to the naked eye.



I am delighted that Mandy chosen this one as her hostess gift. For some reason you can not see the colouring.

Black card stamped with latin writing, the house I coloured with water colour pencils a pale shade of grey, the glass in the windows a soft pale yellow so that it looks like the lights are on in the house and gives it depth.

The Venus De Milo is coloured pale cream with water colour pencils and the foreground flowers are coloured yellow to mirror the windows - but slightly darker.

I had a real struggle with this theme, but am so glad that it stretched my imagination to think of ways to interpret it. And of course I had a very happy three hours or so 'playing' in my studio making them.

Bathing beauties - ATCs for an organised swap

I have been spending far to much time doing manual labour - and other things - and not spent enough time for 'myself' relaxing - so this afternoon as it was raining, I remedied the fact and spent four wonderful hours making these.

These were all monochrome photos to start with!


Having been posed in a Victorian studio, I wanted to 'blur' the fact so have altered this photo and the others, for a 'Vintage Bathing Beauty Swap' but I am not sure that they will be right for it.

The seal I stamped on - to add a bit of fun - it came from USA, I quite like the way that the the foaming sea in the background gives a nice natural seal-like texture to its back.



This one is another 'posed' photograph. I have added layers and layers of mulberry paper to give it texture and to represent a foaming sea. I spent a lot of time colouring and shading these photos - and especially the mulberry paper otherwise it would have looked flat. The stamp I used came from America.


Here is the last one - I hope they are not too 'arty farty' for the swap.



Another Victorian photo which I have 'messed about with' to make it look all wishy washy to give the feel of the seaside.

It was originally a studio shot with a plain background and she was sitting on a chair - the shoes are a giveaway clue!

Fairy Diane

The enlarged scan of the ATC




The photo of the ATC - again much enlarged

This took all morning to make - a lot of intricate work involved but hard to see on the images.

The backing paper was stamped all over with an 'Imagine' quote. Then, with a pen, I dabbed tiny golden dots all over the paper. Then embossed it.

The fairy is made up of different pictures which I have coloured with luminous pens. The fairy's body is covered in gold - and doesn't looked lined as it does in the images.

The hand she is resting on is a stamped image from Kath - thank you for those - which I have coloured and manicured!

The whole ATC has had a couple of layers of embossing put onto it, to give it a dimpled and textured effect.

For the 'Orange' themed swap

This has been photographed - both these images are very much bigger than the ATC!


And this is the scanned image.

Neither shows how it looks in 'real life' - much better.

It is softer looking - and is embossed which gives it a lovely texture.

The 'lady' started off as a nude fairy with long flowing hair - and rather volumptous!

I did some drastic 'plastic surgery' with my knife, and she ended up with having a helmet put on her head, some clothes, and I drew in a spear!

The theme for this month's swap is the colour orange

The painted background paper is a blend of orange colours and looks soft and muted - not almost luminous as the scan shows!

The Imagine quotes are stamped randomly and darker at the top then lighter further down, to enable me to stamp on a face - again at a random angle in a soft brown.

The edging is painted with water colours - and gives more of a soft blended look than the scan shows.

More experiments by me

Inches x 13 The theme: Flowers

I didn't know what I was taking on when I took up the challenge of creating little works of art 1" x 1" - I thought ATCs were hard enough at 3.5" x 2.5".

All except the dried flowers have been embossed so they look like little shiny tiles - but it does not show up in the scan very well.

And these are magnified far bigger than the size they actually are!


One of my favourite flowers - Pink Echinacea



Oriental Style


Gazania



Daisy


Fuschias


Red Dahlia - where the light patches are,is where there is no embossing - looks fine though - but funny in this scan


Marigold centre - again shiny and embossed



Yellow echinacea - embossed and shiny - the bee does not look so prominent in real life - these are only 1" x 1" so very much enlarged on here.


Daisy - embossed and shiny


Morning Glory - Embossed and shiny



Layers of cut up poppy leaves on painted paper.



Stained glass - stamped and coloured, the bits drawn on it, the embossed all over




This is a tiny stem of Alchemilla Mollis which I have coloured red with chalks, mounted it on 'angels hair' paper then painted over it in gold

Lady in Red ATC

Lady in Red - once again - not photographed very straight is it?

The stamped backing paper I coloured with chalks. I then enhanced a Victorian print, using water colours for her and chalks for her background, and I stamped an outline in red of a heart and painted that.

A simple design but it took me two hours to make - just for fun

Meconopsis

I had a bit of paper left over that just happened to be the right size to fit an ATC sized piece of card.

So I spent the next hour or so, adding more and more layers of watercolour pencil work - and the above is the result - I quite like this - it is nice and cheery and full of texture.

Dragonfly on Meconopsis

Do you ever spend hours doing something and nothing works out how you wanted it too?

Well I have had a whole afternoon like that - so here are my mistakes and what I have learnt from them!

This one was going to be for a 'Faces' themed swap.

I saw a picture of a meconopsis I liked, and thought it lent itself to a child's face in the centre. I found a vintage face that was perfect. Cut it out and it wasn't quite round. (I wanted it to actally tuck into the poppy centre.) I cut a bit more off - and yes, you know how it is. It never was perfect enough for me so it went into the bin.

A flash of inspiration - I would stamp a face onto some acetate and tuck that in. Well I tried all sorts of colours and all sorts of faces. Finally got The colour combination right - went to stick it in - when I learnt another very important lesson.

Ink pad ink doesn't seem to ever dry on acetate. So that idea was abandoned. I carried on 'playing' and added more colour and details and finished it.

Later I thought it lacked focus so decided to try stamping a dragonfly onto it. Thought that would look good.

Mistake number 2 - You can't stamp an image directly onto something that has any raised surfaces.

You can tell that I am a total novice with stamping - but I so want to learn how to do it