Textured Tuesday – April 2024

Tuesday.

I’ve been playing around with cyanotypes for the last few weeks, that is on the days it hasn’t rained. We seem to be having more wet days than dry at present and it has been going on for months. Anyway, I’ve been having fun with wet cyanotypes where you have no idea of the outcome, and seeing how much stuff (read here leaves and feathers) I can put on one sheet of paper before it becomes too chaotic for my sensibilities. I’ll leave you to judge that for yourselves, I know what I like and don’t like now, so it was a worthwhile few days of playing.

Three A5 cyanotypes propped up to peruse.

A couple of A4 cyanotypes using the same leaves.

Textured Tuesday – April 2024

Tuesday.

I’ve taken collage to a serious new level for me! After a tentitive play with torn paper strips in collage a month ago, I’ve now developed a daily habit of tearing paper strips ready for more collage. I had only made collages with cut paper pieces and never seemed to find it interesting or satisfying, then I saw torn paper collages. Didn’t like the effect until I started tearing long thin strips that I could put into rows to cover a sheet of paper using similar colours and/or neutrals, mixing many different pages together. I spent hours on the long plane flights to and from Australia and England tearing paper strips, who know what the people next to me thought! So I now have a lovely collection of torn strips waiting to be made into collages.

A pile of torn strips of paper ready for collaging.

An exploratory triptych of torn paper strips.

Textured Tuesday – March 2024

Tuesday.

A bit of play on a beach on the Isle of Lewis.

Slow shutter speed capturing the waves always (well nearly always) gives good results and a similar slow shutter speed but jiggling the camera gives a blur to the landscape and the two photographers with their tripods. I love how the tripods are quite clearly seen for what they are.

A double exposure in camera to put the headlands at each end of the long beach into the one shot. It makes an intriguing image

Shore break, Isle of Lewis. Slow shutter speed.

Photography on the beach, Isle of Lewis. ICM.

Double exposure in camera of a beach on Isle of Lewis.

Textured Tuesday – February 2024

Tuesday.

It is amazing what draws your attention at certain times of the year. It is only now, in late summer the sun comes directly in my eastern window at this oblique angle for a short time. And it is only at this time that the shadows cast from the handles of my kitchen drawers make themselves known. I love the diagonal lines that cut across the rigid forms of the drawers.

Highlights and shadows in the kitchen.

The oblique angle of the sun at only this time of the year makes these interesting patterns.

Textured Tuesday – February 2024

Tuesday.

I enjoy making double exposures in-camera with my Canon R5. I have a choice of 4 different ways to combine images actually in the camera – light, dark, average and additive. Each mode gives different looks to the final combined image and it is very different and more random than overlaying or compositing images in Photoshop. I made these at Cahills Crossing in Kakadu NP and liked the shadow effect of the first image behind the second.

Leaves – Double exposure in-camera.

Leaves – Double exposure in-camera.

Textured Tuesday – February 2024

Tuesday.

A bit of play on my cyanotype papers. Using string I stitched (very roughly it was harder than I thought) onto heavy 300gsm paper precoated with cyanotype mixture. I made 2 of each design and one I treated as a normal cyanotype and the other I did as a wet cyanotype, to see which I preferred. I seem to like the wet cyanotypes every time, no matter what I print onto the paper.

Stitched straight lines on the cyanotype paper.

A curve of stitching on cyanotype paper.

Textured Tuesday – January 2024

Tuesday.

Again taking images from Kakadu last year and combining them in Photoshop but this time with painted fabric as the base layer. Later this week I hope to print the dragonfly onto the actual fabric – something new I’m trialing.

Dragonfly balanced on a curl, combined images in Photoshop.

The same images, different blend mode, different look.

Textured Tuesday – January 2024

Tuesday.

On a whim I went back to my images from Kakadu last year and combined a few I thought would make interesting altered images in Photoshop. I was happy with these results.

Images of new gumtree shoots combined and altered in Photoshop.

Pandanus palms altered and layered in Photoshop.

And again but with a different blend mode – such a different result.

Textured Tuesday – January 2024

Tuesday.

Something a bit different for Textured Tuesday. A course I am doing online, asked everyone to do a ‘self portrait’ by whatever method they liked. I made a 3 layered composite in Photoshop and then decided I didn’t feel it said enough. Later that day I made this little Zine with my own photos that I felt said more about me without being a photo OF me. I used a template in Photobookshop for the layout and altered it to fit my photos and then took a screenshot which I uploaded and printed through my computer onto the A4 sheet. It was quick and easy and I’m happy with the result.

It’s one A4 sheet of copy paper, folded to make the Zine.

A little Zine.

A Self-Portrait Zine.

The Zine layout printed on an A4 sheet of copy paper.

Textured Tuesday – January 2024.

Tuesday.

I’m doing a course with Fibre Arts Take Two called Embrace the Journey. This is taking me out of my comfort zone with painting on fabric and paper. Here I am using moulding paste on an old book page to add texture to the page and strengthen the paper so I can print the flower photo over it. I combined them in Photoshop to see if I liked the result before printing. The whole idea for me, is to add physical texture to my printed images.

A page from an old book, plastered with moulding paste and painted.

Layered in Photoshop with a flower image, now to see how it prints on the book page!