Posts Tagged ‘CED2010’

Daniel thought mashing up this with this might be cool. And I think he was right:

RESPECT.

I’ve spent most of my life
letting my demons convince me
I don’t deserve it.

So I’ve seldom expected it.
Rarely asked for it.
Never demanded it.

That must change.
And my first demand is
that I demand respect from

MYSELF.

Here’s a progress report on the mask-making project that I first posted about a couple of weeks ago.

It ended up taking a while for me to get back to the project because, honestly, I think I might be trying to do too many different things at once with my creativity quest. But that’s another post for later. Back to the mask-making…

To summarize, I used an instant paper-mache product called Celluclay and formed it over a cheap plastic masquerade mask that I bought at Michael’s. I followed the instructions pretty rigorously, except that I went ahead and added the Celluclay right over the mask instead of putting a layer of cling-wrap over the plastic first. I did this on purpose because I intended to leave the clay on the plastic permanently. Well, Celluclay is supposed to dry in a day or two, but after a week of waiting, there were several parts of the mask that were not dry. I realized it was because 1. I put the Celluclay on really thick – too thick, and 2. I realized that Celluclay sitting up against solid plastic will take ridiculously long to dry because no air is getting to it. Oops.

What I decided to do was to try to get the Celluclay off the plastic form while keeping my mask as intact as possible, so that the non-dry parts could get air.

That was a mistake. Imagine if you will what happens when you try to rip something that is partially dry and partially wet off of a form that – when dry – it is designed to stick to. No matter how carefully you try to do it, what you get is something like this …

Yeah, oops.

But I’m sooo glad this happened. Best creative thing to happen all week. Because 1. screwing this up really taught me a lot about how to work with Celluclay, and 2. Frankly, in its own way, those broken shards of mask actually look pretty kick-ass. Imagine those pieces painted up to look like old distressed crimson-colored metal and partially buried in some rocky sand or dirt.

Do you see it? That’s a thematic provocation right there. It’s a story. I’ve accidentally gone from making a bit of wall decor to creating a visual story-hook for The Scarlet Masque. Maybe even the cover of the rpg, should it ever come to that.

So, this ‘failed’ first attempt is sitting on my work counter waiting to be further transformed into an accidental masterpiece.

Meanwhile, I’ve got a second (and currently intact) mask drying on the work counter, too. I’ll share more about that one in future posts. I’m also itching to try to make one out of leather, and I’ve got some cool ideas about decorating the cheap plastic mask as well.

See what I mean about working on too much stuff at once? If you’re counting, that’s FOUR mask projects at one time. And that’s just masks, it doesn’t count the paintings, mandalas, and digital work I’m trying to do as well. Clearly I’m taking too much on at once and not focusing properly on any of it. But like I wrote earlier, that really ought to be its own post.

One of the new creative toys I’ve been playing around with is Apophysis, a free bit of software that lets you generate some pretty cool fractal-based stuff. Like this:

Apophysis is a program where it’s pretty easy to make some cool-looking stuff right out of the gate – there are some good tutorials to help with the basics – but it’s challenging to master.  And I have in no way mastered it. Depending on your personality it can be addictive playing around with the various dials figuring out ways to achieve interesting effects. I’m one of those guys who could get very addicted, but I’m going to try not to get too caught up in Apophysis because I don’t want one more computer-focused thing to distract me. I am, after all, trying to carve out time to be more creative away from the computer.

I’ll probably share some more of these along the way, though, and if you like one well enough to use as a wallpaper, contact me and I’ll send you one of the appropriate resolution. I make the originals at 1600 pixels wide, so that should cover it.

This is what resulted when I gessoed the cover of my art journal and splashed on something colorful, evocative, and symbolic of my effort to get all authentic and sincere in my life and stuff.

Respect to Billy Corgan and his Smashing Pumpkins for the lyrics from which I ripped my 2010 motto:

A newly-finished page in my art journal/sketchbook, with Prismacolor pencils and ZIG pens.

On the off-chance that someone decides to point out that not all these words are actual synonyms of the word ‘fool’, or may contain misspellings, or other provocative elements … I invite you to digest the bottom line. <grin>

Most of the creative stuff I do, I do with almost zero-zilch-nada formal training. Oddly, the one thing I DO have training in – theatre arts – is something I haven’t actually done in over a decade, unless you count some of my better roleplaying experiences.

Anyhow, typically when it comes to sketching/drawing/painting/crafting – and most computer design stuff as well – I get a how-to book or search on the Interwebz and try to work through the tutorials that interest me. I’ve been lucky enough to manage this well enough in the digital design realm to count on it as my source of income, but in terms of tactile art stuff like drawing and painting, I’ve done lots of flirting over the years but never really put my heart and soul into it. But doing CED 2010 has awakened a pretty strong desire to do just that. As a result, I’m forging ahead with things like the image above, which was originally a pencil sketch of my silver triskelion ring I did for a recent tutorial. Of course, as I’ve already written in earlier posts, I seem to have a need – at this point at least – to scan in the stuff I draw or paint in the material world and  play around with it in Photoshop to create a sort of hybrid.

This time, I layered a watercolor wash underneath the pencil sketch of the ring and played with the layers until I achieved a color effect that I like.

At some point, I ought to probably get some sort of real-life mentor/teacher/coach to help me and guide me through this stuff, but I must admit, for now, I’m having fun with all this creative activity and I’ve surprised myself with how much I’m not really bothered about how ‘good’ it is.

Let’s hope I continue to keep the inner critic in check and just keep creating and sharing. ‘Cause right now I really like how this is going.