Monday, October 22, 2012

World Landmarks: 
The Taj Mahal
This was for the World Landmarks LTC tracker.  I wasn't sure what landmark to pick since there were so many to choose from but i always like the beauty and mysterious setting that the Taj seems to exude.  When i saw this image it almost made me think of a watercolor painting.  It was very dreamlike in its state.  I also wanted something antique and old looking so i choose this marble type card stock to print on.  The whole image has this sort of wavy disappearing quality to it.  I punched some fancy corners on the tops of the cards to give it a regal look to it as well as kind of clouds in the sky.  It turned out ok.  This ended up being just simply black ink on a marble tan card with scalloped corners.

Sunday, October 21, 2012

The Girl With The Gears Tattoo
This was for a Steam Punk Pin-Up tracker.  I really wanted to continue my work on fine line stamps.  I ended up finding a great image to work with.  Some of the lines in her hair, eyes, lips and legs i really like.  Overall i thought the carve was pretty good.  I ended up stamping on vellum which is a more see through paper.  I found some great card stock with different types of gears displayed so i used that as my background.  I attached the vellum and card stock using some brass colored brads in each corner.  There were several different background designs that i ended up using so there were a couple of different cards made available for this tracker.  I knew the novel "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo" was quite popular during this time so i thought it would be a funny play on words to use that as my title.
Looney Tunes: Daffy Duck
I did this for the Looney Tunes LTC tracker.  I just tried to pick a main character for my choice.  I had always wanted to do a two sided carve and so i thought this would be a good opportunity to try this out.  I decided to do two expressions for Daffy and then do a two sided card as well.  There really wasn't much to these carves.  I ended up using Staedtler Master Carve rubber since i knew they had a thicker type you could buy.  It was much softer than i wanted but it allowed me the greater ability to have greater control when stamping the image because of the thickness to it.  Other than the carve, there really wasn't much left but using some orange marker to fill in his bill and feet.

Star Wars: Grand Moff Tarkin
This was for the LTC tracker Star Wars.  There were just so many characters to choose from but i decided to do someone that no one picked.  I had always liked his portrayal from the films and thought of a simple design.  There was really nothing to this carve except carving out the negative space.  I probably could have done a little more detail on some of the lines and eliminated some stress lines from his forehead and chins but the likeness seemed to turn out well.  I used some colored pencils for the flesh tone and subtle color in his shirt.  The flesh tone was a little too strong so i then used an eraser over his entire face after applying it and this seemed to soften the color which then looked much better afterwards.