Left of Centre Challenge #138 - Animals

Here we are again - those 2 weeks flew by didn't they? I'm back with my next project for Left of Center Creative Challenges.

This week's challenge requires an animal to feature and our sponsor for this week is Delicious Doodles.

 

  

I chose the blue tit from the lovely digi stamps available. I have a big reason for choosing it. I had a family of blue tits with a huge batch of eggs in a nesting box on my front porch, and someone knocked the box down, destroying half and then came and stole the rest. So- upset and angry about that, I thought that I'd transfer that into my art, and came up with this. It's premise is that nature is never ending and perseveres regardless - whilst humanity is a small blip on the conscious of the world. 

I found the perfect paper for a wonderful 
background at Paper Lozzy on the gorgeous paper pack Mixed Media, it had the right colours that would coordinate with the coloured image.
I used Promarkers to colour the bird and branch, layering up colours from pale to bright yellow, cool grey, and three shades of blue plus black. The branch is a mix of cool grey and two different browns.

The MDF pieces for the nest and the skull with roses are from a wonderful lady called Jac and her company is called Things to Alter. I left the nest as it came, such wonderful detail. With the skull, covered it with Liquitex Heavy White Gesso and used my finger to rub it over the area, then a baby wipe to take off some of the thickness so the details still show. I added a bit more gesso on a baby wipe after it dried to whiten it up a bit more. Once dried, I used Promarkers to colour the skull, teeth, and the roses. I used my finger to blend the colours together on the roses, and added deeper colour to the cracks and crevices in the skull.

I ripped the A4 printed background around the edges to give it an aged look, and used a deep pink ink around the edge to take away any white. Once stuck down, I added some Liquitex Heavy White Gesso in places with an old credit card. Once dry, I used a brown Promarker to add a trunk along the left hand side of the page. I added the nest so it would be in the background for perspective and placed the coloured and fussy cut bird slightly staggered and down from it. To fill in the area between the trunk,  bird and nest I used Petaloo Botanical Mini flowers in Pink. The skull was placed at the bottom and a shadow added with brown Promarker.

The two layered die cut pieces of card in deep orange canvas effect and plain white are from my stash, as is the stamp I used for the quote.

I hope you like my latest project. Don't forget to pop along from 8pm Saturday 9th July for challenge #138 - Animals. I look forward to seeing your makes.

I will also be submitting this project into the following challenges:

A Bit More Time to Craft - #23 - Anything Goes
Dream In Darkness -a July - Anything Goes
 Art Journal Journey - In My Garden
Altered Eclectics - July Anything Goes 
Penny's Paper Crafty Challenge - #285 Anything Goes
SLS Lines Digital Stamps Challenge - Anything But A Card 
Paperbabes Stamps- #37 Anything Goes

Thanks for coming by.

Michelle xxxx

Left of Centre DT Project #136

Hi again - no you're not seeing double, I have actually written two blogs on one day! It just so happens that the newest challenge blogs DT I have joined happened to have their first, or latest challenges on the same day this time round.

 

I'm just as excited about this challenge blog as the last. Left of Centre Creative Challenges is a challenge blog that showcases the weird and wonderful world of gothic, fantasy, punk, grunge, dark and quirky. We also welcome the traditional here, but we do ask that your work is mixed media- on whatever medium you prefer whether canvas, art journal, card, bottle or anything else really! The challenges run every week from Saturday morning and we have a fantastic range of sponsors who we showcase each week, and who are generous in offering prizes of digi images to winners of our challenges. We also do winners badges for those chosen by the DT each week to proudly put on your blog/instagram/website.

This is my first DT project for the team and this week's sponsor is Moonflower Digistamps.

The week's theme is Monochrome and so with this in mind I decided to rummage through my colours and decided on blue as my main colour.

I chose Minako the Oriental Maiden as my digi image, she's gorgeous!!

I adore this image, and have always loved oriental imagery. It was a very popular this week and I'm not the only DT member to choose it, so I had to think about what colour to use so as to not duplicate what had already been done.

I printed on white card and set about colouring her in with my Promarkers. I used four different blues: Blue Pearl, Sky Blue, Duck egg Blue and Indigo Blue. For her skin I used Vanilla and Pink Blossom and for her hair I used Henna. I added a touch of green for the leaves on her kimono.

I used a mix of paper from my stash for the background on my Daler Rowney Mixed Media A4 paper. I tore the papers up and stuck them down, then once coloured, I fussy cut the digi image out and affixed her to the page. I added a sentiment I found in my stash, coloured parts of it with blue ink to keep to the monochrome theme. I added some sequins from my stash to her head dress and in the centre of her fan to add some bling, and some tiny blue flower gems to the centre of the flowers. I coloured a silver metal fan charm from my stash with Indigo Blue Promarker and affixed it to the quote. It didn't feel quite finished so I got my white gel pen and added dots of white to the quote and flowers, and doodles circles and arrow heads onto the blue background papers to add some interest.

I hope you enjoy my project and that you'll come along and join us for this week's challenge at 8pm GMT today. The theme is Monochrome. Go to Left of Centre (LOC) Creative Challenges. We also have a page on Facebook.

I shall be entering this project into the following challenges:

Classic Design Team Open Challenge Blog - #03 Anything Goes

  The Mixed Media Monthly Challenge - #25 2nd Anniversary
A Bit More Time to Craft - #22 Anything Goes 
SLS Lines Digital Stamp Challenge - Anything But A Card

Michelle xx