Self portrait

I particularly like painting portraits and figurative stuff on brown paper and cardboard as it contrasts really well with the pastel hues in skin tones, plus it's free and recycling. I timed this self portrait to try and concentrate on the planes of the face, rather than the features, to help with composition and to keep the piece fairly unstructured and show the brush marks, a style which i love to work in but find quite challenging.

I took half hourly breaks so I could come back to it with fresh eyes, this helps with balancing composition as your eyes aren't automatically drawn to the last place you painted like they do while you're working on it. I always quickly check my line-sight measurements when i return to a painting or drawing to make sure i've not gone too far off course while focusing in on details.

This photograph was taken about half an hour in, I'm disappointed I lost the shape of the nose sketched out here, I'll have to work harder to focus on that next time.

I'm quite lucky that the cardboard is almost exactly the same shade as my eyebrow, it's hard to paint eyebrows in acrylic as it's such a solid medium, it's literally a layer of plastic once it's on the paper and not hugely suited to transparent or opaque textures, which eyebrows are. 

You can see that next to an old self portrait I did a few years ago it's way less overworked around the eyes, I can't seem to make two eyes look in the same direction. I can see that I've made that a bit into my style since the last one, where I left it with one eye, now the face fades out into cardboard and slight structure around the chin and left side. I think I'll play with doing that all over the face, I'd like to have left some more of the cardboard colour showing through around the creases of the lids or maybe the corner of the eye to add a bit of depth.

What do you reckon? anything you think I could do to improve? Anything I could do in future to make the picture look more finished or do you think I left it at the right time? I do love a good natter and constructive criticism

Hugs and cake

Frocktopus

xxx

The fantabulous travelling steampunk yarnbomb

Hello lovelies, as some of you may know I am the very proud curator of the Fabulous Travelling Steampunk yarn bomb, a fun project I set up last year for creative steampunks (and those creative types who fancy dabbling in it) from all over the world to make art together.

 I love the steampunk scene, so much going on and amazing making, so many people helping each other with how to make things and passing on great information and interesting things, but I thought a lot of the chances to display artwork at the events, aside from selling or wearing it,  centred around competitions, which isn't always conductive with the idea of community that's at the heart of steampunk, so I thought I'd try and get a few people together to collaborate and make some public art that anyone can get involved with, even if it's your first piece (we even have some schools getting involved), and have it displayed alongside some really fantastic artists and makers.

Photography by Tom Hardman (my bear)

In the last year we've visited three events, we ran a workshop at the Lincoln Hackspace fundraiser.

Photography by Neil Quincey

The yarnbomb travelled to the Steampunk Stamford event (and possibly will be again this year) at STOAT Steampunks on a train

Photo by Spy Mistress General

We went to The Asylum Convivial in Lincoln

photo by felishumanus

So far this year the yarnbomb is planned to visit

Bristols "Brass Brunel" festival

The Asylum Convivial in Lincoln

and we hope to be at many more as well.

How to get involved

 It would be amazing to send it travelling all over the globe so if you're heading to a steampunk event and will be travelling through Lincolnshire and would be willing to take the yarnbomb with them, please get in contact.

If you or your community group, knitting circle, school or an other group that would like to be involved please do have a go, we have a facebook group and two pinterest boards you can join, one which has pictures of the yarn bomb and one full of inspiration and how to's If you're inspired but not sure what to make, or what steampunk is there's loads of interesting reading on the web to find out more about steampunk/yarnbombing. If you'd like the postal address, to host the yarnbomb at your event or want more information please do email me at thefrocktopus@live.co.uk or say hello and ask any questions you may have in the comments below.

Love and knitting

Frocktopus

xxx

Re-Fashioned studio tour

Eco-fashion designer Eleanor Bland let me have a poke around her gorgeous studio and take my camera along with me, I do get so inspired whenever I’m there so thought I’d share the photos.

I love this waistcoat so much, she used it for an amazing wedding shoot which she used two women in in bride and groom outfits to highlight the issue of gay marriage becoming legal

I’m really gutted I only got one photo of her lovely clothes but luckily you can see what she’s making on her blog. You can find her on Facebook here and you can see her process and what she's making at the moment on her blog here.

Hugs and cake

Frocktopus

xxx

toadstool bloomers and 10% discount in my fancypants new etsy shop

I've been making bloomers, great voluminous fairytale bloomers, that look like toadstools That look like old-fashioned children's clothes, because I'm always bemoaning that they have the best clothes and us big kids miss out. They look pretty sweet and homely peeking out from under a dress, they look awesome with steampunk and mori stuff too. You can get yourself a pair in my etsy shop.x

It's my birthday in a weeks time so I'm having a sale through april for all my blog readers and likers on Facebook/twitter, so if you fancy getting yourself a pressie from my shop just use the code BIRTHDAYPARTY to get yourself a discount.

As you can tell I'm a little bit in love with them, I don't mind parting with them though as there's plenty more fabric at fabric corner so I shall be popping back there very soon (and if you're in Lincon and crafty you should too, it's in the corner of the indoor market, amazing fabric.)

Purdypuss has been back to stay again and has decided scissors are her new favourite toy and pattern cutting is pussycat playtime, it's incredibly cute but she nearly lost her whiskers the other day.

Hugs and cake

Frocktopus

xxx

Watercolour Historical Fashion Illustration

I've recently bought myself a set of water brushes and don't know how I got on without them, especially as they mean I've been working in watercolour again. it's very easy to make watercolour painting muddy, especially as I tend to work in thick layers, the same way I do with acrylic paint so I tend to use a thick white liquid watercolour for the highlights. I'm going to try more pen and watercolour wash work soon.

The brushes in the picture are Pentel aqua brushes, they're one of my favourite things, I don't really go in for a lot of kit but these work really well and it means I can keep them, an ink pad and a sketchbook in my bag at all times. If you fancy a pack you can find them here, there's also loads of different types out there for varying degrees of money, mine were £3 for three with postage.

On a sad note this painting was done for a local steampunk magazine, unfortunately there was a bit of messing around involved and, not to be a downer on things, I have learnt a valuable lesson not to work for free for a business if you've already heard worrying things, there's plenty of better ways to get your artwork out there. It's not only a waste of time but devalues your work and the hard work of other artists. On a happier note I have discovered an artists union that is trying to stamp out this kind of thing.

You can still have a read of the articles author Sandi James's diary of steampunk events at her blog sandi by gaslight though, it's really sweet and there's loads of fantastic photos of amazing costumes people have made, the fact Sandi makes historical and steampunk clothing really comes through.

Love and cake

Frocktopus

xxx

midnight moon and rust

I thought I'd go hunting yellows and oranges with my new camera, as they show up so bright in the lovely blue grey light we've had today, plus it doesn't hurt that yellow is my very favourite colour.

I'm very much enjoying photography at the moment but I'm trying to sketch more, I was going to attempt a sketch a day for the year but crochet got in the way. Here's last weeks sketch.

We had a christmas party the day after boxing day this year, we usually have one on christmas day but with health and seeing both families this year we thought we'd give ourselves a days recuperation first. I got all my sketching stuff into a sneaky corner so when my fatigue hit I could sit and sketch people but I was too busy catching up, cuddling and being hypnotised by the fire, so my first sketch this year is of the fire, burned out and smelling of smoke and bbq, like most of us the next morning. oh and bear proposed back at the party, pruuuuuu.

Did you all have a merry Yule or Christmas?

Love and hugs

Frocktopus

xxx

Christmas tree light-painting tutorial

I had great fun playing with long exposure on a point and click digital camera, the room wasn't really bright enough for most photography, especially with my unsteady hands, which turned out to be the perfect way to get some great effects with light painting. All you need is a camera, a dimly lit room and a christmas tree full of fairy lights and reflective baubles.

I've been getting festive the last few weeks, the house is full of baubles and fake plastic trees, present making is well underway so the house is strewn with wool (no change there) and last night we finally cracked out the lebruchen and the pink plastic tree all of my very own. 

To get these pictures I experimented mainly by taking a shot while moving, sometimes round in circles like the one above, sometimes while shaking the camera up and down or side to side, sometimes forwards and backwards. They all made different effects.

It helps to have a lot of different reflective textures and lights as these all produce different results, which a christmas tree full of baubles is perfect for.

These would make fantastic Christmas or Yule cards, christmas trees are nearly always beautiful and I love the pagan history behind them, but I've seen so many pictures of sparkling trees with a pile of pressies under them they can sometimes blur into one and it's not everyones style (I personally love me some traditional christmas stuff though.)

This technique doesn't need a christmas tree though, you could probably get some great effects with any reflective material or light source, there's some amazing light artists out there, just pop it into google or pinterest and get inspired.

Thanks for reading and I'll hopefully have a new camera of my very own again soon.

Happy yule and Merry Mince pie season

Frocktopus

xxx

Imbolc Yarnbombing at Plank festival

Last Saturday was Imbolc, celebration of Brigit, goddess of spring and making,a festival of new beginnings. So what better time to brush off the snowy cobwebs and cover a village in crocus coloured crochet.

I'm so happy with my poms (half pompoms) I can't bear to throw away my scraps of wool and they look like tiny anemones growing out of the wool.

Bear had the brilliant idea of filling the pocket with sweeties, we also managed to limit ourselves to nicking one packet of parma violets.

Ta-dah

I can't take credit for the last picture, a fantastic textile artist called Carol Parker turned Market Rasen into a yarn bomb Hiroshima, there were so many fuzzy stripes in that village I had a hard time finding where to home mine. You can see the rest of her pieces for plank here and what else is going on during the festival which continues until the 2nd of march here.

We had a wonderful day out and are planning more,  but now my patchwork has been set free I'm still working up rainbow and fluorescent granny squares, any ideas on what to make with them? I'm thinking a mini skirt.

Hugs and crochet

Frocktopus

xxx