Fabric Collage of Tucker

Boston Terrier on Blue

December 14, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 2 comments

As an art quilter, I generally don’t make two of the same quilts on purpose. But, while I was auditioning the green background on Piper’s portrait, my enthusiasm got out of hand and I was having so much fun, I just had to complete it. But, it was a commission and I had not even asked the client what colour she wanted! With a copy of the templates in hand, I made a second portrait of Piper and fortunately, the black & white version also looks great on this saturated blue.

Quilted pet portrait, boston terrier portrait

Below is the workup for Piper, showing that I had traced the line drawing onto a thin muslin background. The lines are almost all covered up, but hopefully you can see a few of them in the face area. Since the individual fabric shapes are all backed with Lite Steam-s-Seam II they are lightly sticky and I can simply fill in the spaces, one shape at a time.

Process for constructing pet portrait

Using a re-positionable fusible product such as Lite Steam-a Stam II allows you to view your work in the vertical plane as it progresses. No pins, no glue, no pieces slipping around! It’s truly a ‘what-you-see-is-what-you-get’ approach and makes a world of difference.

Here’s what I learned from making Piper twice:

Always find out what your client wants before getting too carried away!
Photocopy your templates so you can make a new set if, needed.
Using a re-positionable fusible lets you work in a vertical plane and truly see your work as it develops.

There you have it: making a piece twice can really have unexpected advantages.

A Boston Terrier Joins the Pack

August 22, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

Piper is a 6 year old Boston Terrier who’s as sweet and adorable as they come. His mom captured this great photo of him in a local park. He’s pretty focussed on something interesting in the distance so I strongly suspect that cookies were involved in him sitting still!

The expression on Piper’s face told me right away that this would make a terrific candidate for a fabric portrait and I could hardly wait to make it. Here is the 20″ x 24″ quilted portrait made from that photograph. It’s made entirely of cotton fabric (and batting) and was stitched using a Bernina sewing machine.

quilted pet portrait boston terrier

I wanted to make an interesting background that related somehow to the grassy park setting so I experimented with a collection of green fabrics in my stash. I cut the chosen fabrics in widths from 3/8″ and 1 1/2″ and then placed them in alternating directions all around Piper. Since I had applied a fusible product (Mistyfuse) to the back of the fabrics before cutting them, I was able to press them onto the background with an iron once I was satisfied with the effect.

Deciding on the quilting design is always a challenge. To help with this decision, I start by doodling on paper before trying out the best designs on small 8″ x 8″ quilt sandwiches. In this case, I came up with a free motion design I’m calling paper clips. I used a green polyester Magnifico thread made by Superior Threads and stitched the paper clip design in one continuous line over the entire quilt.

quilted pet portrait boston terrier

I like to add an internal border to set off the portrait and more often than not, this Australian aboriginal print is the winner. I love the playfulness of the white printed lines as it reflects the dog’s playful soul and I think you’ll agree that the balance of white on black complements Piper’s colours really well.

Welcome to the pack, Piper!

Another dog portrait is done!

July 28, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

The latest dog portrait has finally graduated from the design wall to the dog house. Welcome, Gus … formerly known as Max!

Each portrait I make provides an opportunity to try something new and this time, I decided to make a strip pieced background. Orienting the strips on the diagonal seems to enhance the sense of depth and add extra punch to that big pink tongue. I also decided to use more colour in the eyes, nose, and mouth, again emphasizing these great features.

Gus waited a long time on the design wall as I spent almost a month touring by bike through France this summer. Now that I’m back and rested from towing my possessions behind me on my bicycle over 1400 km from the Loire Valley to Provence, I’m in the studio and making dog portraits again. All that pent up creativity is getting released. Ahhh… that feels good.

I have also been working on improving my brand and the first item on the improvement list is to change the domain name of my website to 2dognightdesign.com. More exciting changes will follow. Thanks for staying tuned to my journey as it evolves in the world of dog portraits.

A Golden Lab Emerges from My Stash

March 26, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

Labs appear to be the most popular dogs right now so it seemed fitting to do a quilted pet portrait of Max, a golden lab who is walked by our favourite dog walker, Paige, at Beyond The Leash Dog Walking. He’s on the design wall and looks like this:

Here’s a recap of how this comes together. I began by posterizing the photo with Picasa and then went to work deciding how best to define all the different values (lightness/darkness).

Once I had outlined the shapes, I marked them with their values and arrows to indicate how they would be layered. I traced this onto a sheet of tracing paper to create my master.

The next job was to find the fabrics that would work for this portrait. I started pulling all the fabrics that might remotely be suitable and cut out a small swatch of each. I placed them on my value finder tool, aiming for eight different values of tan/cream/yellow and seven values of pink. From these, I chose the best matches.

Next up was to trace the shapes to my Pellon Lite EZ and fuse these to the chosen fabrics. It didn’t take long before I realized this fusible product would not work for this job. I applied the sticky side of the fusible to the fabric and cut it out ok but when I tried to remove the paper backing from my cutout appliqué shape, it became clear that they overshot the amount of stickiness required. The tacky layer is so sticky that a thin plastic layer separating it from the paper backing pulled away from the paper, leaving me with a piece of fabric with a smooth plastic backing. I tried again and again to get it to work and after 5 failed attempts I threw the Pellon Lite EZ in the garbage. I went back to my Wunder Under and managed to finish the job. These are just some of the scraps remaining from all that fussy cutting.

So how long did all this take, you ask? I didn’t set any stopwatches but it’s in the vicinity of 16 hours. The funny thing is this: time seems to disappear from my awareness when I’m doing this. Yes, it requires patience and lots of decisions but that feeling of being in the zone is a mighty fine feeling. And seeing the dog take form is the icing on the cake.

Welcome to the Dog House, Tinkerbelle

February 15, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

Today was a great day because I finally delivered the quilted pet portrait of Tinkerbelle to her parents. Tinkerbelle was there and she was none the wiser of course, but Mom and Dad were thrilled with the quilt.

Without further a-do, here is the last instalment of this series explaining my technique for finishing a pet portrait.

Step 13

The final step is to finish the outside edges and add a hanging sleeve and a label. This is no time to gloss over the details and rush to the finish line because the quality of workmanship here can make or break the piece. The traditional finishing method is to square the quilt up and add a single or double fold binding to create a narrow outside border. I prefer a single internal border in my portraits so I finish the edges with a facing for a clean finish. The facing is simply a 2 1/2” wide strip of matching fabric (a separate strip for each edge) that’s stitched to the front of the quilt and then turned to the back and stitched down by hand. To save time, I prepared the hanging sleeve and attached its top edge to the upper facing strip before it was applied to the quilt. Once the facing was secured on the back, all I had to do was stitch the lower edge of the hanging sleeve to the back.

I always record my name and the date the quilt was finished on a quilt label which I print onto fabric. After fusing it to the back of the quilt I secure it with an invisible hand stitch. Then it’s time to photograph the portrait before transporting it to its new home.

Tinkerbelle is Off the Wall

February 12, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 2 comments

It’s time to celebrate because Tinkerbelle’s portrait is done and she has moved off the design wall! In this blog, I’ll describe how I quilted the background and the portrait itself.

Step 10

I knew that I wanted to frame Tinkerbelle with an internal border 2 1/2” from the outside edge and that provided me the final dimensions of 22” wide x 24” high. Having selected the blue-green batik, I cut out a rectangle this size plus an additional 2” in width and height. I cut out slightly larger pieces of lightweight batting and backing and made a quilt sandwich out of the 3 layers, spray basting them so they would cling well and not slip around while I stitched them.

I had to decide on a free motion design so I took out a paper pad and doodled a few free motion designs, then chose two of my favourites. I’m a fan of testing my ideas before using them so I stitched some small samples to see how they would look. Oh my, am I glad I did that! This is how they turned out. The design on top was the winner hands down because it has a calming feeling while the one below looks busy and chaotic.

There’s no need to quilt behind the portrait itself so I marked off that area with a chalk marker. Then I went ahead and quilted the rest of the quilt sandwich.

Step 11

Next, I pinned the portrait in place on the background and with a Sulky invisible monofilament thread and Schmetz Microtex 60 needle, I zigzagged along the entire outer edge. I used my walking foot for this operation. After securing the portrait this way, I switched to an open-toed darning foot, dropped the feed dogs on my machine, changed to a Schmetz Microtex 70 needle and used the five colour-matched threads (Aurifil 50wt cotton) to stitch around the raw edge of each piece in the portrait.

Step 12

I had selected a black on white aboriginal print for the internal border since it seemed to echo the light on Tinkerbelle’s face. I planned to make a 1/2” border so I cut a 1” wide strip the required length plus a few inches to join the two ends. With a Hera marker I marked a 1/4” crease on each long edge, turned these edges to the back of the strip and pressed the strip well. I marked the placement of the internal border on the background with a chalk marker and then pinned the strip down along the chalk line. Using a narrow zigzag and invisible monofilament thread I stitched the inner edge of the border down, leaving a gap where I needed to join the two ends. I used a standard technique for joining these with a diagonal seam then resumed stitching the rest of the inner edge and finished off the outer edge.

All that’s left now is to finish the edges with a facing and add a hanging sleeve. That will be the final instalment in this series. If you have any thoughts on the processes I’ve described, please give me a shout by leaving a comment. Thanks again for checking in.

Auditioning My Rendition … of Tinkerbelle

February 8, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

If you’ve been following along with me, you’ll have seen that Belle’s portrait finally came together. The next step is to find a good background for her, something that will really make her personality shine. I started by auditioning fabrics from my stash. Auditioning is simply placing the fabric on the vertical design wall and laying the portrait on it, then standing back to view it. It’s really important to audition on a vertical surface so you’re addressing the piece face-on and can absorb the full effect. What I was looking for is simple: do I get an ‘ah-hah’ feeling to tell me it’s the right one or does it feel flat or just wrong? Of course there are no rights or wrongs and you just have to follow what your head and your heart tell you is best. Here are a three worthy candidates I selected.

: belle on blue green

And here are my thoughts on each one:

I really like the movement in the pinky orange batik with the grey maple leaves stamped all over it but I struggle with the fact that Belle’s face is bathed in light and nothing in this background supports that. Or does it? Perhaps it’s the warmth that seemed to oppose the coolness of the greys and blacks.
The blue background worked well for my previous portrait, Jackeroo, but it’s a flop in this case. It simply feels flat and motionless and there’s no light emanating from it.
The green batik has movement and depth because of the blue/green shading. The lighter areas almost look like sunlight shining through a dense leafy foliage. It also has a subtle leaf pattern on it and while it doesn’t look so great in this photo, it ended up being my favourite. Now it’s time to prepare it for quilting so I can stitch the portrait down.

For you quilters out there, what tricks or guidelines do you use to select fabrics that play well together? And how do you know when they’re playing together well?

Thanks for reading my blog. Next time, I’ll describe how I prepare the background and what I do with the portrait.

All Together Now…Altogether Now

January 27, 2015 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

The quilted pet portrait of Tinkerbelle is coming together at last. I’ve been describing this technique of transforming a photo of your pet into a quilted pet portrait in the last couple of posts. Today’s post is all about bringing a lot of little bitty fabric pieces together.

After fussy cutting out 85 pieces from 9 different fabrics, I started placing and fusing them onto a base I had cut out of fusible non-woven stabilizer. To be honest, this was a real challenge. Here’s the deal: many pieces had edges that had to be tucked under AND edges that had to go over the adjacent shapes. There were basically a lot of interlocking pieces. Read on to find out how this all came together.

Step 9

So how did I bring all these pieces together? First, I spent time studying the original photo to observe depth of field — what parts are closer and which ones are further away? Then I did a dry run with all the major shapes to see how this interlocking would work. I made lots of mental notes and then I cleared the deck, making sure the keep the shapes together in numbered groups. I pinned the transparent master to my portable working surface, slipped the base underneath and one by one, removed the paper backing and placed the shapes in their final resting place.

Here’s the forehead region. All those little arrows marking the ‘unders’ and ‘overs’ really come into play here as they tell me which edges to place underneath the others. Some of those pieces are small! I use tweezers to move them into place.

As I positioned each piece, I used a light touch with the iron to tack it to the base and avoided touching the edges that had to remain free to allow the next shape to tuck underneath. Here’s how she looks under the transparency when all the shapes are in place.

At this point, I need to look at her with a critical eye to decide if I really achieved the right values in the right place. I can see there are a few subtle adjustments to make however the construction is completed. I’m off to the fabric store now to find a background that will really make this portrait pop. Next up will be a post all about colour and focal points.

If you’ve read this far, thanks for reading my blog!

Nahanni, meet Nahanni

December 29, 2014 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

In November I made a portrait of a curly-haired poodle named Nahanni. She’s a lovely dog with a beautiful calm temperament which made her fairly easy to photograph. Her eyes are two big pools of love that I managed to capture in the picture and the portrait. Today I had the pleasure of taking that portrait to Nahanni’s owners, as they fell in love with it and wanted to purchase it.

Nahanni seemed to understand the whole transaction as she stood in front of me and lifted her paw to shake hands. Well, maybe that’s stretching things a bit, but she did shake my hand a number of times…most likely wanting a cookie. Many thanks to Dave and Susan for being the first to buy one of my pet portraits.

Canine Intruder

December 29, 2014 Anne Mathers Comments 0 Comment

The latest doggie pet portrait is complete and I’ve named it Jackeroo. Our Jack Russell, Tashi, charged at Jackeroo when she first saw him on the design wall. It was hilarious to see her barking at the portrait (with a ball in her mouth of course!) while dancing around on her hind legs. There and then it was clear that I’d captured the spirit of this cute canine.

Jack Russells are bouncy and energetic so I chose to quilt all the curly cues on the patterned background and then I inserted a thin internal border of a black and white aboriginal print to set him off.

Tashi still thinks there’s an intruder in her house.

Jackeroo was inspired by a photo taken by Paige Kerr (www.gobeyondtheleash.com).