Portrait Quilts.....Learning to Fly

Portrait Quilts...they grab my attention and just won't let go. I have been following the work of many portrait artists over the years: Charlotte Warr Andersen, Bonnie McCaffery, Maria Elkins, Deidre Scherer, Hollis Chatelain, Lura Schwarz Smith and Marilyn Belford. More recently the animal portrait quilts of Toni Whitney. Click on their names if you can't resist taking a peek at their portrait quilts.

I long to create a portrait quilt. The closest I have come is photo transfer portrait quilts. They are fun, I enjoy the thread work, but I am ready to sink my teeth into more advanced portrait techniques. I have hoped to take a class from one of the artists mentioned above, but that just hasn't happened yet. If I could just glean one or two tips from each of these artists, just imagine what I could do.........I am day dreaming here.

I have decided to quit dreaming and teach myself, through trial and error, some portrait quilt skills and techniques and create my own portrait quilts.

This morning I played around with the Photo Shop Elements program on my Mac. I have had it for a few years, and never touched it. I managed to open the program, import a photo and manipulate it just a bit...........

Click Images to Enlarge:

This is the ORIGINAL image I started with

This is my niece, who is now 20 years of age.

She found a wounded bird in our yard and brought it in to care for it.

I started playing with some of the EFFECT & FILTER controls in Photo Shop, having no idea what I was doing... I love the way her freckles are pronounced in this image.

BE SURE to click on these images to see what the computer program did to manipulate them.

This image defines the shaded areas on her face and arm

This image looks like a painting on canvas with lots of texture

This image looks like it was embossed onto copper

The outline of her face, features and arms is well defined.

This will help create pattern pieces for the portrait.

I love the hard outline of her features, it defines the specific pattern pieces I need. Plus I love the freckles it created all over her skin, and the bird is more defined.

This also looks like a painting

This looks like it was cast in cement

She has a NEON glow to her in this one.

This has lots of thread work possibility.

Reminds me of a watercolor painting.

Also helps to define the separate areas of her face, hair, body.

This looks like a basic sketch.

I printed this out on transparency film.

I will put the film on the overhead projector, cover my design wall with paper, and project this image onto the paper and trace the image larger to make a master pattern.

It is a start...

"When you have come to the edge of all the light you have and step into the darkness of the unknown believe that one of the two will happen to you... either you'll find something solid to stand on, or you'll be taught how to fly." ~Richard Bach

This is my favorite of all the images I created.

I also printed this out on transparency film.

I will see which one works best when they are projected onto the wall.

I have decided to work intuitively using the skills that I have......and see where that leads me. I will keep you posted as I make progress on this portrait quilt.

CLICK HERE to view this image as a Portrait Quilt

CLICK HERE to view Photoshop Elements Tutorial

Learning to Fly...

LuAnn

To see my New Work CLICK HERE

To see the Thread Shed CLICK HERE

To see my Exhibit Quilts CLICK HERE

To see Tutorials CLICK HERE

Play Day......Mark it on the Calendar

I was cleaning out image files this morning and found these photos taken at a PLAY DAY last February. As soon as I saw the photos, all the wonderful memories of that day came flooding back to me..........

Click Images to Enlarge:

We marked it on the calendar.........PLAY DAY........we looked forward to the date for weeks. When it finally arrived, we gathered up all of our supplies and met for a fun day of playing, experimenting and creating art.

The majority of these supplies came from thrift stores. The Goodwill is one of my favorite art supply stores!

We brought supplies to play with Shaving Cream Printing, Melted Crayon Printing, and Jello/Gelatin Printing techniques. You can find a tutorial on this blog for Shaving Cream Printing if you CLICK HERE.

Most of these stamps came from thrift stores....we used them in the jello printing technique.

This orange and green print on silk was made using the shaving cream printing technique. If you have never tried this.........it makes for a very fun play day!

This orange and purple piece is also a result of shaving cream printing.

We don't get too serious when we are playing and experimenting..........the key words here are playing and experimenting.

Everything you create may not be a magnificent piece of art, but at the end of the day you just might end up with one or two pieces that have real potential, that get you enthused and inspired to turn them into a terrific little journal quilt. This is an excellent way to try out new techniques on a small scale and see if you like the particular technique, or see if they will be useful in larger projects in the future.

Purple and Black shaving cream print.

This print inspired me to put it into a journal quilt.

CLICK HERE to view it.

Melted Crayon Printing Technique........TREE

CLICK HERE to view the completed quilt.

At the end of our PLAY DAY the counters and tables are covered with our experiments. We work in a 9x12 inch size, so the prints can eventually be finished as journal quilts, or sewn into larger pieces.

As I look at my calendar........I see in July I have a PLAY DAY scheduled with my friends. I promise to post our little experiments on this blog.

Remember.......set a date with your favorite friends.......mark it on the calendar!

It is one of the best things you do for yourself.

Here's another link to a Shaving Cream Tutorial....CLICK HERE.

May Your Bobbin Always Be Full,

LuAnn

To see my New Work CLICK HERE

To see the Thread Shed CLICK HERE

To see my Exhibit Quilts CLICK HERE

To see Tutorials CLICK HERE

Gardening & Computers...

I have neglected the flowerbeds lately with all the time I have spent finishing up the Sunflower Quilt. I was looking out the window sipping coffee this morning and saw how the poor climbing rose, so heavy with blooms, was drooping over. A bit of guilt set in.......out the door I went with scissors and twine...

Click Images to Enlarge:

These CA Poppies are just glowing. They have self seeded themselves around the corner of the patio and now growing under the climbing rose.

It took quite a bit of twine, but the rose is tied up to the patio, looking much happier now. I ran into the house to get my camera. Some of these blooms or so luscious I just have to photograph them.

The bumble birds have a feeder right next to the climbing rose...and they were not too happy with my spending so much time around their rose bush. They kept buzzing around my head trying to scare me away. I held my ground and managed to get a few photos of the roses.

When I came back into the house and downloaded the photos into the iphoto program on the computer, this pale pink rose caught my attention. The petals are so distinct looking, each one so separate and well defined...I decided to play around with this image and see what happened...

iphoto has very simple controls (I am no computer wizard) so I moved some of the controls back and forth to see what would happen to the image. Check out those well defined pink petals in this photo...very dramatic.

This image has a vintage look to it........still soft like the original image, but with an old fashioned photo appeal to it.

I played with the temperature control and started turning the rose different colors.

Then I played with the saturation control and made the rose very very yellow.

This looks neon yellow...

Then I took all of the color out of it with the contrast control. It looks more like a black and white photo. The petals stand out distinctively in this image.

The temperature control turned the rose shades of blue

I think all of these images, printed out on fabric, would make a great collage quilt. Also just one BIG HUGE image printed onto fabric would be fun to do lots of thread work on and free motion quilting.

If you are inspired by any of these images, please feel free to download and use them in your artwork. They are full high resolution images, and should print out very nicely for you.

Enough computer time......back out to the gardening,

LuAnn

To see my New Work CLICK HERE

To see the Thread Shed CLICK HERE

To see my Exhibit Quilts CLICK HERE

To see Tutorials CLICK HERE

Working Cattle

It was just too gorgeous and sunny today here in Western Oregon to stay indoors and bind the sunflower quilt...........besides.....my favorite guy had other plans for me....the moo-ing kind...

Click Images to Enlarge:

We worked cow and calf pairs again. There were about 15 pairs we didn't get to when we worked cattle in May. Today was the perfect sunny day for it. The mama cows and calves are coming into the corral to be sorted. We separate the cows and calves into different pens.

This cow didn't like my camera.....so I had to move so she would come through the gate. She is a pretty cow, but a bit wild.

Here is a gentle giant. We have the nicest bulls on the place this year. They are big, beautiful, calm and easy to work with. This big guy didn't mind the camera at all.

The bull is the next one into the squeeze chute...

He is soooo BIG he hangs out the back end of the chute. He looks like he is wearing the chute! He didn't mind. He stood quiet and patient while we worked on him. I wish the cows and calves were this good in the chute.

My favorite guy is putting fly tags in the bulls ears. They keep the flies off his face during the hot summer weather.

Here is that wild cow getting her fly tags

More cows and calves coming into the sorting pens

Mama cow comes over to check on her calf while it is in the chute.

While the guys were loading up all of the equipment I strolled around with the camera. I spotted some foxgloves growing over by the corral fence. I love the dots up inside the blooms...

Sprinkler heads on the end of the irrigation pipe

On my way home I stopped at the top of the driveway........the cattle looked so pretty grazing through the tall grass on the edge of the road.

Now that I am home I need a good scrubbing before I can even think about getting close to my quilts!

I have taken so many photos during the process of creating the sunflower quilt. I decided to put some of them into a slide show so you can follow along with my Sunflower Quilt Journey... If you want to take a peek at what I have downloaded to the slide show so far CLICK HERE. Open your browser window as big as you can, and the slide show photos will be BIG and you can see all the great detail work. I will continue to add images to this slide show as time allows.

CLICK HERE to view My Quilts

On My Way To The Shower,

LuAnn

To see my New Work CLICK HERE

To see the Thread Shed CLICK HERE

To see my Exhibit Quilts CLICK HERE

To see Tutorials CLICK HERE

Sunflower Quilting All Done...

On Tuesday I ran out of bobbin thread........I ordered more online at midnight and went to bed. Wednesday I went into town........I brought home this beauty from the Goodwill store. Yes, another bed frame/garden fence. I just couldn't pass it up for $5. Now I need to look around for a can of sage green spray paint and some primer.

Click Images to Enlarge:

Thursday......still waiting on the arrival of the much needed green variegated bobbin thread for the Sunflower Quilt........I threw in some laundry and headed outdoors to weed the flowerbeds.

The Peppermint Lilies are blooming

A climbing rose on the side of the Thread Shed is blooming.

I decided to weed the flowerbed out front. The whiskey barrel is filling in nicely.

The baby chicks were more than happy to see the weeds!

The peeps are 8 weeks old this week.

Oh......did I mention........Henrietta is actually Henry. Yes, one of our pullets has turned out to be a rooster. This is him gulping down a big blade of grass. Notice the big red gobblers hanging under his chin and the big red crown on top of his head and the long tail feathers.........yes, we have a rooster!

Yes......the thread arrived in the mailbox.........barely 36 hours after I ordered it online! Now that is service! It is the green variegated cotton YLI Thread I was using in the bobbin for the Sunflower Quilt. You can see the 3 empty spools already stitched into the quilt. I didn't take any chances.......I ordered a 3,000 yard cone this time.

As long as I was ordering thread I decided to get more of those gorgeous variegated trilobal polyester threads. They are a very subtle change in color, not too distracting.

Click the image to enlarge it if you are interested in seeing just exactly what kind of thread I am using...

I wasn't blogging yet when I was into the applique process of this sunflower quilt. So, I thought I would give you one of my applique tips. During the fusible applique process, sometimes during the repeated handling of the quilt, the fusible comes loose from the quilt top. Rather than take the quilt top over to the ironing board, I pull out my trusty UHU glue stick and glue the applique piece back down onto the quilt. It works like a charm, and this glue does not gum up your needle while stitching the applique work down.

Friday I spent the day in the Thread Shed and completed the machine quilting on the Sunflower Quilt..........this is the very last sunflower I quilted. I used the very bright orange variegated thread.

As I look at this 100 x 100 inch quilt.........I can't believe I fit it all under my domestic Bernina sewing machine. The dense quilting is wonderful and the quilt feels so yummy..........it is a treat for my eyes.

I would like to thank all my quilting friends who cheered me on BEFORE the machine quilting process began.......who gave me the confidence and made me believe that I really could machine quilt something this BIG. Hugs go out to all of you!

Machine Quilting Stats: 4,000 yards of quilting thread, 40 Bobbins filled, 40 hours to machine quilt (I am a very fast machine quilter). This does not include any of the piecing or applique work.......that would add up to hundreds of hours.

Today is Saturday..........I plan to steam block the quilt and get the binding sewn onto the top side. Then the next time we go on a road trip.... I will have a binding to sew down while we motor down the road.

CLICK HERE to view My Quilts

May Your Bobbin Always Be Full,

LuAnn

To see my New Work CLICK HERE

To see the Thread Shed CLICK HERE

To see my Exhibit Quilts CLICK HERE

To see Tutorials CLICK HERE