…compilation of tutorials
Pink Paper Peppermints has a beautiful project: 31 Crafty Flowers.
I checked them all and I wanted to present one of them, although I haven’t tried it yet, because I dont’ have the right markers: the Watercolor Button Garden.
Aren’t they beautiful?
And be sure to check the other flowers too :)
Links:
Watercolor Button Garden
While browsing Origami links I found a tutorial on how to cut Kirigami flowers, a technique we used when we were children for cutting snowflakes.
I hadn’t realized that this technique is so widely usable and brings so beautiful results.
On the photo you see a flower I cut in very short time for a greeting card and suddenly I felt the urge to doodle on it ;-)
Every petal looks different now.
The photo is bad, but I hope that you can see what I am talking about.
Links:
Kirigami Flower
I found an ingenious way to make my own Airbrush tool.
I haven’t tried it yet, but I think of using it with the cut-out letters from my letter stencils.
(The picture is a mock-up, made digitally to show what I am aiming for.)
Links:
Pocket Graffiti Pen (with explaining photos)
Here at unikatissima:
Letter stencils
While working with polymer clay I found a tutorial on how-to make items with a Bargello-look.
Then I made a little research to know what Bargello is (links see below):
It seems, that the first ‘Bargello craft’ was embroidery, but then the quilters worked Bargello-looking quilts, the polymer clay people made those items with a Bargello-look and the stampers and cardmaking people use this technique on paper. And I made my Bargello digitally as you can see on the picture ;-)
What a versatile technique ;-)
Links:
Embroidery:
Wikipedia: English entry for ‘Bargello’
How-to make Bargello needlework:
Bargello Work
Bargello needlepoint
Quilting:
How To Make Bargello Quilt
Polymer Clay:
Tutorial on how-to make items with a Bargello-look
Bargello Swap
Tutorial on how to make a Bargello pattern as cane and as sheet
Stamped Paper:
Bargello (English) (with explaining pictures)
Rosie showed her beautiful carved stamps and mentioned that she wants to carve letters too.
I prefer to use letter stencils, because I can use them in such a flexible way.
On the first photo you see a page from an artist book of mine yet to be finished. It has the theme ‘Colour’ and I stenciled the word ‘Pink’. On the other photo beneath you can see the stencil.
This is how I did it:
You’ll need:
What to do:
The tape makes the paper not only sturdy, but also quite waterproof, so that you can use it several times with nearly every kind of colours. If necessary you can put tape on both sides of the paper prior to the cutting.
You can find a similar tutorial on instructables.com for making your own freezer paper and your own freezer paper stencil. I guess it is better for making bigger stencils, but I haven’t tried it.
Links:
Rosie’s carved stamps
As I saw this tutorial on how to make vellum spirals I was amazed: such beautiful paper spirals and so easy to make!
On the photo you see my spiral with changing directions.
It looks so frail against the light.
The tutorial is in German, but there are explaining pictures (you must look at the PDF file!).
What you have to do is basically:
They suggest that you begin to experiment then:
I had a lot of fun and I hope so will you :-)
I intend to use those spirals in the future on cards, tags, in altered books and so forth.
I’d love to know about your experiments with folded spirals.
Links:
Tutorial on how to fold paper spirals:
(Download the PDF file)
Flexagons a quite interesting things: a kind of card with four sides, and you can flip from one side to the other, back and forth.
But to better understand what Flexagons are, how they work and how you can make one for yourself take a look at the Flexagon page.
On the photos you see the four pages of my first (and up until now last) flexagon. (Click on thumbnails to see the photos.)
It doesn’t work so well, because it is to bulky:
I made them from cardboard to make them lasting longer, glued then cotton on to the cardboard, because I thought that fabric would bend better if you flip them over and over and then glued on the pieces of my hand-embroidered and tape-transfered collages on the appropriate places.
Next time I will see to it that they get slender.
But anyhow: I love my flexagon ;-))
Links:
Flexagons
And if you want to embroider your collages:
English Embroidery Stitch Diagrams – Deutsche Stickstichbeschreibungen
(see also Paper Crazy Quilt)
If you want to know more about image transfers
Easy Photo Transfers (different techniques)
Image Transfer
Packing Tape Image Transfers
(see also Artist Book)
Here at unikatissima:
Paper Crazy Quilt
Artist Book
Bead picots are a beautiful way to give you work a neat border.
I was therefore glad to find this tutorial on how to make bead picots tutorial on how to make bead picots.
On the photo you see a freeform bead embroidered pin I made; I worked the bead picots all around the pin.
I also made once a little book (given away without taking a photo ;-(), where I used the bead picots to border the paper pages – it look great, too.
Next time I’ll make an Artist Book, I will use bead picots on the paper, as well as on the next crochet purse I will make (but no one knows when this will be ;-)), perhaps even the next greeting card I’ll create and who knows what ideas I’ll get by then ;-)
Links:
Bead Picot Instructions
The original site doesn’t exist any more and is now available through webarchive: Bead Picot Instructions
Here at unikatissima:
Freeform Bead Embroidery
Artist Book
I already cut different pop ups, and I find this one quite elegant.
I haven’t done it yet, but I surely will one day.
(If you like the fractal repeats, take a look at the previous mentioned Fractal Art.)
Links:
Fractal Cut
Wikipedia: English entry for ‘fractal’ – Deutscher Eintrag für ‘Fraktal’
Here at unikatissima:
Fractal Art
As I mentioned before, I don’t often stamp. Therefore I found the tutorial on how to make stamps with an inkjet printer very interesting.
I haven’t tried it yet and possibly I never will, because printer ink is also expensive, but who knows? Because I really want to ‘stamp’ the image on the photo and I’m sure that I wont carve it from an eraser ;-)
Links:
Craft Chi: Inkjet Transfer Stamping
Here at unikatissima:
Eraser Stamps