More Crafty Musings

Altered Photos - A Workshop

Yesterday was the first time I gave this workshop, and I enjoyed it a lot. We got together in a nice shady garden, and had a blast with water, paint, gel pens and more.

I think these types of workshops are my favorite, since they're all fun and freedom without an attachment to the outcome. I think sometimes it's even better when something "goes wrong". Because then you can really feel free. Thinking that you've ruined it, you let yourself go even more, scratching, painting, stamping carelessly. And then my favorite part is watching how someone who was convinced that she'd "ruined" her picture, starts liking it!

These were the samples I made for the workshop:

 

 

And these are some of the beautiful photos altered by the women in the workshop:

 

 

 

 

Mystery of the Heart - A Skinny Fat Book

I enjoy collaborative projects, and this is probably the fifth or sixth fat book I participated in, and the first skinny fat book. What makes a fat book fat are the big embellishments, and what makes this one a skinny fat book is the fact that the pages are narrow.

I've participated in various types of books, in some, where there were many participants, we photocopied the pages, and embellished photocopies. In this book we are only 9 participants, so I decided to do it all by hand, no shortcuts.

My intention was to sew a fabric page, but somehow, as I was gathering materials, this is what came out:

Closer up:

The group shot:

As I was taking this side shot, I thought it could be nice to make a wedding/white themed fabric book:

It's no surprise that everything I'm doing now has white or tulle in it. I'm getting married in two months, so that' s one big inspiration there! ;-)

I like how the pages turned out, although I think they're a bit empty. I was thinking of adding a quote or blessing, but I thought that would really be too cheesy.

I'd love to hear your thoughts, and in the meantime, here's a video of a travel themed fat book I participated in.

Blender Pen Transfer

This is a tutorial I published on my Hebrew blog last year, and I'd like to share it here as well.

Image transfers are lots of fun, you never know what the outcome will be, and you can play around with them afterward, creating interesting new images for your journal and layouts.

This is no doubt the simplest transfer. I have a few blender pens, but the only one that works for me is Chartpak blender pen.

Here's what you do:

Print your image in a laser printer (won't work for inkjet):

Put your image face down on another piece of paper/fabric:

Start painting the back of your image. As it wets, you will be able to see your image through the paper:

You can lift a little, to see how it's coming along:

And... you're done! tada! This is the transferred image:

I also tried transferring images from magazines. the only ones that worked were from "Time Out" magazine. I have no idea whether their paper is the same quality all over the world, but Time Out Tel Aviv transfers really nice images:

 

And this one is from a seventies Burda, I was impressed!

Over here I did a collage of sorts with a few transfers:

And a small piece with image transfer and stamps:

What I found out was that it is impossible to transfer quality glossy magazine images. You'd have to look for magazines with lower quality paper, for the ink to transfer.

I really enjoyed the process, and there are many possibilities: transfer on paper, fabric, wood, domino cubes, and more.

Enjoy, and let me know if you've tried it!

The Proposal Mini

I have a confession to make. I don't have a single complete album at home. Certainly, I've completed quite a few albums for other people - one for my sister, one for my brother, one for my father's 60th birthday, and many others for friends' babies. But when it comes to me and my stories, I've begun the "workshops in Holland" album, the "Amsterdam" album, the one about my grandparents, the one about all the houses I've lived in, the one about the trip to the West coast two years ago - yes, I've actually bought albums and started working in all of these, but not one of them is complete!

So I've decided on a whole new concept. Forget the album. I want the stories, and they have to be small. To start off, I made a small mini about The Proposal (I'm getting married in 3 months :-). It took me one evening, I kept is as simple as possible, used old catalog pages I've been saving for years (literally. Some of the pages are from a catalog I brought back from Holland 3 years ago...), and here it is. For the cover, I used Elise Blaha's tutorial , only instead of paper, I used a card and envelopes I bought in Target, and instead of the ribbon, I sewed through the middle. I really like how clean and simple it turned out to be!

It's in Hebrew, and a bit personal, so I'll show just a few pages. Here it is empty, most of the papers are recycled from catalogs, and there's one Anahata Katkin postcard and a small Basic Grey paper as well.

Still empty:

This glassine envelope is also something I've been saving for ages. It was the packaging of a brooch I bought at Thymbyl Design on Etsy, and I liked the way the ribbon was wrapped around it. The married couple inside are on a free card, an ad for a local photographer. I liked how they look through the glassine envelope:

And now with the photos and text (Hebrew):

 

The Minimal page

Sometimes it doesn't take a lot to be happy.

I love saving interesting papers, and my drawers are so crammed, it's unbelievable. Everytime I go through them I find bits and pieces that I can already throw, but that doesn't even make a dent in all the paper I have! Sometimes, if there's a scrap or an especially interesting image, I'll stick it inside my journal, hoping for it to become a page later on.

Last week, as I opened my journal, two pieces of paper fell out. One was this girl, an image I had saved from an ad for a new yogurt place, and the other was this scrap of Basic Grey paper. I picked them up and just stuck them down, the I added the strings, that turned the circles into balloons.

I was happy with the page, and left it as it is, minimal, but pretty!

What do you think? is your art journal always busy?

An Evening Stroll in Tel Aviv

(The first picture is of grafiti that says "Tel Aviv" in Hebrew)

 

 

 

The stuff I find...

I love find interesting stuff on the floor, and although I'm not that much of a junk collector (maybe because I do still think it's a bit gross) I do take some of the things I find home with me.

Here's a peek into a cool catalog I just found this morning. I've never heard of this brand, but they have gorgeous shoes, and I love their colors and interesting pictures. I think it's great inspiration, and I hope to use their papers some time soon.

 

 

What did you think?

New beginnings

What is it about people closing down their older blogs and starting new ones?

I really don't know, but this is probably my 6th or 7th blog. :)