Wednesday, April 30, 2008

By the Lion!

Oops. My, time did fly past this month, didn't it? Here it is, last day of the month again, and I'm just now posting my GPP Crusade entry. And I apologize, fellow Crusaders; I haven't kept up with everybody else's entries either. Only read a few of them so far.

This month's crusade assignment was stencil cutting. OMG. Michelle is such an enabler. I mean, there are worse things to be addicted to, true, but really, how many addictions does she think we can handle?

For my stencil, I decided to go with a Narnian theme. Gee I wonder why. Anyway, what came to mind was Peter's shield, the one that Father Christmas gives him. "The shield was the color of silver and across it there ramped a red lion, as bright as a ripe strawberry at the moment when you pick it." The shield of the kings of Narnia.

And of course I couldn't do something easy and/or conventional. That wouldn't be any fun. But more on that later...

So I dug out my little Dover heraldry book that I've had since the 6th grade, enlarged a lion rampant and a shield, and lo, I had my design. So I got a slab of glass that Mom happened to have lying about from our days of experimenting with polymer clay, dug out some quilter's template, and opened my brand-new handy-dandy little stencil burning tool, popped in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe DVD, and set to work.



The design:
lionstencil1
See all those little points? Why I do this to myself remains a mystery.

Step 1, the Lion:
lionstencil3
All those little black spots are where the stencil burner actually, well, burned the quilter's template. Apparently that stuff's not as hardy as it looks. Works, though.

After cutting out the Lion, I then cut the outline of the shield. This way, the shield with the Lion cut out of the middle would be a combination mask+stencil, with the additional Lion mask that came out of the middle of the shield. (Was that coherent?) Two pieces of plastic = two masks + one stencil. w00ties! My master plan. I'm sure someone somewhere has done this before me. But I didn't know about them, so I'm gonna claim it as my idea. *plants flag*
Dum-dum (that's me) didn't take a pic of the shield before actually using them, so you only get to see its shape after it's been doused with paint. These, and others, to be precise:
lionstencilsupplies2

The results of which are such:
lionstencil4
The one at the far left bottom had the Lion mask laid down and the paper spritzed with copper Shimmer Mist, then the mask peeled up and the shield laid down and pounced with red acrylic paint on a sponge. The middle top one was the same sequence, with gold and red acrylic paints applied by sponge. The far right was also the same sequence, with acrylics and Shiva Paintsticks sponged on.

And yes, I know, it's supposed to be silver, not gold. Gold shows up better and I like the way it looks with red. And copper is just what we happened to have in the Shimmer Mist. Oh well.

With the Lion laid back into the stencil after all that painting, it looks like this:
lionstencil5
Pretty spiff, no?

Anyway, I have now purchased some spray fabric paint, and have grand plans for this stencil. I'm also resisting the urge to stencil it on EVERYTHING I OWN.

Me? Obsessive? Nah. Well, maybe a little.

And...
Coming Soon to a Pocket Near You: The Chronicles of a Narnia Scarf

7 comments:

michelle ward said...

OMG!!!!!!!!!! You can definitely claim that invention....a lion mask, cut from a shield makes a shield mask with lion stencil AND the leftover piece should be a shield stencil. Wowee, you are a genius!! Carrie - these are so fab - and they rock in color! I can't wait to see how you use them on fabric. Thanks for sharing your work and your cleverness with the street team.

michelle ward said...

oh, and p.s. - can't wait for the movie!

Trillian42 said...

Ooh! Looks awesome, sweetie! And the stencil looks like art all on its own now.

And, you claim it, eh? Do you have a flag? ;)

Anonymous said...

In preparation for the movie, I've been rereading the series. I love it so. This is great!

Kat W said...

Fab stencils, you did a wonderful job on them! And black spots on your stencil are okay - you might be a perfectionist, but your stencils don't have to look like art, too (grin)! :)

Kim Mailhot said...

Aslan would so approve (my cat's name by the way !)! I love the Carrie Double Mask Technique as well. Gorgeous !
Cheers !
Kim

Sarah said...

oooh - what a fab mask/stencil/mask combo

you genius you!!!

and doesn't it look great all covered in paint :)