JDayMinis, 1:48 & 1:12 Scale Minis, Laser Cut Designs too.

Monday, April 26, 2010

Softies for Shelby


I have just finished making this felt stuffy piggy for Shelby.

Shelby is the daughter of a miniature friend Lori from Oh Mini Of Mine. Her daughter Shelby has kidney failure and is recovering from a broken femur. Carey created a web site called Softies for Shelby and is collecting stuffed softies to help cheer up Shelby. The blog is http://softiesforshelby.blogspot.com/

Thinking of an idea was the most difficult, so many possibilities. First I did a line drawing on paper of a pig and cut the various parts of felt and glued it all together with fabric glue. I then built up the ears and other parts with more stuffing and felt. Then I painted in detail with fluid acrylic paints. I haven't sewn this piggy as you would need to for a younger child. I will get this in the mail tomorrow.



Please have a look at the Softies for Shelby blog, people have done such lovely stuffies and Carey is wonderful for suggesting this for Shelby.

Cheers, Jean

Sunday, April 4, 2010

My Cottage Gallery & Gift Shop


After my last Watercolour Workshop blog I realized had not taken new photos of my Cottage Gallery & Gift Shop in ten years and I had changed it during that time. The plastic I had put on the paintings caused reflections and actually yellowed so I removed them all.  You can also see the new painting I just finished in the workshop over the mantel piece, thought it went nicely with the theme of the shop.

This room box makes a great place to store paintings until I find rooms appropriate for them in my houses, I can shop from it, LOL. As I mentioned in the last post this room box was one of the workshops I was so honored to take from Brooke Tucker. She was so encouraging and fun!!!

You can see many of my watercolours, some from my collection of sepia photos that I love of children with toys. I made the molds and china painted all the china which I used to sell until  I moved onto computer graphics and designing books and kits. My friend Sue Vining from Victoria, showed me how to make the cottages,I am always very grateful for that. They were so much fun and I made a few in porcelain too.

You can click on the images to open them in a larger window for more detail.
Thank you so much for looking!

Saturday, April 3, 2010

Miniature Transparent Watercolour Workshop 5, quarter scale painting too!


 


For this workshop I would like explain how if finished the painting shown below as well as start a quarter scale painting. 

Above I'm showing an example of how I have used some of my miniature paintings in settings. This room box was a workshop I did with Brooke Tucker. You can also see some of my china painted porcelain pieces on that are on the right side of the Gift Shop room and shown on the left. I  find china painting very similar to watercolour painting except you fire the layers. I'm sorry there is a glare from some of the plastic I used to make the paintings look like they had glass in front of them.

 





 

Before I was finished with this painting I deviated from being completely transparent, this hasn't happened to me very often but the white flowers really needed to look as though they were on top of the paper rather than being the white of the background so I did use zinc white to accent the flowers. I have to admit as well that I didn't leave enough white paper showing through for the flowers. The flowers as part of the white background just didn't work either, they needed more emphasis. Once I was finished adding the final details I removed the tape. I found that I hadn't put the tape on quite straight so I straightened the painting with a light pencil line and added a bit of paint to the top right area. It ended up looking straight, really important for such a small scale, especially for framing. I was happy with the finished painting but did feel I overworked some areas and they weren't really as transparent and light as I would have liked.

Quarter scale version of this original.



First I scanned in the picture and figured out what size it would be in quarter scale and reduced it. If you would like to try it, here is the original scan again for one twelfth scale again and a quarter scale scan. Just right click, save and print it out. You can see below that I have done a simple outline sketch on my paper. Graphite paper doesn't work very well in this small size. If you are just stepping in at this point to try this smaller painting you might like to have a look at my previous workshop notes to see my choices of paints and brushes.

 





Above I have started doing light transparent washes, the graphite was starting to colour the paint so I erased the pencil lines at this point. There is usually no problem erasing pencil or graphite lines as long as the painting isn't wet and you use an art gomme eraser. I'm using more paints for this painting because a lighter touch is needed with more paint colours rather than glazes as in the previous painting.

I found for very tiny paintings I have to paint with my water and paints much closer to my work. The finer brushes don't hold as much paint and the smaller areas don't absorb the water as well. This is as far I have come with the painting now. I'm hoping to start working on a photo for the next workshop and show you my finished quarter scale painting.
Perhaps I will use this bowl of fruit I took a photo of a couple of weeks ago.
I've taken some photos this week I thought you might like to see.
This was really unusual and I was thrilled to get a few photos of an otter rubbing it's back on the beach and   up in the park while we were walking along the beach in Oak Bay.

This photo I took early one morning on one of our walks, loved the sun just breaking though the cloouds and the reflections on the bench.

Took this photo today of the Rhodos in our front yard with primulas, they have been amazing.

A couple more of my miniature watercolour paintings, That largest painting is 1 and 1/8" in height. I did the painting of the girl with her doll from an antique black and white photo. Fun to translate the black and white into colour. 


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