Monday, March 25, 2013

Mandala rescue

Last week I showed some zendala tiles done with a template that looks like a sphere. I didn't like the last one I showed, so I cut out the middle and promised to show you what I did with it.
On the left is the zendala tile with a white border. I thought the sphere was
too dark (and messy) at the edges so I cut out a smaller circle, shown on the right.

I've been working on this mandala for some time. It's 14" square. I'd made three rescue attempts already but I think this last one is working! I've added some collage and a fair amount of white ink.

I had started drawing a center (shown above), but found I preferred the cut-out from the zendala tile there and so did my daughter and husband! Coincidentally (really?) it was within a millimeter or two of the size of the middle of the mandala! But I also liked what I'd already drawn. This mandala is on illustration board, so with an X-Acto knife I carefully cut around the circle and peeled it off. Now I have another lovely little tangled circle to do something with.
Mandala with the original center peeled off.
I glued the new center on, and also changed some too-dark-reddish areas towards the corners. (Now they're too light! Oh well, I can deal with that.)
Mandala with its new center, still not finished.
It's not finished  yet. There's still a bit more collage, some fine-tuning and some touching up to do.

Friday, March 22, 2013

Sphere look zendalas

I was cleaning out some files the other day (I did throw things out, honest I did!) and discovered two templates for drawing 2D works that look like spheres, especially if the edges of the circle are darker/shaded. The templates fit on a zendala tile although they were a wee bit small. I thought it would be easiest to use square grid tangles and tried a few.
Tangles: Beadlines, Black Pearlz, and mainly Rosé variations
Tangles: Camelia variation
Tangles: Assunta variations and Black Pearlz

I had started one with a currently favorite tangle, Snorr, from Sandy Hunter, CZT (I have yet to figure out all the lovely variations she shows!) but it just didn't seem to have enough variety. I wondered if color would help and opted for the rainbow transition I used earlier. It was improved, but I really didn't like how dark (and messy) the outer edge was. So, I used a compass and drew a smaller circle on the back and cut it out. Here's the before and after:


I didn't know what I was going to do with that little circle until I remembered a piece I'd been working on, off and on. More on that next week.

Go ahead! Try this at home!  

Here is the link to a 2-page PDF with the two templates I used, resized slightly to fit better on a Zendala tile. It takes some brain gymnastics when the squares become less and less square towards the edges. The tangle won't fit well there; just don't tell anybody.  Very large thanks to both Erin and Roy for helping me figure out how to do that link thing! (I learned something. Yay!) 

Have fun! And if you do try this at home, send me a photo and I'll post a selection here.

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

Box begone! (Diva challenge 110)

Woohoo! Permission to go wild! These tiles don't look wild at all, but I did try something I've been thinking about for a while. It's a technique used by colored pencil artists.  A design is impressed into the paper and when you draw over it with colored pencil the design is left white. Like this:
I wondered how that would work with tangles. I had two ideas. The first was to do it as described. The second was to impress the patterns and then go over the whole thing with water-soluable pencil. I expected the water (and color) would sink into the impressions and be darker. Once the patterns were visible I darkened selected areas.
Tangles: Firecracker, Giotto, Paisley Boa, Paradox, Tripoli, Whyz
Tangles: Coaster, Crescent Moon, Gneiss, Hollibaugh, Munchin, Providence
Well, the water idea didn't work very well! This whole concept might be better with color instead of gray, or in a larger size. The more detailed tangles are less successful.

If you want to try this (probably with colored pencils!) here are two methods:
  1. Use waxed paper and a hard lead (white) pencil. Put the waxed paper over your drawing paper and draw on the waxed paper, pressing reasonably hard so that you impress the drawing paper. Remove the waxed paper and, lightly at first, color over the designs on your drawing paper using the side of the pencil. The white pencil is just in case you break through the waxed paper. If you're careful you could use an ordinary hard lead pencil, I'd say 4H or harder. This method is what I used for the colored sample above.
  2. Use the pointy end of a compass to impress the designs directly into the paper. Depending on your paper, this may tend to tear or shred. Test first. This method is mainly what I used for the tiles above.
Having tried both I can tell you that it's much easier to do curving lines with the pencil and waxed paper than using the compass point. You could also try your thumbnail, an unbent paper clip, a pointy knife...
Compass with pencil and point, Verithin brand white pencil, and
waxed paper with some impressed designs.

And just for fun, INSIDE these boxes are some of the Zentangle tiles I've created over the past two years.


Monday, March 18, 2013

Auraknot

I had an idea for a variation of Auraknot. I thought that if the bands became gradually thinner on the way out and in from the original 'star' it would look a little more dimensional. On my first tile I forgot that you need an uneven number of points to best obtain the interweaving look. I have stars with six and eight points. Oops. Oh well. You can see, a bit, the effect I'm going for.
Tangles: Auraknot, Black Pearlz, Flez, Paisley Boa, Pearlz,  and bump Striping

Second tile, I remembered: uneven number of points. I went for seven. The diminishing band width shows nicely on the way out, but I realized it's hard to get the effect on the way in; there just wasn't enough space.
Tangles: Auraknot, Pearlz

Friday, March 15, 2013

Three zendalas in color

The first uses design #29 from the Bright Owl. I painted a turquoise acrylic wash outside the mandala design, then tangled that area in blue and the rest in black.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Camelia, Daggerly, Drupe/Fracas,
Knightsbridge Aura, Paradox, Paushalöv, Tortuca

The second uses a Zentangle pre-strung zendala tile.  I wanted to break up the design a bit so I added the six large circles. This one and the third began with acrylic washes in purple and magenta.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Lamar, Starburst, Tipple, Tripoli elements,
plus Rounding and spirals.

The third began as a three-pointed design. I kept adding strips to it, somewhat like Inapod. The three areas ended up looking a bit like bulbs or seed pods I think. It's also darker than I expected. I almost gave up on it more than once, but I kept thinking, "Hmm, maybe I could try that." In the end, I think it's alright.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Bunzo, Inapod, Paisley Boa, Pearlz, Purslane

Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Weekly challenge #109

I, too, was quite taken with the 'bump' Striping effect recently presented on the Zentangle blog. I had tried it with basic black and white stripes, but I loved what some others had done with wrapping another tangle around the bumps! Amazing! I decided I should try it.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Crescent Moon, Lamar, Tripoli, and 'bump' Striping
Tangles: Beadlines, Black Pearlz, Künstler, 'bump' Striping

In the end I was quite wimpy at putting other tangles in the bands and didn't try anything very fancy.

UPDATE: A second challenge this week was to think of names for this tangle/technique.  Cheryl Rotnem suggested 'Roman' and I suggested 'Alanancy'. Maria combined the two into the new name Romanancy, which is how this 'bump striping' will be known from here on in. Read about it on the Diva's blog here.

Sunday, March 10, 2013

LAMAR - a new tangle!

Tangles: Beelight, Knightsbridge, Lamar, Tortuca, Yincut
There is a trend happening here: I seem to be inspired in the bathroom. Dansk, Chebucto, Pia, and now Lamar, were all inspired by patterns in bathrooms! Here's a photo of the tiles in our bathroom in Mexico that inspired this tangle.

I deconstructed this pattern, adapting it to pen-and ink drawing. Here are some tiles I did while working out possibilities.

The Spanish word for 'sea' or 'ocean' is mar. Years ago I was told by a Spanish prof that mar is normally a masculine noun (el mar) but that sometimes in literary or poetic work it's feminine: la mar, thus the name of the tangle. Here's how to do it.
Tangles: Lamar, Magma, Paisley Boa, Paushalöv, Tortuca
BTW: It's getting harder and harder to keep track of tangles and names. If this pattern has been presented elsewhere, or if the name has been used earlier, please let me know! 

Thursday, March 7, 2013

Adventures in monotangles: Cubine

There's a new Zentangle challenge out there! Roy Stauffer, CZT and Mindful Creations blogger, has started a monotangle challenge. He used Cubine, so I did too.

Whyz

Weekly challenge #108 from Laura, the DivaCZT. It's been over two years and she keeps coming up with good things for us! I like these UMT (Use My Tangle) weeks because I often discover an unfamiliar tangle. This week it's Whyz from CZT Jane MacKugler. It takes a bit of concentration.

On my first tile I used the basic Whyz tangle as the string and filled the spaces with variations of Whyz, just to get a feel for it.

Then I branched out a bit.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Jonqal, Khirkee, Knightsbridge, Whyz

I quite like this tangle (didn't think I would, actually) and there are many possible variations:
  • Once I goofed and started lining up the 'Y's rather than alternating them, but I thought, "No mistakes" and wondered what I could do with that. It's one of my favorite variations! 
  • You can put the 'Y's side-by-side from square to square, as Laura did in her example, rather than alternating. I did too, in the lower left of the second tile. Then you can make interesting chevron, feather things.
  • Various areas can be filled black, or striped, or left white. (Or stippled. Didn't try that. Good idea.)
  • The small triangles can be filled, and look a bit like pinwheels (see first tile, left, and second tile top right).
If you haven't tried this tangle, do.

PS: just FYI: I messed up a small section of Khirkee and turned it into tiny Knightsbridge. Then, for artistic unity, I did tiny Knightsbridge elsewhere on the tile.

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Stars 'n' stripes

This was not pre-planned but resulted because I wanted to try the striping idea presented recently on the Zentangle blog, plus I had some roundish areas in my string that turned out to be nice for stars.
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Drupe, Going Down, Gneiss, Tortuca
I considered saving it for later, but July 4 is a lo-o-o-ong way off!

UPDATE: I've added to my post about Knightsbridge based on suggestions from Maria Vennekens, CZT.

Sunday, March 3, 2013

Recent tiles, new tangles

There are so many patterns being deconstructed and designed for pen-and-ink drawing that it's a bit overwhelming at times. I often print instructions and save them to try later. Well, my stack recently outgrew its paperclip so I decided I'd better get at trying some of these tangles!

New tangles I tried recently are Paisley Boa, Paushalöv, Olb, Going Down, Many Moons, Leaflet, and Bed of Roses.

Tangles: Beadlines, Black Pearlz, Flez, Olb, Paisley Boa
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Paisley Boa, Paradox variation, Paushalöv
Tangles: Beadlines, Bed of Roses, Going Down, Paisley Boa, Paradox, Tipple
Tangles: Black Pearlz, Coaster, Florz, Knase, Many Moons, Paisley Boa
Tangles: Beadlines, Bed of Roses, Leaflet, Olb, Paisley Boa, Paushalöv, Tipple