anonymityblaize

Firstly, my thoughts go out to everyone affected by the earthquakes and tsunami in Japan and the Pacific basin. I hope that all my flisties in the region, and all your loved ones, are safe and sound. I haven't seen a fandom auction and/or help resource go up yet but I'm sure there will be something soon. Right now the only helpful links I can think to post are Google's People Finder and the Red Cross Blog.

ETA: That link is for the UK arm of the Red Cross, try the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies site.

Son of ETA: Fandom is awesome - hie thee hence to help_japan 

This sentence is an abrupt-change-of-tone buffer.

So, today's crafty post. I had this floor lamp that I loved very much, but some of the panels had been damaged over the years, so I decided to cut all the panels out, replace the ones that were too badly ripped and salvage the ones that weren't. Maybe I'd add some small embellishments, I thought. Then it turned into an epic stencil project that took up all my crafts-for-me time throughout January and February. And then I discovered that it's really hard to take pictures of an item that is itself a source of light. Especially since when the lamp is off (or I tried to use the camera flash) you can't actually see any of the designs - it just looks like panels of plain paper. So this post has taken quite a while to get organised!

Because it's for me, it's a bit messy in places and I tried some techniques that I won't try again. But I actually quite like how it turned out, overall. I'm definitely going to try to use some of these ideas again for smaller table lamps I can sell, but that'll require quite a lot of research and planning!

The biggest problem I had with taking photos was the difference between the Bat signal panels and the other ones. With the naked eye there isn't as big a contrast as there are in these pics.
( Loads more pics under the cut! )

 

I can hardly believe that it is the time to be doing this already. Where did this year go?

Anyhow, if you think that any of my one-of-a-kind geeky crafts would make a good Christmas present (or a Winter-celebration-of-your-choice gift) this is your warning to get your orders in soon!

The last dates for delivery before Christmas are -

Standard Parcels within UK: Wednesday 15th December

Airmail Parcels to Western Europe: Monday 13th December 2010

Airmail Parcels to Eastern Europe, USA and Canada: Friday 10th December 2010

Airmail Parcels to South & Central America, Caribbean, Africa, Middle East, Asia, Far East (including Japan), Australia  and New Zealand: Monday 6th December 2010

So if you want to purchase any listed item as is from my etsy store or my folksy shop, please do so at least one or two days before the last date for your location.

If you'd like a custom order, or you want something personalized, please order before the end of November, and remember the more complicated the order, the more time I'll need to complete it! Photos of all my crafty creations are on Flickr and I can relist or remake any items not currently up in my stores. Please feel free to get in touch with any queries.

Just to make this post a little more interesting, here's a t-shirt I've just listed and a sweatshirt I customised for myself.

This idea could definitely get very addictive. But the way I'm doing it is veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeerrrrryy time consuming*, and therefore clearly not a sensible thing to continue with in this manner, as I very much doubt people would pay $150 or something equally ridiculous for t-shirts like these. I'm looking into cafepress right now and am also going to experiment with t-shirt transfer stuff.

But for now, some words for Buffy and/or Princess Bride fans.


*I'm making these by hand with guidelines and fabric paint applied with a cocktail stick. On average it takes me about two minutes to do each letter. It's ridiculous.

Tomorrow I'll post my favourite of the bunch, even though it took me FOUR BLOODY DAYS. It was worth it though. ETA: Ta da!

Son of ETA: The effulgent t-shirt is now listed here!

Yeah, so. Inception has totally taken over my brain and invaded my crafting time. So this happened.


( Loads of pics behind the cut )

A while ago I started experimenting with two-tone stencils for t-shirt designs. I made a Flight of the Conchords tee, and then made an Enterprise one. So when I embarked upon a t-shirt with the Enterprise D on it, I figured it was time for another tutorial post, since the bleached-out t-shirt design tutorial went down quite well.

I'm going to do this in two parts - this post is about turning an image into the stencil, then the second part will be about putting that design onto a t-shirt.

So, let's find out how I made this:


(See, Star Trek fandom, I haven't entirely abandoned you for Inception!)

( Lots of images behind the cut )

If you've got any questions, please feel free to ask.

A few recently(ish) completed custom orders. Some BSG nerdiness, some more phaser pants, and some wings on sleeves.


( More pics... )

The majority of the available processing power in my brain remains beholden to Inception. Apparently this movie is the world's most resilient parasite. I've now seen it twice and a fairly epic reaction post essay is percolating in my brain, but this is not that post yet. This post is the crafty stuff I would have posted last week if Nolan hadn't stolen my brain space.

Previews (Yes, I am still obsessed with the Hipstamatic app, yes, I bought all the additional lenses and films.):

Saw Flight of the Conchords live about a month ago (almost exactly a month ago in fact) and for some reason it's taken me this long to post about it properly. I fail at prompt internet-usage. Anyway. It was, unsurprisingly, a hilarious and highly entertaining evening. The boys were looking particularly yummy, and the songs sounded fantastic. Many more instruments on stage than I had expected (and some that didn't get used - they don't follow their own set list much from what I can tell. I'm pretty sure we got an unplanned rendition of Albi, and Jemaine was constantly mouthing song titles at Bret, who either would nod or look at him like he was a madman.)

Highlights of the gig:

• Heckler: “Where’s Mel?” Jermaine: “She’s fictional. So she’s hanging out with Bart Simpson and... Taggart." (cue huge cheer from the crowd as Scottish crowds do when you mention anything remotely Scottish.)
• Three new songs. Three! (Fave moment: "I said, 'I don't have any I.D. on me / Who even carries I.D. in 1353?!' / 'I maketh not the rules,' quoth he.")
• Jenny! Woo! I love that song.
• Sparkly jumpsuits.
• Tiny piano!
• The New Zealand orchestra. His name is Matt. He does odd jobs (but not strange tasks).
• Three part audience singalong to Epileptic Dogs.
• Many other things that have fallen out of my brain at this moment in time.

Ever-so-slight disappointments of the evening:

• No Bus Driver's Song. Denied yet again.
• No keytar. (But there were instruments up there I could not identify for the life of me.)

My cheeks hurt from laughing by the end of the night. And the crowd was on fine form. Not too much random heckling. Found a few good youtube clips of the show - so here's kilt towels and a very different version of Sugalumps.

And of course I had to go in a homemade Conchords t-shirt. Who would I be if I didn't? This was my first attempt at a two-tone print. It required two stencils, which didn't end up matching as precisely as required, so it was a slightly aggravating process. I think I ended up making t-shirt!Jemaine look far grumpier than he did in the original photo. But it's something I'm going to keep experimenting with.



( More pics under the cut )

And even more pics here if you're interested.

As may be quite obvious, I have been quite obsessed with making Star Trek crafts of late. At some point I will wean myself onto other fandoms and obsessions. In fact, pretty soon I will be asking for the wisdom of my internet friends to help me decide what the next cross stitch of head-melting-ly biggness will be.

But for now I present to you some nu-Trek uniforms that I would totally wear as a Halloween costume if I were doing the dressing up thing this year. But I'm not. So goodness only knows why I made them. Hopefully someone will want them!

Previews:



( Some more (quite large) pics behind the cut )

And you can see even more pics here.