Not Quite Right.

 Although I had a fun couple of hours printing from my moulding paste plates, the end results aren't quite what I had hoped for.

 I obviously had the paste too thick and the depressions are too deep for the paint to get down into the crevasses.

           That isn't to say I can't use the prints, I can and will, but I had hoped for something different.

All these are done in the blue-green range so that I can convert them in Photoshop to various shades of orange on black, which is what I want for a new project that is simmering on the back burner.

Third in the Series.

 This is the 3rd. and probably last in the spiral series. It uses all the new stamps that I carved recently, and also the spiral moulding paste board for the backgound. This above is now printed onto fabric.

This is a detail of the fabric above, showing the various stamps and the background printing. I have over stamped the main motifs with various gold coloured paint and with a tiny bit of copper as well, but the paint really doesn't show up in these photos. Now for the appliqued motifs that I used in the previous 2 works, but first some machine stitching.

Texture Plates.

 I wasn't happy with a few of the moulding paste plates that I made, so I covered them over with new paste and worked hard to make interesting textures.

                                       This above was made with dried and pressed Bracken Fern.

                                             This was just my finger tips in plastic gloves.

And this was with a dried seed pod, not sure if this one will be any use actually. Hopefully I'll have time tomorrow to do a couple of quick prints and see if they're worth playing around with. Otherwise I'll cover them up and try again.  I wonder how many coats I can apply before it all cracks off ??

More Textured Boards.

 It was a bitterly cold and wet day today, so it was a good opportunity to continue playing. I made up another plaster board last night, vaguely like a swamp with reeds, using some pressed foliage that I had to hand.

 At each stage I took a photograph and this was one before I added more blue to the 'water', so that when I inverted it in Photoshop, the white areas became black and the blue became orange. I mentally called this The Tar Pit!

Here it is again with some of the pink removed, but in removing the pink I inadvertently lightened the black, which I really didn't intend to do. Easy to fix however.

Moulding Paste Experiments.

 The moulding paste panel dried over night and after sanding off the pointy bits I gave it a couple of coats of acrylic varnish to make it a bit more water proof.

I then used it to give background texture on the gelatine printing plate.  In the process the panel picked up lots of colour and ended up like this. I'm very happy with the results on the panel as seen above, but not quite so happy with the gelatine prints.

                                       They may end up O.K after a bit of Photoshopping!

New Technique.

 I thought that I might try making a printing plate with an old piece of foamcore, using modelling paste for some texture.
I've never tried doing this before, and I'm hoping that I might be able to print some interesting background papers for more gelatine printing.

I used some of my recent spiral stamps to make an overall random pattern of spirals in the modelling paste. I'll leave it to dry over night and see what happens. It could of course crack the first time I try to use it, but that may in itself create some interesting textures for printing. I'll have to sand down some of the pointier edges as they would probably cut the paper when I try to press down on the plate. Watch this space!

One Last Stamp.

         I wanted just one more of the large stamps for the 3rd and final piece in this series.

      It will of course be used on the gelatine plate so a bit of roughness doesn't really mater.

                                     This is the 5th stamps in this group of related images.

New Stamps

                                                                   4 new stamps in all.

                  This pattern is made up of the new spiral stamp plus one of the old ones.

As usual, I can't help trying out a simple inversion in Photoshop just to see what it looks like.......

I like it!

New Stamps.

 Still working, vaguely in this case, with the spirals, I needed a new small stamp for the 3rd and last in the series.

As it is quite small the carving is a bit rough, but it will be used on a Gelatine plate, so I can get away with less than perfect!

                             Now I need another small spiral and a couple of new leaf shapes.

                                                                   More tomorrow.

Rain at Last!

    After a very long time of little or no rain, it's a delight to have at last had a decent downpour.

                  We need plenty more but the gardens are enjoying what we have had so far.

Autumn Shapes.

 It's not often that you see plants against a neutral background, but this spent Agapanthus head was beautifully posed against a cream front fence.

Rust.

 I was rather taken by the old water supply system for the locomotive that I wrote about yesterday.

 The rusted metal looks wonderful against the blue sky and close up the texture is amazing, almost like bark on a tree.

I'd love to be able to wrap some fabric around this and see what patterns the rust might create. Not to be unfortunately!

A Trip into the Past.

 This is an old steam locomotive that runs between the towns of Castlemaine and Maldon in Victoria.
                    It is part of a tourist attraction called the Victorian Goldfields Railway.
The trip only took us 50 minutes, but the sounds of steam, whistle and 'clickety clack' took us right back to the 'olden days'.

The locomotive was built in the early 1950s, although the carriages are much older, being around 100 years old. Perhaps they carried troops  to the city as they set off for Gallipoli, what a sobering thought.

         This rusty old water supply pipe caught my eye, great textures when seen close up.

'T-Junction.'

                          It's a bit rough, but it's for an exhibition for anything beginning with 'T'.

Seasons.

 This Meadow Argus butterfly is looking quite pristine at this time of the year, usually one would expect tattered wings so late in the season.

Evidence of past droughts. With very little rain so far this year we may be heading for another one.

Cyclamen

 Every time that I visit the garden of Sunnymeade at this time of the year I'm stunned by the amazing display of tiny pink and white cyclamen.

Both sides of the path are equally stunning, but the sunshine on the further bed has bleached out the colour from the photo of  those cyclamen

The young man who works this garden has a real talent for stonework, and this is his Garden of Hathor.  Unfortunately it is too late in the season for the Clematis that grow up all the pillars to be in flower. He also manages to trim some of his trees into fascinating topiary shapes, see the one to the right in the above photo and in the picture below.

Morning Walk.

 It's amazing what changes in an inner suburban area from one day to the next.  I spotted this old truck on it's trailer, but I have no idea who the manufacturer might have been. No sign of the Indian motor cycle; now that was a fun film, 'The Last Indian'.

 The council for once has shown a bit of imagination.  Instead of knocking down the established trees to put in a perfectly straight path, they put in a pretty curving one instead. It's a pity that the birds have eaten all the grass seed!

I've often admired these delightfully simple but very attractive stained glass windows as I walk past. Now the house is to be demolished, so I suppose I'll see the window glass all smashed up in the bin very soon. What a shame. (You can click on any image to enlarge it.)