paintings prints and stuff

digital collage - Vivien Blackburn This is a very simple digital collage, combining some of the rocks from the long panoramic view of Sennen Cove with the marbling *analogue* collage shown earlier, made using my marbling experiments. I used the clone tool and multiple layers to add to blank areas and change things a little. Then the burn and dodge tools to lighten and darken areas for emphasis and the eraser to delete unwanted areas and redefine rock shapes with new edges. Finally I flattened the layers. I could possibly develop this into an abstract in the future, on a large canvas. moving it on not simply copying it, so when my printer recovers from its nervous breakdown I'll print it off and put it in my sketchbook for future reference. I thought the patterns went quite well together. What do you think?

Melanie emailed with a great description of using shaving foam for marbling and it looks a really interesting alternative to try. I harassed her to write a blog post as she'd written it up so well for me :>D and here it is: http://my-croft.blogspot.com/2008/10/play-time-marbling.html Do go and look. She has some lovely sanples of works she has done and a clear and funny description of the process. Thank you again Melanie :>)

Edge of the Waves, marbling, collage and coloured pencil, Vivien Blackburn (unfinished work in progress) I've been learning how to use marbling techniques to create gorgeous papers - I've got a lot to learn but it was fun! I wanted to use the papers in collage and my first experiments are here. They are done with torn and cut marbled papers, some watercolour and a little coloured pencil. Tides Edge, marbling, watercolour, collage, Vivien Blackburn Oily inks were dripped into a large tray of water, they float on the surface and I swirled them with the end of a paintbrush, breaking up the globs of ink and creating swirls and drifts of colour. Then a sheet of paper was dropped in, sometimes lifted out without dragging and sometimes dragging it to create extra movement of the swirls. I used watercolour paper and cartridge paper, for the effects I wanted the cartridge paper worked better, the ink continued to move for a little as you lifted the paper out. With the watercolour pape...