Surrealism Project

This is probably my first attempt at a surreal piece of work. I liked the idea of a water faucet pouring into a large body of water. I decided to explore the idea of a very large solid object becoming liquid. Here I rendered a photo of a train to look like a water droplet. I wanted a burst of color so I included inverted umbrellas dotting the scene. My next major project is a midterm project. Again, I am doing a surreal theme. I have a fairly concrete idea but now the challenge will be to find images to help me create the piece.

The Aged Face

Here you can see briefly the process of creating this projecct. I found the photo of the homeless man from a source of free stock photos. I then arranged my model to sit and dress like the elderly man then I used tools in Photoshop to take pieces of the elderly man's face and place them on my model's face. I lastly added the cracks in the photo as an overlay. Note that one hand is young and the other is old. Also the highlight on the cheek bone of the elderly side makes the face look less full.

Latest Work in Photoshop

Here's the latest project. We needed to turn a photo from today into an antique. This was created in Photoshop using channels and adjustment layers and my very favorite... blending modes. Here is my favorite assignment so far. This is a warhol-inspired portrait of Geordie. We were asked to do a portrait of a human but being inspired by Warhol, who loved his dogs, I thought it was appropriate to do a portrait of the little love of my life, Geordie! This was also created in Photoshop and the photo of Geordie is white. Each layer is a different blending mode. This really shows the different effect of each mode. I used a smart blur for the outline.

Website Finally Launched and Fall Semester 2011

Lots of exciting things have been happening lately. First of all the Summit City Sighthounds page is now officially up and running. You can check it out here:

http://www.summitcitywhippets.com/


There are several dogs listed there that need homes and many more are on the way! I hope the new site I created will be helpful to those considering adopting an I.G. I want to make it the most up-to-date website for prospective families. I am working on a project to remember dogs who have passed away and I hope people will get on board with it and send me their photographs so I can share them there. I'm doing the same thing for dogs now in their forever homes who were adopted from the rescue. That's a little less sad so maybe more people will be willing to share that with us. The site has been up for a few weeks now and there have been NO responses! It's a bummer.

Also I started classes at IPFW last week so I can complete my BFA. I should have done this in the first place but you know life never works out the way you think it will. I am following my heart and that's what's most important. I've been very busy the past couple weeks but it's been the most happy I've felt in quite a while. One of my classes is Computer Art & Design where we are learning Photoshop and Illustrator. As I sat in class I didn't know whether I wanted to laugh or cry. I was overcome with emotion thinking about how powerful these programs are. I am totally blown away by their capabilities and it's like a drug, I just want to learn more and more. Here is my first project. I turn it in tomorrow so I don't have any feedback on it yet. Our assignment was to create a "hybrid human" of sorts. I was lost on an idea until I remembered my Dad's words in my head. He often refers to car people as "gear heads" so I thought it might be fun to create one:

First necklace

I estimate it was a 26 hour project but she's finally done!

What's New in the Studio

Here's a look at what I'm currently working on: Freeform peyote bracelet. I'm pretty excited about this one. I got some bright pink/orange colored beads and paired them with some lime and matte yellow, luster sky blue, and black and silver of course.

This is my first attempt at a freeform necklace. It's a bib-style necklace but the mistake I made was to choose beads with different sizes so it's made the necklace bend in weird ways and I'm afraid I'll end up taking it apart and starting over again with more uniform beads. Trust me, this is HOURS of work I realize I'll waste.

This bead embroidery cuff has been a work in progress for quite awhile now. I just finished stitching around the edges but found that I have gaps now between the two parts. I'm taking inventory of what beads I have left in pink so I can fill that in.

If you don't mind I'd like to take a moment to vent. The ONLY stand alone bead store in Fort Wayne, Bead Source is NOT a great bead store. I've found that the seed beads she sells are not of the best quality. They are not uniform in size and I have to weed out many many beads. ALSO I've purchased small quantities of certain colors, such as the pink I used here and when she runs out of this color, she doesn't re-order it again. So now I've got an incomplete project with no way to get more of this color of beads to finish it! This has happened with several really great colors of seed beads and she doesn't have any more in stock AND didn't have that much in stock to begin with. So if you're living or visiting Fort Wayne and make a trip to her store, purchase with caution and with this knowledge.

I'm sure her other large beads and findings used for STRINGING beads are fine but a store that is exclusively for beads should offer quality beads of all sorts.

Ah, well I am about to be saved though because I got my Fire Mountain catalog in the mail and I am very excited to make my first purchase from there. I looked through it yesterday and marked things I wanted. Now I have to narrow down all the things to fit within my budget!

Last weekend I stopped by Creative Fish's Art Blast 2011 and LOVED IT! I know it wasn't a very large event but it was great. There were some really great artists there. One I particularly liked was Jennifer Black of Black Rock Design from South Bend. Please go look at her things. They are awesome! I bought a necklace from her and she's just so nice and had the best and most professional booth there. She has some great pendant necklaces and really cute earrings.

http://www.blackrockdesign.com/home

http://www.etsy.com/shop/blackrockdesign

Geordie takes a boat ride!

Geordie went on his first boat ride this weekend. We got this awesome pet vest at Ride the Wave in Angola but you can find one at many different sites online if you search O'Brien Pet Vest. It's got adjustable straps and fits really well. It's perfect for I.G.s.

He hung on to Daniel's waist for dear life! By the end of the trip he was almost asleep!

New jewelry!

I've got some new items hitting my Etsy site:

Here are some rings I made that I won't be posting quite yet but are available for $5!

This is a lariate necklace with a fleur-de-lis charm. The beaded chain is really delicate.

Next are two netted bracelets. These are really cute and can be worn if you want to dress up or down. The first is tortoise colored with gold accents and a violet bicone crystal bead as the toggle clasp. The second is black with lime green accents.

I will be posting these over the next few days so keep checking out laurengstudio.etsy.com!

Geordie is an amazing little dog

This past weekend was AMAZING. It was so fantastic to see SO many Iggies just running freely and playing. The ride down was less than fun. Daniel was sick (and still is...well now we both are) so he wasn't in the best mood and Geordie decided to follow right along and be a whiner nearly the entire 2 hour drive. When we arrived we had to go through a maze of gates and fences. Seriously, it's 3 or 4 different sets of gates to go through but is very necessary when you have a room full of a hundred free Iggies. We walk in and Geordie is going nuts pulling at the leash but I'm scared to let him go. It was like a mother seeing her child leave for the first day of school, but I let him go and wow, did he GO! Geordie's foster Dad assured me he would come around once in a while to check on us and sure enough he did! Every 15 or 20 minutes he would come running up to us for a quick hello and then off he went! Geordie sure knows how to get in trouble. The main area was fenced off to another side where the restrooms, food and the photographer were. When I went to the bathroom he pushed down the entire fence to try and get to me. And later his foster mom's nephew walked up holding him and said, "I found him by the food table by himself." He had figured out a way to get the fence open. Aside from those adventrues we just saw him whiz by with other Iggies. He had a fantastic time. By the end of the day when I picked him up he rested his head on my shoulder and started falling asleep. He barely made a sound on the way home. And today, I'd like to share that for the FIRST time Geordie played tug of war with me... for 5 seconds, but 5 seconds is amazing to me! Playing with toys is something he rarely does and I don't think was ever taught to do, so this is a huge victory for us. Here is a pic of him watching tv the other night:

We had a little scare the other morning when Geordie woke us at 2 am just crying in pain. We couldn't figure out what was hurting him but anywhere I touched he cried out. I finally narrowed it down to his ears. He moved around fine and when he finally calmed down he went underneath the bed to hide. The next morning I took him out and touched near his ear and he shrieked again. I called the vet and took him in for an emergency appointment. Of course when we arrived he decided nothing hurt and made no sound anywhere the vet touched. So she couldn't figure it out but did see a wax plug in one ear that could have been irritating or painful and also found a small bug bite by the ear which could have been it too. He's been fine since then so I really don't know what happened. Atleast we know if there's something wrong at all with him, he WILL let us know.

On a different note I've created some new bracelets which I'm pretty excited about. I'll post pictures soon.

Iggy 500 Here We Come!!

It's finally here and tomorrow I will be traveling to Noblesville to my first Iggy 500! While there I will have 2 pieces of artwork being auctioned to the two highest bidders. I will be creating charcoal pet portraits of the winner's Iggy. Here's the one I did of Geordie, along with some others I've done in various mediums:

"Geordie" (top) & "Jake" (bottom)

"Lenny" (top) and "Baby" (bottom)

I hope people like the idea. 100% of the profits go to support the Italian Greyhound Rescue. Supposedly there are Iggy games like howling and tail wagging so I definately want to take the video camera! I've been helping out the rescue as well working on an update to the website. I'm having to learn Dreamweaver software so when I finally figure it all out I'll post links here so you can see what I did.

If you're interested in learning more about italian greyhounds visit http://www.indianaigrescue.org to see available Iggies for adoption or http://www.summitcitywhippets.com for links to breed information (this is the site I will be working on).

New bracelets and the launch of fantastic earrings by Kari

Here is a preview of new bracelets I'm making in freeform peyote. They are so much fun to work on because there are no rules and you just keep adding until you like it! I have been nagging my sister, Kari to make some things for Etsy because she is a creative genius. She finally gave me some of these to add to the site:

These earrings are made of Koosh balls! They are AWESOME!

These are made of fishing lures. They are super sparkly!

Both of these pairs of earrings will be up on Etsy soon.

New projects

My first attempt at oil painting: I made a beaded ring which is really comfortable to wear and has enough stretch to not be too tight.

Beaded flower

Beaded flowers... fairly simple but takes awhile. I liked the look and the book suggested it be added to a necklace but I liked the look on a bracelet. I didn't realize however that the flower is so top heavy it won't stay on top. It just flops over so I can't even really wear this. I may need to add it to an elastic backing so it will stay in place.

Trying something new

I purchased another beading book at Borders (they're going out of business here in Fort Wayne so stuff is discounted) and it's been one of the easiest books I've found to follow. Beaded Allure by Kelly Wiese has 25 patterns for beadweaving projects. The book includes many necklaces which is something I wanted to try. I tried one of the easiest projects, the lariat (bottom) and it turned out pretty cute. I still need a ring to attach to the other end but didn't have one at midnight last night while I was finishing this. I also tried the netted collar but instead turned it into a bracelet since I started this one after the other and it was getting really late. I used up some old beads so it isn't of the best quality and I had some trouble getting the tension right but I think it may have been because the beads were not very uniform in size. THAT is why it's important to get quality beads. Those that you find in the multi-pack just won't cut it but they're good for practice.

Geordie insisted on being on my lap the entire time I was beading so it was quite the balancing act. The netted bracelet looked nice as a collar on him... I thought it was cute and he looked up at me like "Mom, you are out of your mind." I knew I needed a female dog so I could make cute stuff for them! SO I think I might make one and have one of the I.G. foster moms see if one would be nice on one of their girls.

Geordie's first portrait

It's about time I did one of these:

Geordie's first portrait! He is such a character. Today I was working on this in my office and he wasn't finding a good spot on the air mattress in here so he started climbing into the closet where I have some blankets and pillows piled up. He can zero in on those blankets like nothing else! I had to scold him and tell him to get out of the closet since I have some artwork in there and I didn't want claw marks on them. He is crazy. Italian greyhounds truly are velcro dogs. They need to be next to a human at ALL times. My Iggy belives he IS a human:
Enough said.

Geordie/Geordo/Jorge "hor-hay"/Twinkle Toes/Bubby

New addition to the family

Introducing... Geordie!

Well it was QUITE a process but he's finally ours. Geordie is a 6 year old Italian Greyhound (aka Iggy) we adopted from the Italian Greyhound Rescue Foundation. He was abused in his previous home. His owner surrendered him after she decided she couldn't take his "behavior problems" anymore which of course, she was at fault for. Now that he's being properly cared for he is such a sweetie.

I made my first official sale on Etsy which was exciting. I've been trying to work on beadwork. I made an Iggy Mom bracelet for Geordie's foster mom as a thank you. I may be making more of those to donate to the annual IGRF Iggy 500 gathering. I finished my first bead embroidery project. It turned out alright, I'm just trying to figure out how to finish the edges: