Diva Challenge #173 : Redux, Remix, Revisit Your Comfort Tangle

This was an interesting Challenge. Basically it was about change. It could be about the way that you do a tangle or something different such as your tools or technique. Right before the challenge I did something similar but it was not really with a comfort tangle so I did not want to just re-post that tile. Coming up with comfort tangles was not really much of an issue. The harder part was deciding what I wanted to do differently to stretch what I did with them. Some of this is that I was not really sure how to do something different with them. Some tangles are just easier to do tangleations or embellishments. Here is what I came up with. I hope you enjoy it.

Tangles used: My comfort tangles are Shattuck, Cadent, and Cubine. I like Annee but do not use it that much ( that is one of the other challenges, to mix it with one that you do not use often).

What is different about this is that I never used the blue on the tan tiles before. It is a 01 blue Micron. I have never done this variation of Cadent before. It is one in Margaret Bremner's post on Cadent variations. You can find it here. I also used Inktense water color pencils for shading. Before I had only used these pencils for a color wash. I had shaded with colored pencils before, but generic ones. This one is Sea Blue.  The white highlights are with a Prismacolor White wax pencil.  I do like the way that it turned out. It was done on a standard Renaissance tile and it was a little tough doing the Cadent. 

Earlier I mentioned that I had just finished something similar. This was with Mooka. I do use Mooka, but do not consider it a comfort tangle. After seeing some of the entries in the last Diva Challenge, I decided to play with Mooka a little.  I originally posted it on my blog on Sunday June 22, 2014. I am just including the shaded version here.  I used a Sakura White gel pen, white chalk pencil, and grey Fabrico marker. 

I have not had a chance to look at many of the other things submitted. I hope to do so over the next couple of days. If you have not looked at them, I would strongly recommend you do so. After looking at some of them, or even before, you may want to consider trying your hand at it also. If you really get into it, you may even want to post it on the Diva's blog.

Thanks for visiting. As always, comments are welcomed, encouraged, and appreciated.

Go Tangle !!

Experimenting with Black tiles, White gel pens and Mooka

Was impressed, and inspired, by some of the Mookas that were part of the Diva Challenge. Like a lot of others, I can look at what I have done and am not totally satisfied with the results. Had some time so decided would work on a couple of  things. One was Mooka and the other was practicing working on the black tiles with white pens. Did not post this in the Diva Challenge as it is not a Duotangle. Did not include Auraknot.

This tile is really "out of the box" for me. When I have used Mooka, I have generally been pretty conservative. I wanted to push this a little and see what happened.  It really was an experiment in different ways that I could embellish Mooka without totally eliminating it. There was not anything original in my embellishments. I am sure that you have seen them in others work. They were however not things that I have tried before.  The only thing I was really conscious of as I was doing the Mooka was to make enough of a curve on the end. I did try to keep them a little consistent in width. I have always tended to put a larger "bulb" on the end of mine than some folks.

I remembered to take  at least two pictures of the process. Did not take pictures of what the original Mooka looked like. Figured that most people could make this out. It is one before shading and one after shading. This was done on a standard black Zentangle® tile.

Here is the one before shading

Not sure why, but to me this has a little bit of an aquatic feel to it. Was not intended.  

May have gotten a little carried away with the shading. I will let you decide. Most of the shading was done with General white chalk pencil. I also used a Fabrico grey marker in a couple of places. I wanted to go back to the Sakura to compare, as I have been using the Insignio more lately.  I used the medium nib for the basic lines, weighting and fill. I did not have any problems with it globbing. Like the Insignio, there were a few times that the ink did not flow as well and I had to go back over a line. I really was conscious about how I was using it. I do not remember if it was something that I heard from Rick & Maria, or someone else that mentioned it in a blog, but they said that you had to "tickle" the paper with the pen. This seemed to work well. That may have also caused some of the lighter cover at times if I had too little contact. I did not feel much pressure at all from touching the paper. 

Here it is with the shading. 

Over all I am pleased with the way that this turned out. There are a couple of embellishments that I am not thrilled with, but I figure that is the purpose of practice- to figure out what works and what doesn't.

I appreciate it if you have made it through this post. It is longer than what I usually do. I hope that some of the information I provided was useful as you experiment and work with black tiles, white gel pens, and of course Mooka. 

Thanks for visiting, As always, comments are welcomed, encouraged, and appreciated.

Go Tangle !!

Diva Challenge #172: Duotangle - Auraknot vs Mooka

Did not get a chance to do anything for last week's challenge. I like Duotangles, but some are more challenging than others. Like a lot of others, Mooka is a tangle that I use, but not always satisfied with the way that it turns out. Really tried to just let it flow. I think maybe I got carried away. I was not that dissatisfied with the way that the Mooka turned out, but I think that it got too busy with the lines and the Auraknot got hidden. Tried to help this with a some highlighting, but not sure how successful it was. Will not have time this week, but really need to do a little more work with the black tiles and white pens. I have not done any for a while. Forgot how tricky the shading and highlighting can be. I did enjoy doing this though, so that was a plus. Here is what I came up with. I hope you enjoy it.

Used an Insignio White Angelic Colour gel pen for this. I think this has a smaller nib than the other Insignia pen. Used a Zenstone to do the shading. 

If you have not all ready done so, would encourage to visit The Diva's blog and look at the other pieces submitted. I plan on trying to look at them. There are usually some really great pieces of art. 

Thanks for visiting,  As always, comments are welcomed, encouraged, and appreciated.

Go Tangle !!

Zendala Dare #94 - Happy

Was not sure I was going to get any of the challenges done this week. It has been a very hectic week and not sure that things will change anytime in the near future. Was glad to see that Erin had returned to post the Zendala Dare. As is typical for the first dare of the month, she added the extra challenge of Happy. She suggested that people could use tangles that started with the letters in the word happy. I have to admit that after I started, I kind of forgot about the extra challenge. I did get one letter as I used Hollibaugh and I did use tangles that I enjoy, and I am happy that she will be able to post a Zendala Dare for at least a couple of months. I hope that this qualifies as meeting the criteria for the Dare. Here is what I came up with.  I hope that you enjoy it.

Tangles used: Knightsbridge, Flux, Zinger, Ennies, Hollibaugh, 'Nzeppel (variation)
I have a student that does 'Nzeppel freehand. I have never tried this before so decided to try it here. Did not turn out exactly like I pictured it but was pleased with it for a first try.

This is getting posted late enough that I am assuming that most anyone that sees this has all ready looked at the things posted on the Bright Owl. However if not, would suggest that you do so. I hope to look at some of them this evening. I have no idea even how many have participated this week. 

Thanks for visiting. As always, comments are welcomed, encouraged, and appreciated.

Go Tangle !!

Beyond the Basics Class: Working on Fabric - Canvas totes

Held a Beyond the Basics class yesterday. There were 3 in the class. Some had been tangling for over a year and one has only been tangling for a few months. This however, was the first that any of them had worked on fabric. I had done a couple of canvas bags about a year ago. Had thought about doing a class on it but just never got around to it until how. These were 5" x 6" canvas totes that I got from Hobby Lobby. It is a rougher surface and we used Pentel Fabric pens. Wanted to keep it simple for them as they had not used either these pens or fabric before. We started out the class by talking about some of the differences in using the fabic pens and to keep it simple suggested that they use patterns that did not have a lot of fill. We spent about an hour reviewing different tangles that could be used and I demonstrated them if they were not sure about it. The last hour was spent working on the totes. They all did a super job.

I have not taken pictures of class a lot before as I never remembered to take my camera. I recently acquired an Ipad so I used that to take a picture of their results. Here is what they did.

It was a fun class for me as I did not feel pressed for time and there was more opportunity to achieve that silence as people were working on things. I love the variety that they came up with as we did not use a string and I left it up to them as to what tangles they wanted to use. One neat experience was that one lady very early announced that she had made a mistake. Suggested to her that she just sit back for a few seconds and think about the possibilities that she could pursue. I reminded her of the " there are no mistakes in Zentangle®, only unplanned opportunities" tag phrase. She chuckled, but very quickly reminded herself that she just needed to go with what she could. As she continued to work it was neat to hear her become excited about her results. What she had originally seen as a negative, she turned into a positive. 

I started working on one but only got a little done as I was helping them. I was also experimenting with some different fabric pens. I had purchased a set of Uchida Fabric ball & brush markers a while back and never got around to trying them out. This gave me the opportunity to do so. I finished mine today. I was using color. I did not want to throw that into the mix for them, although I think  most of them would have been able to handle it. Here is what I completed today.

I used both ends of the pens. For some reason the black ball point did not work as well as the other colors. Not sure why. Before I tried the other colors, I thought maybe it was the roughness of the canvas. It was not a problem with the other colors.  The upside of this is that it gave the Featherfall a somewhat gray look. With all of them, the brush did provide a better cover more easily. It was also pretty easy to get a reasonably thin line.  The only color that I did not use was the yellow. I wanted to try these because the Pentel Fabric pens are only in black. I do not use color a lot, but wanted to have another option when I wanted to. Next I will probably  try to do something on a fabric which has a higher thread count and see how they work. Neither the Pentel pens or the Uchida markers bled through the material.  

If I am doing a black/white ZIA I will probably use the Pentel pens. I like the darkness of it and it does go on smoothly. The only draw back is that they do not last long so if you are doing a larger bag, will probably need more than one pen. 

Thanks for visiting. As always, comments are welcomed, encouraged, and appreciated. 

Go Tangle !!