All posts by Jackie

Happy New Year 2024

That is another year gone.  Where did all that time go?  I am so good at procrastination and wasting time that I have become quite an expert.  This isn’t what I wanted become an expert in so I will have to change that and utilize my time more efficiently in future. I am not going to answer my phone (text/emails etc) while I am doing craft-work, and I am  going to set boundaries to make sure I am not interrupted.  I often feel that the universe is out to thwart my attempts at getting some craft time: the numerous bleep alarms for taking meds/eye drops,  tea times and pee times.  As soon as my hands get hold of a pen or paintbrush somebody comes to the door.  I just set up my craft table to do some macro photography only to find my husband has put his  washing on.  Great you might think – he has put his own washing on, however,  the washing machine is just in the other room and the vibrations mean that, despite using a tripod, I can’t get my subject in focus.  Ok enough with the excuses!!  Here is a wee doodle I did to make a greetings card.

abstract doodle
Abstract doodle

Happy New Year!

Finished painting with more layers, drips, shading and blending

Abstract a la Michael Lang

I love Michael Lang’s large abstract paintings and decided to have a go following one of his you tube videos and I enjoyed learning his blending techniques although I didn’t exactly master it.  I found it difficult to keep my circles round and my straight lines straight but it looks ok from a distance.  I also couldn’t get the drippy technique – partly due to the buckle of the paper (he used a flat board) and I just couldn’t quite get the right consistency.  I used mainly acryics and acrylic medium, but also pens and finished with gel pastels to brighten a few areas.  The camera didn’t pick up the aqua colours and made them look a bit blue.

Here are a few photos of some of my layers:

the 1st layer of the abstract - mainly blacks and browns, circles and lines.
1st layer abstract
2nd layer abstract adding colour and shading.
2nd layer abstract
More layers abstract adding more circles and lines and blending.
More layers abstract
Finished painting with more layers, drips, shading and blending
The finished painting.

Well I think I am finished the painting.  It will probably sit in my folder and I will pull it out every now and then to see if I  want to add anything else to it.

Doodle rectangles with Ecoline liquid watercolour.

You know that feeling when you are anxious and overthinking and you just want your brain to stop.  Mindfulness and breathing are useful tools, but then doodling can be pretty good too, at allowing yourself to be in the present moment.  This is what I was doing yesterday after watching linaforrester on instagram.  I loved the colours she used (bright green and yellow) but I wanted to try my own colour combo.  I have a few Ecoline liquid watercolours that I haven’t touched in years so I made up an orange and a purple and gave it a go.  Sadly my ‘Delicate surface Frogtape – low tack painter’s masking tape’ ripped my paper in a couple of areas when I was very carefully peeling it back.  It may be that the paper pad I was using was too old (the cover had come off so don’t know what it was) or that I was leaning on it too hard while doodling. Hey – ho these things happen.  It was fun to do.

small rectangles with doodles and watercolour
Doodle rectangles

 

Tangled art journal pages.

It has been a while since I last did anything in the way of art so just to get my little grey cells thinking creatively again I got out an old art journal, that I hadn’t filled, and randomly put down some colour for the background across 2 pages.  Next, I doodled about with some black lines and filled some areas in.  It was way too black so I brightened it up with white dots and just had a play.  It isn’t quite zentangle but it was fun to do and a good way to get me back into doing some art.

2 art journal pages with black lines, black filled in circles and white dots, on a background of magenta and turquoise toned down with white wash
Tangle journal pages

Dried fungus

This little guy (couple of cm )was found in amongst a pot plant that I was photographing the other day.  It is all dried up but I loved the texture.  The black background is black velvet – gosh is that tricky to get properly spotless.  I have never tried stacking photography and I think would have looked much better using that method. Nothing is properly in focus so I will give it another go.

dried fungus on black cbackground

Photos of pot plants.

Happy New Year.  I have not picked up my camera in quite a few months so I thought I had better use it again before I forget how to.  It is too cold for me outside just now as my arthritic hands just won’t work at all when cold.  Even my craft room is only 14°C  so not great.  Over on A Year With My Camera (AYWMC) I joined the  ‘Plants and flowers’ group once I had completed the course, and January’s topic is: potted plants indoors or outdoors so I took a few photos.  Both batteries for my camera had run out of juice so while I waited for them to charge I used my phone to do an overhead shot of an oxalis. Cropped, a filter and vignette added – I do like the effect but maybe a bit OTT.

Oxalis palmifrons with filter, taken from above
Oxalis palmifrons

Once my batteries were charged I used my mirrorless camera to take a couple of shots against a black background.

Oxalis palmifrons side lit foliage
Oxalis palmifrons
Aeonium Voodoo on a black background
Aeonium Voodoo

Neurographic art

The last few months I have been concentrating on the garden and keeping it alive during the hot weather.  Lately we have been having the conservatory fixed so all the plants that lived there had to be kept on every available table in the house so I didn’t have access to any table.  I finally got my table back and had a go at some neurographic art.  There are quite a few you tube videos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtKSOUV7U8U   that show you how to do it and although there is an actual therapeutic method,  I just did it for fun.

watercolour and pen painting with interlacing circles and rounded joinsThis is the painting,  and I took a photo of it and shrunk it to make a greetings card with a black border.  The card is white but as my scanner wasn’t working I had to use my phone camera to photograph it and the card wouldn’t sit flat so I just cropped the white of the card out.

A few floral photos

I love spending time in the garden taking photos of various plants but would like to get a bit more arty than the usual ones that I take.  Here are a few floral photos that I have attempted. Some were from an online course that I took (https://ayearwithmycamera.com/)  and some are just me mucking around learning what I can do with my Sony Mirrorless camera or  Xenvo lens for my android camera.  The last shot is Saughton pavilion.