We've been on a few cruises and lately have been cruising with a line that has 'Ceramics @ Sea'. They wheel out a trolly with blanks of plates, mugs, bowls, coasters, etc. and you choose an item to paint. They supply all the brushes, glazes, and some books that can be used for inspiration.

This is the box with lid that I painted last time out. It has a different aquatic scene on each side.

The crew takes them away for firing and there is a champagne reception on the last day of the cruise for the artists to meet and pick up their finished pieces.

Ddd studio3d@ccwebster.net

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 1:51 PM PDT

Updated: Monday, 25 June 2007 2:01 PM PDT

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Here's a fun little website to play at: http://www.stampitout.wildjelly.com/index.html

Stamp It Out is a simple postage stamp generator (not legal postage) where you upload your own image, select a country (for the correct postal markings), and generate a custom stamp. You can right-click to save the images - of a single stamp or a 'hand-held' group of 4 - or you can print up a full page of your images.

Images come complete with postage stamp edges and are as cute as can be!

By supplying your own image you choose whether you will be making a statement, commemorating an event, sharing your kid's art, or making a custom piece to include in a collage. What you CANNOT do with it is paste it on an envelope in lieu of legally purchased postage!

Here is the handheld view I made from one of my stitching cards.

Go - Play - Have Fun!

Ddd studio3d@ccwebster.net

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 10:06 AM PDT

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Here's a way you can combine rubber stamping, treasure hunting, and the family vacation! What fun idea is this? It is called 'letterboxing' - a lot like geocaching but with a rubber stamp as the hidden goal.

From the website for Letterboxing North America http://www.letterboxing.org/index.php comes this explaination:

"Here's the basic idea: Someone hides a waterproof box somewhere (in a beautiful, interesting, or remote location) containing at least a logbook and a carved rubber stamp, and perhaps other goodies. The hider then usually writes directions to the box (called "clues" or "the map"), which can be straightforward, cryptic, or any degree in between. Often the clues involve map coordinates or compass bearings from landmarks, but they don't have to. Selecting a location and writing the clues is one aspect of the art.

"Once the clues are written, hunters in possession of the clues attempt to find the box. In addition to the clue and any maps or tools needed to solve it, the hunter should carry at least a pencil, his personal rubber stamp, an inkpad, and his personal logbook. When the hunter successfully deciphers the clue and finds the box, he stamps the logbook in the box with his personal stamp, and stamps his personal logbook with the box's stamp. The box's logbook keeps a record of all its visitors, and the hunters keep a record of all the boxes they have found, in their personal logbooks."

The Letterboxing North America website has instructions for getting started, a glossary of terms, and a way to locate targets to search for by either text-based searching or by clicking on a US map for the area you want to search in.

I used the map method (look under the 'clues' tab) by clicking on my own state and then the city closest to me. This brought me to a complete list of the letterboxes in my area. A quick scan down the cities for my own, and off I went to read some clues. I did my searching from my armchair and, working my way through the clues, could walk right to any one of the three I read up on. One fine day this summer I plan to create a letterboxing journal, assemble a kit, and start collecting those rubber stamp impressions from my local area.

My children both live in different states than I so I can plan some letterboxing when I go on family visits as well.

Other letterboxing sites include Atlas Quest at http://www.atlasquest.com/, Letterboxing in New Zealand at http://www.psychokiwi.org/letterboxing/nzboxing.htm Many others can be found by searching 'letterboxing' in Google.

Ddd studio3d@ccwebster.net  

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 7:15 AM PDT

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Are you feeling a bit blue? A few clicks of the mouse will help you find a color to complement it!

There is a great interactive color wheel for you to play with at  http://www.paintquality.com/color/colorwheel.html

There is a tab called Color Combinations that lets you click on various of the primary colors as well as white and black to see what effect they have when combined with other colors.

The Color Schemes tab highlights on the color wheel the patterns for Analogous, Complementaries, Split Complementaries, Tetrads, and Triads.  Within any of these color schemes you can rotate the color wheel to see the results.

Other controls show the wheel as reference colors, with their Shades, Tones, and Tints.

Confused? Click on the Glossary tab for definitions of all the terminology used.

Explore color and get back in the pink!

Ddd studio3d@ccwebster.net

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 6:27 AM PDT

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Hi all -

Let me share with you the best e-zine I have found! SSReflections is an on-line stamping and scrapbooking magazine that runs on the theme of a cruise ship sailing from port to port around the world.

Different decks and lounges feature the variety of techniques and interests in these hobbies and are exceptionally well presented by a variety of 'crew members'. They cover the gamut from traditional to digital scrapping, stamping arts to altered arts with many related topics covered in each monthly issue.

Their own website describes itself this way

SS Reflections Ezine
www.ssreflections.com  

If you are joining us for the very first time, let me explain what S.S. Reflections is. We are a completely FREE online magazine for you with a truly unique concept. SSR is a virtual cruise ship from the Golden Era here to entertain you as we visit a new country/port each month. We have an amazing crew who create designs and share ideas with you each month from various areas of the ship. Our fly-out menu bar, to the left, can take you anywhere on the ship that you would like to be. It will guide you through each deck on this magnificent ship! If you'd like to read each and every feature, at the bottom of each page is a blue arrow and our click to link which will take you to the next page to read as though you were turning a page of a paper magazine! Each page is linked to the next. As mentioned above, we now have a Quick Links feature to help you get to where you want to go to next! We also have an into page for each deck which are listed in the Quick Links section. On these pages are ship's wheels with our crewmember's pictures inside - you can click on the wheel to read a short, fun bio for many of our designers. You can also click on the name of their room on the ship and it will take you directly to their article, or you can email each crewmember directly by clicking on their name! Please write to your favorite designer and be sure to let her know what you love about her and SSR!

They include lots of advertising, product reviews, reader challenges, contests, and more.

Sail away on SSReflections for the trip of a lifetime!

Ddd studio3d@ccwebster.net

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 3:22 PM PDT

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Today I'm sharing another great site for printing art projects. Canon has put together Creative Park (http://cp.c-ij.com/english/index.html) with topics and projects grouped under the headings of

Greetings - cards, stationery, envelopes;

Scrapbook - paterened papers, tags, photo frames, borders, fonts;

Calendars - insert your own photos;

Photo gallery - hundreds of beautiful photos to download for use in your projects;

Photo style - teaches you to be a better photographer;

and my personal favorite 3d Paper Craft - dozens of projects to print and construct. In the animal category:

How about a 3D Black Lab 1/2 the size of the real dog, complete with red bandana? Maybe you'd prefer to make emperor penguins? These and others are completely formed 3D models. Others are available in simpler models that just fold over at the top along a 'seam line'.

Under Craftown you can download and print all the parts for a complete city with over 30 parts and pieces.

The general category of 'items' has such projects as a Chinese Dragon, Dharma dolls, Lucky cats, and a Chinese boat.

Having an Italian dinner? Go to the section on architecture and you can whip up a Leaning Tower of Pisa centerpiece! Or just on a whim you can reconstruct the Statue of Liberty, the Sydney Opera House, the Sphynx or dozens of other projects.

The science section features several dinosaurs as well as a globe, star chart, and sundial.

Teddy bears, airplanes, cars and games are featured in the 'toys' category. I think the wedding bears would be a nice centerpiece for a bridal shower.

The origami tab brings up scores of printed origami papers as well as papers printed for specific origami models. You can print a paper and fold as instructed to end up with a rabbit with features already in place!

The Seasons section features many 3D cards, bunches of gift boxes, party goods such as decorations and masks and ornamentations.

You can spend a lot of time at this site followed by a lot of time constructing nifty things followed by a lot of time admiring the results and sharing them with your friends and family.

Go have some 3D fun!

Ddd studio3d@ccwebster.net

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 7:48 AM PDT

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Earlier this week I showed the process of working from my Parts & Starts bin to make a variety of cards from old junk mail, calendars, paint chips, and the like. I finished up a total of 6 cards from that session.

As a reminder, here are the scraps of things I started with:

This card was the one I finished that first day, without camera glare this time! It uses a travel brochure picture, large paint chip, strip of scrapbook paper scrap, printed cardstock, wire mesh, brads, seal from a Kahlua bottle, and a clear sticker, all on green textured cardstock. Only the brads and clear sticker are not 'salvage' items.

Card two uses a brochure illustration, a butterfly from a calendar cover, handmade paper, paint chip, blue tissue paper, and two cloth stickers. Although it does not show by looking at the front cover, the interior cardstock is bright orange. I left the paint color of the paint chip showing at the bottom as it was appropriate to the theme. On this card, only the stickers were not salvage.

Next is a card made with a coaster from the Olive Garden restaurant, monoprint leaf paper, paint chips (2), grosgrain ribbon, printed scrapbook paper with text, and a rhinestone brad. The leaf paper was left over from some prints I made myself some years ago so the ribbon and the brad are the only non-salvage items.

Next up is a card that uses a travel brochure illustration, paint chip, handmade paper, copper tissue, vellum, clear sticker, and metal tape. Originally the colors all matched the photo but the whole thing was too bright for my taste. So I ran vellum thru the Xyron and sealed the illustration behind it. Then the edges didn't stick together well enough so I added the metal tape to bind it. The vellum was scrap as was everything else other than the sticker and the metal tape.

Here's a funky little card made with a catalog illustration, scrapbook papers (2), and stickers - two mock-3D and two fabric. I cut the scrapbook papers with a variety of circles and finished off with round punches. Three of the punches go right through the front cover of the card. Only the stickers were not salvage items.

This is my least favorite card. It uses a travel brochure illustration, paint chip, tissue paper, scrapbook paper, brads, clear sticker, and gold metallic marker. The brads and sticker were not salvage items.

So, having finished up 6 cards from that session, all the bits and pieces are sorted back to their scrap bins and the worktable is ready for a new project.

What will it be.....

Ddd

studio3d@ccwebster.net

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 8:02 AM PDT

Updated: Saturday, 9 June 2007 8:36 AM PDT

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In the studio tour I mentioned having a "Parts & Starts" drawer. How many of you caught that??? How many of you understood that??? Well, here I am to explain it!

Whenever I run across something interesting that I think I might want to use in art some fine day I toss it in a bin I call Parts & Starts. These might include calendar illustrations, magazine ads, catalog clippings, travel brochures, neat things torn off of commercial cards, a bit of metal - those kinds of things.

When the drawer gets full or I feel like playing I take out the bin and spread stuff all over my work surface. Today I pulled out these things.

Then I start rearranging things into groups that look good together. Here are 4 groups of things that I matched up: First is a paint strip, a brochure from the credit union, and a butterfly from a calendar cover.

The second group is two different kinds of paint strips and a coaster from dinner at the Olive Garden.

 Group 3 is just a paint strip and an illustration from a travel magazine.

Group 4 is an illustration from a cruise brochure, the seal off the neck of a Kahlua bottle, and another paint strip. (By the way these large single-color paint strips I get from my local hardware store are peel and stick - made so you can apply it right to the wall and see how you like the color without painting).

To each of my groups of things I add coordinating bits from my supply drawers so I have a complete set of things to work from. For group 1 I added some handmade paper, tissue paper in both blue and yellow.

Group 2 picked up printed paper with writing, a leaf-printed handmade paper, and some grosgrain ribbon.

Group 3 got some orange handmade paper and copper tissue.

 Group 4 was the set I ended up working with today. I added some printed scrapbook paper, printed cardstock with a plaster-finish look, and a piece of wire mesh.

These elements were torn, trimmed and rearranged until I found a layout that I liked. Then I adhered them in place.

I then tore the right side of the grouping, trimmed up the other two sides and used green brads to adhere the wire mesh on three sides. This reaffirms the green in the photo and 'frames'  the collage. Finally, I it mounted on a folded green textured cardstock and added rub-on text as a title.

I will go back to my original groupings of supplies and finish them off in similar steps. When I am done, in a typical session, I might have anywhere from 6-12 cards to file for future use.

Start saving junk mail!

Ddd

Posted by studio3d@ccgmail.net at 3:56 PM PDT

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