MCC Time to Tangle with Colours - Wk 2

Links: MCC (My Creative Classroom), Marie Browning

The Dual Brush Pen assignment for the second week was to create a tangled landscape whilst focussing upon the indirect blending technique with the Blender Pen. I also wanted to try using the optional 'haloing' technique that Marie demonstrated. With hindsight I might have been better only adding a few haloed swirls in my lower portion of sky. When I haloed the inside of the outermost border in grey there was very little difference between the halo & the black so I tried moving it a little with the Blender Pen & ended up quite pleased with the result. Some more lessons learnt through what I would once have considered mistakes. I also used stippling to create the foliage for the fractal tree.

Landscape ZIA
tangles: Chillon, Fractal Tree, Jonqual, Knightsbridge, Meer, Mooka, Nipa, Printemps, Purk, Scallops
Tombow Markers colouring on Canson XL Series Mx Media 98lb/160g paper

A Square Challenge for Chocolate Baroque

May's Challenge (Number 14) for the Chocolate Baroque Zentangle Group is to create a tile or ZIA based upon a square string of our choice.

I couldn't resist working on a ZIA using the techniques I've been learning during the MCC Time to Tangle with Colours course. I decided to use warm colours this time & to work on watercolour paper (Daler-Rowney Langton 300gsm Hot Pressed Extra Smooth) as opposed to the Canson XL Series Mix Media 98lb/160g paper. The Tombow inks move well (but differently) with water on  either paper though they do seem extra 'bright' somehow on the watercolour paper. I also discovered that using a conventional Sable brush as opposed to a synthetic water reservoir brush helps to eliminate any hard lines & moves the colour about more effectively.

Again I have used my Black Page Album Moleskine for mounting the squares.

tangles: Hollibaugh, Knightsbridge, Nekton, Nzepple, Quandary, Tripoli, W2
Tombow Markers outline watercolour blending, indirect Blender Pen & direct to paper colouring 

MCC Time to Tangle with Colours - More Wk 1

Links: MCC (My Creative Classromm), Marie Browning,
           Glenda Waterworth (Seussisms post)

I struggled rather with the final assignment for the first week. My first mistake opportunity for learning came as I tangled, since, all the patterns I chose except the border are based upon grids. Next time I shall pay attention to the need for balance between grid-based & organic flowing tangles.

Secondly, as I worked with the Derwent Coloursoft pencils, I realised that I was getting an awful lot of debris & the layers began to 'stick' or 'catch' upon one another - particularly visible in Jester (top right). I switched to using my Polychromos pencils which, being oil-based, don't crumble & give off debris, but I still struggled to blend. I tried smoothing out the blending with the Tombow Blender Pen & found that it made no difference with either brand of pencil. Sitting & thinking about this I've concluded that I was much too heavy handed in my laying down of colour  &, possibly, the Tombow Blender isn't compatible with either Derwent Coloursoft or Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils.

Analogous Pencil Colouring
tangles: Cubine, Flukes, Jester, Pearlz, Screen
Derwent Coloursoft (Flukes & Jester) & Faber-Castell Polychromos (Cubine, Pearlz & Screen) both
blended with Tombow Blender Pen on Canson XL Series Mix Media 98lb/160g paper

MCC Time to Tangle with Colours - Wk 1

Links: MCC (My Creative Classsroom), Marie Browning

I was thrilled to discover that MCC were proposing to run a second tangling course taught by Marie Browning & so I signed up as soon as I could.

The class is taught using Tombow Dual Brush Pens & Irojiten Colour Pencils. I have a good selection of colours in the Tombow Pens but, since the Irojiten pencils are at present not easy to get hold of in the UK, I shall be using my tin of 36 Derwent Coloursoft pencils which are wax-based like the Irojiten.

The assignments for each week are optional, however, I always learn more when I actually engage with my materials & know from experience that a particular product can vary greatly in its performance depending upon what type of paper it is used upon. I shall include what I choose to do for 'homework' here in blog posts but for reasons of copyright I will not be giving detailed technical explanations.

The first assignment involved using the colours we find combined in the natural world to start a reference tool in the form of a notebook or Pinterest Board. I decide to work with the latter option using my own photographs to create a board which you can find HERE.

For my second assignment I chose to use oval shapes with a cool colour scheme to create a piece of Zentangle Inspired Artwork (ZIA) in my Black Page Album Moleskine.

Cool Colours ZIA
tangles: Cadent, Cubine, Hollibaugh, Nzepple, Printemps, Quandary, Triangles, Tripoli
Tombow Markers outline watercolour blending & indirect Blender Pen colouring on
Canson XL Series Mix Media 98lb/160g paper

The Challenge of Borders

April's Challenge (Number 13) for the Chocolate Baroque Zentangle Group is a tangle based challenge focusing upon borders.

I drew my own string (above) & then watched the tile evolve totally dispelling my preconceived ideas about a sun with rays.

tangles: Barberpole (tangleation), Wire Wrap, Zig Zag Border

Spring Tangling

Firstly, thank you for all your thoughtful wishes - my migraine control has improved over the last month & after catching up with some essential organising about the house I shall hopefully have some more time for artwork.

I had some very old papers with a rather large floral looking design which I thought might work as a framework for tangling. I outlined some areas of the pattern until I had what looked like a very large flower & then tangled the petals using a selection of tangles from Suzanne McNeill's book Zentangle 3 plus Cubine from Zentangle Basics. The resulting artwork was then mounted onto black cardstock & a scalloped edge card blank. The inside is simply decorated using die-cut elements from Spellbinders Shapeabilities Lace Doily Motifs & Accents.

tangles: Bubbles, Chaingang, Cubine, Droplets, Loops,
Rain (tangleation), Scallops, Yincut

inside of card

Challenges Entered (card above)

Everybody-Art Challenge 228 - Spring (a floral theme plus the green of Spring flowers)

Simon Says Stamp Challenge - Easter/Spring (the Spring theme of flowers & the colour green)


As I had a second large card blank (but without scallops) I made another card using slightly different tangles but keeping the same design for the inside.

tangles: Barberpole (tangleations), Bubbles, Droplets, Loops,
Rain (tangleation), Scallops, Strircles, Yincut

Tangling with Chocolate Baroque

The March Challenge (Number 12) for the Chocolate Baroque Zentangle Group is based upon a floral theme.

Chocolate Baroque recently released a sheet of rubber stamps, Tangled Garden, containing images for both tanglers & non-tanglers alike. I used the large open flower image for my tile which I then mounted onto a piece of black cardstock making it a ZIA (Zentangle Inspired Artwork - any artwork incorporating tangles which differs from the standard 3½ inch square tile). Chocolate Baroque also stocks other Zentangle Supplies (books, tiles & Sakura Pigma Micron pens etc....) plus a selection of Dreamweaver Stencils (some of which are featured in Zentangle 6).

tangles: Betweed, Knightsbridge, Opus, Tipple

I stamped the flower using grey ink as I wanted to have a framework for my tangles & yet be able to ignore the stamped lines if I wished to. I came to the conclusion that I had to either colour the flower or shade the tangles - I have much to learn in this department, besides which I'm also unfamiliar with watercolouring using the Distress Stains - & settled for colouring the flower. I actually watercoloured the flower first, dried it off with my heat gun & then worked on the tangles.

Recipe

Stamp Chocolate Baroque UA4SP0400 Tangled Garden. 
Inks VersaFine Smokey Gray; Broken China, Chipped Sapphire, Mustard Seed &Tumbled Glass Distress Stains.
Pens/Markers 01 Black Uni Pin Drawing Pen (tangles), Memento Tuxedo Black Dual Marker (edging tile).
Cardstock Winsor & Newton Cotman 190gsm Cold Pressed/NOT Grain Fin Watercolour Paper; Black
Punch Woodware (corner rounder).

I have lots of ideas for this challenge but my crafting time has been somewhat curtailed by a breakdown in my migraine control. As a consequence this blog & PEP & Paper have been rather lacking in posts, so my apologies if you have visited & found nothing new.