The Curator - Week Four

I spent the first class for the Curator this week doing fabric manipulation samples. I woke up that morning with an idea for using pintucks in my brain but it didn't work the same as it did in my head. I spent almost the whole day just making pintucks. I just sat at my table with my headphones on watch Pollyanna on my tablet while making pintucks. Somehow I started with that and then dissolved halfway through the day to singing along to Rocky Horror. I'm still not quite sure how that happened.

For the last two hours of the day I tried to manipulate the pintucks into the coral shape I had in my head but I couldn't seem to get it to look the same. I had this idea that I would fold the pintucks so the sides were together and sew, like a fan shape. I though if I sewed two of these back to back this would form the coral shape. Er... Not quite what happened because the coral wasn't shaped like two back to back fans but I did like the fan shape. I would've went ahead with it but it was too big and bulky where the rest of my samples were small and delicate and intricate.

On Friday we had to do our resolved samples but I still had most of my other samples to finish so I finished my scaled up machine embroidery of the coral and continued with an extra machine embroidery after my lecturer came over and informed me that it was the start of my first resolved sample.

At the same time she told me that I should most definitely continue my fabric manipulations today. She also told me that one of my pintucked pieces of fabric could be considered a sample on it's own.

I set out to manipulate the pin tucks in different ways. I stitched one of my drawings into one of the pintucked fabrics. I couldn't help feeling that there was something not quite right about this one but I couldn't put my finger on it. I might try some hand embroidery to bring it more in line with the other samples

I sewed pintucked strips lengthwise onto black organdie with some straight lines going thorugh the middle holding it in place. I like this sample immensely but I do feel the back looks more interesting than the front. It needs more stripes surrounding the pintucks as the side look just too plain.

Finally I looked at using the pintucks on their side but I could work out how to stand them up but still have them attached to a base. I decided to stitch them down at the edges after twisting them over so that they'd stand up. I inter-weaved them to connect them together and I really like the effect. I almost imagine them as snakes curling around one another. I felt it was too light putting watercoloured white cotton onto light blue cotton. I think I need to put more black into it.

I ended the day by making up some black organdie pintucks so that I can use them over the weekend.

Panic has most definitely set in today. For the end of the project (Wednesday) we have to have eleven samples.

Two Machine Embroidery
Two Hand Embroidery
Four Fabric Manipulations
Three Resolved samples

I still have two resolved to do. One to finish. One hand embroidery to do and Three fabric manipulations to finish. So I'd say I'm definitely panicking.

I'm going to have to do some serious work over the weekend to get them done in time.


Bobbi Jean Shields
Quintessential Information

Nomad - Week Four

Today was Do What You Will day so I stuck to using my Promarkers and ink as I really like that effects. I found some nice marks that I really feel I can print with. I like that big and bold way of working with the promarkers.

I also tried some double layer drawings which I felt worked very well but my lecturer said that they represented more what I could do with print rather than the print itself. i.e. Using multiple layers of sheer fabrics.

I think I know what I want to take forward and photocopy for next week. There are drawings which really leap off the page yelling 'Pick Me! Pick Me!'

Next week we are choosing what goes onto acetate and then gets turned into an A2 screen for printing. This means I have some serious photocopying to do but honestly I think I may just photocopy them down to A4 then scan them in. Pick which parts I want to work with on Photoshop and print them out. Saves a lot of wasted paper and easier than cutting out tons.

I think I may want to make my samples on Photoshop too. I am really quite comfortable with Photoshop.  I really feel that's where I would get my best print ideas from. I can experiment freely and if it doesn't go the way I want it too I can manipulate it or change it quickly. It saves a lot of time. Sometimes photocopying can be useful too though.

Bobbi Jean Shields
Quintessential Designs

Nomad - Week Three

  Our drawing task this week was using my personal favourite: Watercolours.

I started by doing a watercolour background with a wash brush and then working into it while it was still wet. The colours ended up bleeding together and created a weird mish mash of colours which was interesting but not exactly what I wanted. I waited until the painting was dry and worked back into it using a smaller brush to put in the finer details

I then started working with a more delicate way of using the watercolours with small detailed strokes with a more concentrated colour which I got some great effects which I feel I can take forward better than my first watercolour. From this I started looking at a colour pallette.

Originally the idea was two colours that I could work from but it ended up being about four.

Next week is just Do as You Will. So I think I may go back to using the ink or the promarkers as I really felt that I got some really good marks from these mediums which are ideal for print. I also think I should do some work at home in order to expand my range of drawings which I can use in the printing process.

Bobbi Jean Shields

Quintessential Designs

The Curator - Week Three

This week was our first week sampling for the Hunterian, the Curator, project. Our first samples are two machine embroidery samples.

I spent all of Wednesday doing my first machine sample. It was based on my drawings of boulder brain coral and strontianite. I started by sewing the brain coral as I like the interesting shape and I thought the differing weights of line would create an interesting aspect to play around with.

The strontianite was added using stitched bondawebbed pieces as I felt when I had placed the coral the rest of the A3 sample was lacking somehow. I felt that the shape of the strontianite could bring together the piece effectively.

Halfway through the day four of us were chosen to speak to the lecturers individually along with a student teacher from the GSA. I spoke first about my project to the group and I really felt that I could talk through my work effectively and I do believe that it has alot to do with keeping this blog.

As I'm writing about my work I really feel that I am remembering my thought processes better and I can really explain my work in a more coherant way.

My lecturers and the student teacher gave their comments about my work. I was told that I should try to make my embroidery not quite as tight and to play around with scale. As my journal pages were different sizes which you probably cant see properly in the photographs, my lecturer who takes us for guidance suggested that I make a fabric book with different sized samples. I'm not sure how I feel about that and for now I think I'll keep them separate till I have them all done but it's something to keep in mind. All of the lecturers agreed that making photocopies of my work and using the photocopies to pay around with scale would be a good idea.

In my free time I managed to take one of the corals and enlarge the scale  and stitch the pattern of the coral onto fabric which had an interesting effect.

On Friday of this week it was Hand Embroidery Day. I really found the concept of today weird as our lecturers are usually telling us that we should be doing hand embroidery at home because they want us to take advantage of our access to the machines.

I wasn't really sure what to do so I started by embroidering some of my drawings onto black cotton. I thought that if I couldn't think of a non literal way to do it then I should use my time wisely and put together a literal sample.

I took me all day to finish the hand embroidery and even then I suspect that I should go in with some colour as I have only been using grey thread in different weights onto black cotton.

So far my samples aren't really forming as a collection. I think that it's because of the hand embroidery. As I have done it in black it doesn't quite fit with the rest of my samples. I think bringing in colour to all my samples will help with this.

Bobbi Jean Shields

Quintessential Designs

Nomad - Week Two

Our second week in print was another drawing week.

We continued with drawing but this time we started to use different mediums. We used our Promarkers for the first time. They're really good. I really enjoyed using them. You can get different weights of line with them and they're really easy to use.

I first saw these being used at the 2013 Comic Con in Glasgow and when I found out we were going to be using them this year I was really excited. One of the comic book artists had been drawing anime style portraits with them.

We used them with our regular fineliners just like a double pen drawing and it gave a really fantastic effect with the differing weights of line interacting with one another. In doing this we also started to experiment with drawing in dots and dashes in order to make it more interesting.

We then used ink to draw our objects. I know that sounds silly because we were using pen and now ink but we used the ink like a paint, using brushes and skewers to make different weight of

line and different marks across the page.

I focused in on the details of my objects looking for shapes I could make into repeating prints or as a border. I think I got some good marks that I can make into a print though I am still torn on whether to do an interiors project or a fashion project. I have however started looking up source for both on Pinterest.

Bobbi Jean Shields

Quintessential Designs

The Curator - Week Two

This week I was back at the Hunterian Museum. It was our second week of drawing and this week we were working with pencil.

In order to make up for last week, where I accidentally did some pencil drawing on our fineliner day, I did a fineliner drawing as well. 

I fortunately remembered to bring my A3 cartridge paper to draw on instead of just drawing in my journal. 

I used some of my watercolours to colour my backgrounds that I was working on. I also bought a new better looking journal that is bigger. 

Our lecturers decided to take a look at our work and so they told me I should place my drawings from my smaller sketchbook in as pages by themselves so that I have different paper sizes in order to make the journal more interesting. I like the idea but actually taping them in was hard to do. The tape kept on sticking to my fingers.

I enjoyed using pencil in that I can alter as I wish. I also like using pencil as I can get different weights of line however I do love the crispness of using a pen. I can't decide between the two.

On our second class of the week for the Curator we were supposed be doing collages and watercolours but I prefer watercolours so I spent most of my time doing those.

I really love using watercolours but I took the opportunity to use my promarkers as I love the effect of the differing weights of line. I experimented with using them and then going over the results with an ordinary fineliner although I did find out that if you use black fineliner onto black promarker there is no difference and so it won't show up at all. 

I mixed using watercolours with pen and did some drawings using watercolour first then adding pen or vice versa. I also had some with only watercolour.

I also found a good name for my project. "Gift's from the Underworld" The cabinet of minerals behind me was titled this and I had been reading about Greek Myths this week so it stuck in my head.

This week is our last week of drawing at the Hunterian during class time.

After class I went into Glasgow to Remnant Kings and bought two twenty centimetre strips of nice patterned fabrics for the Hunterian project. I also looked through the remnants bin at the front of the store for some fabrics that I liked. I think I ended up spending around thirty pounds.

Bobbi Jean Shields

Quintessential Designs

Nomad - Week One

Anthropologie

This week I had my first print class of the year. I enjoyed print a lot last year and was really looking forward to it this year. This project is different from my other projects this year which are being divided into five week segments. This project is being run over twelve weeks and other than a short one week print project is our only print work that we will have in our portfolios for our UCAS applications. Last year's work doesn't get submitted. Even if I wanted to submit it the college still has my sketchbook from last year to be used as an example. I hope I can get if back at the end of the year though my mum's probably going to kill me for that comment. I have enough stuff to keep without adding more but I really love my first year work in print.

We were asked over the summer to collect objects and source relating to the word Nomad. This was part of a live (but not really) brief for a shop called Anthropologie. While the shop isn't actually involved we have on base our designs on if we had been designing for them.

Anthropologie

I spent the summer gathering bric a brack from charity shops eg pottery, nice boxes and such. Some of it was relevant to the brief and some of it not so much but I ended up with some objects with nice patterns that I could draw. Anyway so I brought it into college and we were giving drawing tasks to do. As with most projects we started with the basic warm up drawings with some added ones that were mind boggling.

The basics are:

Line drawing: Basic drawing with a fine line pen this tends to be what most of your drawing is done in but the other warm up drawings are just basic variations.

Non Dominant Drawing: This is the same as a fine line drawing except the pen is held in the opposing hand e.g. if your right handed you would do the drawing in your left hand. We didn't actually do this one in print class but it tends to be one that we do alot.

Continuous Line Drawing: This is where you cannot lift the pen from the paper. Some lecturers in the past have told me that they will charge a pound for every time you take your pen from the paper. I find it really hard because I like to be able to jump from doing one thing to another.

Blind drawing: This is where you do not look at what your drawing at all and only look at the object itself. This is quite hard to do so many cover their drawing with a blank sheet of paper so their not tempted to look. Typically this is a continuous line drawing as if you lose your place you cant really get it back. it usually just ends up as a bunch of random squiggles.

Double Pen Drawing: Exactly as it sound this is where you tape two pens together and draw simultaneously with both. This can get pretty confusing. The trick is to pick a dark colour and a light colour and concentrate on the dark. Then you don't lose your place so easily.

The two mind boggling drawing tasks were:

Double Pen Symmetry Drawing: We had to use two pens in either hand and imagine a line of symmetry down the middle. So we had to draw on one side and a mirror image on the other side which was really hard to do. Needless to so mine was a bit of a disaster.

Blind Drawing : We had to stare at our objects for 5 mins and then try to draw from memory. I think after the first ten seconds of drawing everyone was just making it up as they had forgotten what it looked like.

It was good to leap straight back into drawing and I really am looking forward to experimenting with the drawings to take them into print however I cannot decide whether or not to do a fashion project or an interiors. At first I was thinking fashion but now I'm leaning more towards interiors.

For next week I can leave some of the less relevant objects at home.


Bobbi Jean Shields
Quintessential Designs