Be Still.......

I'm taking part in Kim Klassen's 'Be Still 52' which began last week.......that's a whole year of focusing on still life photography.

So here I am.....week one....reminding myself to stop, breathe deeply and just be still for a few moments every day.

For me, photography is about noticing the little things around me. These poppy seed heads from last year are so tiny; it would be easy to just dismiss them and put them in the compost bin.

But they are incredibly beautiful, like tiny minarets......or ancient writing tools :-)

The background is one of my mixed-media background papers.

Textures over the top.....Kim's 'Fully' and 'Februarymagicedges'.

Here's the link to Kim's class.....

And here they are again with a little Photoshop layering and altering...... and one of my inky background papers.

Thanks to my blogging friends, I've recently discovered the joys of Hipstamatic on my iPad and iPhone. 

(Thank you Lynn and Viv)

I downloaded it months ago but couldn't get to grips with it....but over the past week I have persevered and now it's my favourite app. Yes, even more than Waterlogue :-)

The basic app was free, but I have bought a couple of add on packages. Basically you can change the lens and the film to get different effects and build up favourite 'recipes'. Or you can just shake the camera up and down and get a random pairing! 

Very interesting....

These examples use 'Melodie' lens and 'Dream Canvas' film. My favourite combo up to now.

More to come soon......

Back to the drawing board.....

I decided to go back to drawing and painting last week....here's my first attempt before I started using the paints and crayons. I also want to quirkify her in some way (still pondering :-)

I've had major problems with my computer which my clever son has done his best to rectify but we aren't out of the woods yet. This was one of the problems......

 

 .........its a 'mother board' :-) It makes my brain hurt just to look at it....to think someone actually understands all that. 

I still need a new operating system though - there goes another £88 :-( 

A couple of posts ago I said I was playing around with this image from my garden, with the idea of altering it for mixed media projects.

Up to now I've cut out the flower in Photoshop and altered it with different backgrounds and textures.

 

 Still a work in progress.......

Next step -  drawing/painting/printing.

Back soon :-)

Accept.....

I'm struggling a bit with the prospect of Autumn and Winter this year. I've never been a fan, but for some reason I'm dreading the next few months even more than usual. I'm trying to be positive though, hence the digital piece above is for me.

The next three are my tributes to Autumn.......I do love the colours of the leaves and berries; I'm just not so keen on the dark evenings, rain and howling wind.

 

Images are my own, textures are from Kim Klassen and Shadowhouse Creations. 

Masks and brushes are from Designer Digitals. 

Here are my originals.......apart from the rose which is a free photo from WikiCommons.

Last week we went for a walk around Elvaston Castle Country Park, just a 10 minute drive away from us. I thought I'd take some photos of the Autumn colours, but what I found was some rather gorgeous purple.



The berries are from a bush called Callicarpa americana .....more commonly known as 'Beauty Berries'. I've never seen them before and couldn't quite believe the amazing vivid colour.

Finally.......I've been having a play with Kim Klassen's PSE mosaic tutorial ('The Test Kitchen' - see side bar). I love the colours, but I still think I could do better....... (well its fun trying :-)

A Little Teacup Challenge

Lynn and I have been 'talking teacups' this week. It all started when I saw the lovely Bridal Invitation card in her Zazzle shop (you can find the link on her blog). So we decided to have another of our own little challenges this week.....if you would like to join in just link back to us in the comments box and we'll come to see you!

Above you can see my first version.....and to the left is the original photo. This is one of my favourite cups; it isn't very old - on the back it says 1996 "Florence" by Royal Doulton.
I picked the rose from my garden yesterday...it was the very last one left on the bush. So I called my digital piece "The Last Rose of Summer".

My second version has a clematis flower; we have a 'late' purple clematis climbing over an arch in the garden..... I can't believe it's still producing flowers.
I love 'text textures' ;-) this one is free from Boccacino (Flickr).

All the other textures and layers I've used are from Kim Klassen, Shadowhouse Creations and Playing With Brushes.

Whilst watching Frances Pickering at Ally Pally last Saturday I spotted her embroidery threads all neatly organised on rings and thought I can do that!!!

 Mine were in a real mess....








so I bought some of these.....

 ...and now they look like this! (Mmmm...not sure why there are so many pink ones - mum must have given me those ;-)

I Love Photoshop

I did a bit of Photoshop fiddling with my 'Born to Reign' painting (see sidebar left), using the photograph I took when it was half done.......

 .....then I changed it again.....

....and then I realised it reminded me of something I'd seen on a friend's blog recently.

The lovely Jo at Tanglefrost (who is talented with words as well as her hands) makes fantastic creations with leather and beads. She has made leaf brooches and pins for a while now but has just recently begun making flower crowns. I would LOVE one of these ......how wonderful to look as beautiful as Jo's daughter.

  

They are so original and would be perfect for weddings and special parties...have a look at the gorgeous photos in her etsy shop.

Speaking of friends.....Corrine at Dosfishes did a postcard swap with me and this is the great piece of art I received from her.....

Her blog is full of interesting photos, great collages, digi-art and recycled art....another recommended visit!

Back to Photoshop - I love using it for creative stuff  but also appreciate its value when it comes to repairing old photos. My mum recently gave me a picture of her and dad on honeymoon; it was badly damaged but it means a great deal to her so I had a go at repairing it. This is something I need to perfect my skills at, but mum was really pleased with my attempts. Here's the before and after......

(Please click on photos)

Then I had a go at a photo of my grandma (mum's mum) when she was a young woman (she's in the centre). I have a feeling the photo was cut up many years ago when they had a family dispute!!

That clone stamp and plaster...such amazing tools :-)

Have you guessed? I love Photoshop!!

Ooooh I nearly forgot - I went for a walk with DH (the Brown-Eyed-Boy) this afternoon and found these...

...any guesses what they are? They are 7cm long. (The place where I found them is a big clue.....but I won't give that away just yet :-)

Time Away........

I won't apologise for having been AWOL for the past few weeks.......I know you understand :-)

DH and I went away for a few days - more on that later - plus I've been spending some time reading, visiting friends and gardening. I'm sorry I haven't done any blog-visiting for a while ; I've spent very little time on my PC because of a problem with my neck. Anyway....following a visit to the physio earlier this week I'm feeling a little better.

A couple of weeks ago we visited my lovely friend Rosie and her DH, who looked after us extremely well. We spent a happy afternoon sitting in their garden in the sunshine, watching the blue tits in the trees around us, then Rosie and I played in her art room for a while whilst the men cooked us a fantastic dinner. Can life get any better? :-)

Over the next few days we moved on to the Malvern Hills, Great Malvern, Ironbridge and finally Wightwick Manor. This gorgeous house was furnished under the influence of the Arts and Crafts Movement and has original William Morris wallpapers and fabrics....plus Pre-Raphaelite works of art. At the top of this post you can see the digital collage I created from the photograph below. This is only the side view of the house.........the full view is further down.
23/4...thought I should explain that the face is William Morris and the quote is his most famous one: "Have nothing in your home that you do not know to be useful or beautiful".


Two more Wightwick digi-collages, with the originals below......

........and here's the whole house. More detailed photos to come in my next post.
Remember that house shaped box I showed you? Well some of you guessed correctly; it's for my father's ashes. We weren't sure where to put them and tried to think of all his favourite places. Whilst we were pondering over various possibilities Mum jokingly said 'His absolute favourite place was sitting in your conservatory Linda!' Over the next week the idea grew on me ...... and gradually people have begun to accept it.
So what's left of Dad is now in a sunny corner of our conservatory....I think he would approve :-)

And finally, I wanted to show you this rather gorgeous photo stand I bought recently; it's perfect for displaying my digi-art..........

Paper Whimsy Ladies

Four digital collages I created for the new Paper Whimsy group which I belong to (scroll down to see link on left hand side). All done with PW downloadable images for digital art....... see here .


Other bits and pieces are mainly from Designer Digitals.
I painted the wings myself.
(Please click on images for a better view.)

More Digital Collage

Flower from Wikimedia Commons, clipping mask from Katie Pertiet at Designer Digitals, quote from Marcee Dugger at Digital Scrapbook Place.......plus a few coloured layers and filters.


Cow parsley photo from my sweet friend Jo (Tanglefrost), scratched layer from Night-fate-stock at deviantART, grunge border from Katie Pertiet at Designer Digitals plus some of my own layers.