Time for a cuppa?

The challenge at Sunday Postcard Art this week is Coffee Time chosen by Marie. All week I have been thinking about the topic and yesterday I had decided I wasn't going to put an entry in.  Then I woke up in the middle of last night with a clear vision of how the finished piece should look.
It hasn't turned out exactly as I wanted, but pretty close and I learnt lessons on the way, bonus!

The vision was for an old 1950's cafe sign that has been left to weather and been damaged, the hands have fallen from the clock and rust is taking over.  The process for this was difficult for me, and it took several attempts and it's still not a perfected technique.

Hmmm, what time does the clock say?

Starting out with 300gsm paper I applied 3 coats of Deco Art Butter.  While the paint was drying I found the coffee cup image on the net and the clock face on the Andy Skinner dropbox.    I arranged the elements in Photo-shop and then (filled with fear and trepidation) I put the painted paper into my printer!!!!!

 I sprayed the whole of the card with hairspray to try to avoid any damage to the piece during the next phase. I painted rust elements around the outside and some chips of rust over the centre panel.  Then I added some small crackle medium in various places. Over the top of all I painted a very weak wash of Quinacrodine Gold and then immediately laid a paper tower over to absorb the excess. Unfortunately the crackle medium seems to have reacted with something??  (don't know what) and when I applied the final paint wash, the crackle medium turned brown.  There is a bit of photo manipulation on the dark patches to soften the edges, but otherwise this is exactly as it was scanned.

This was so much fun to create, I have a feeling I will do more of them.

Sepia tones for modern days

Haere mai  
The challenge at Three Muses this week is to produce something in Sepia.  I did do a collage but I didn't care for it much so went looking for another subject.  Without further ado, I give you my entry to this weeks challenge...  The view from the top of the Paekakariki Hill, New Zealand.

Look out at the top of the Paekakariki Hill outside Wellington

I have lived most of my life in New Zealand and whilst I was looking through photo's it occurred to me that many photo's of NZ could easily look to be legitimately taken in sepia! (Sorry to my Kiwi friends :)  This is a photo that I took from the top of the hill on 27th December 2008.  Captain Slow and I had just spent Christmas with his parents at Eketahuna and we drove over for a day trip to Wellington.

On route, somewhere north of Taihape (famous for it's giant gumboot!), I took this photo too.

I actually did do some photoshop things to them.  Converted to Black and white, added noise, adjusted levels and even my arch nemesis - added text!

Thanks for looking and Haere ra.

New Year Circles

The theme at Thee Muses this week is circles.  I've been busy playing with techniques but wanted to do something for the last challenge.  So I made an 'out of this world' piece.

Happy New Year

I think it looks like the craters of the moon, hence the 'out of the world' reference.  It began as white card stock with a thick layer of gesso applied.  Into this I pressed various circular objects, bottle tops, pencil ends, paint brush ends etc.  Once dried I painted the whole piece black and then covered that with a blue / green gold.  Next came many, many layers in ever lightening shades of viridian paint using a dry brush technique, until the final layer was just zinc white (almost translucent).  In all I believe there to be approximately 25 - 30 layers.
I really wanted to use this piece for something so decided to take a photo into photoshop and add a seasonal greeting.  This is where the hard work began!

Becoming more and more frustrated that I couldn't make the words appear as I wanted I threw a hissy fit.  Captain Slow to the rescue....  he took the file and manipulated it as I wanted it and then gave it back to me (so technially, this isn't all my own work).

This piece now feels more like leather than paper but I don't know if it's due to the gesso, the paint or both.

Thank you everyone, for taking the time to look at my work this year and for leaving such wonderful and encouraging words.  I wish you all the very best for the new year and hope that it brings you everything that you would wish for yourself.