Here's a scan of the progress I've made on my John Wayne portrait. It's still not quite done yet, but it's getting there. I spent several hours on it today while I was home from work. Unfortunately, I was home because I threw my back out and was physically unable to find a comfortable position to sit/lay/stand, so stitching was terribly unpleasant. Oh well, such is life.



I'm actually really, really happy with it so far. I'd even venture to say it's the best piece I've done so far. If you wanna see any detail whatsoever your best bet is to click on the picture.

Oh, and I have a good shot at showing this off to Chicago artist Tony Fitzpatrick tomorrow. I'm super excited.

And now for something completely different. . .

The Duke!






Obviously still in progress.

I would just like to thank everyone on the Needlecraft board of Craftster as well as the people over at Mr X Stitch. I've been going through a bit of a rough patch for some time now and all of your comments and encouragement have really helped me a lot.

More than you could ever imagine.

: )

I'm not finished with my robot girls yet, but I needed something new to work on. I posted a picture on here previously of some vintage Playboys I'd tracked down at a garage sale. Well, when I actually opened them up and started looking through them I realized what an awesome find I actually had. One of the photo sets was actually based on sketches done for Playboy by Salvador Dali.

I know, right?

Anyway, the whole set was awesome but there was one picture that caught my eye immediately and I knew I had to do something with it.


It's just so creepy in all the right ways.

So I did some sketching and I changed a few things here and there to suit my tastes and here's what I ended up with.


Done on some cheapo pink cotton which actually sucked way more than I had expected to work with. It's mostly in shades of black and grey with the exception of the nipples because for some reason those have to be as realistic as possible for me. I am a nipple perfectionist.


I'm very happy with how the hair turned out except for the fact that the lady on the right seems a tad bit uneven. I may go back in and fix that, I haven't decided yet. I'm not crazy about how her face turned out though. I had a really tough time with it for some reason. I think I was working with too long a needle and it inhibited the amount of detail I could achieve a bit.


But, I love the way this turned out.


And although from the picture you can hardly tell because the greys all kinda blend together, this is about five different shades of and it took about two hours to complete.

That's about all there is to say for now except that you haven't seen the last of this Dali set. I will be working up some more stuff from this, really soon.

This embroidery brought to you by: Randy "Macho Man" Savage


Oooooh yeeeah!

Some recent sketches.


This was an ad for Fringe Hair Salon. That's supposed to be a ruler. It's unfinished.


I think this is the girl from Bat for Lashes? I went overboard with the hair. The bangs and the bottoms look exactly like I wanted. The rest is total shit.


Closeup.


Another Fringe ad. Her face turned out unnaturally long. I may turn her into a werewolf.


From a photo by Matt Schwerin. Unfinished.


Closeup.


Another photo by Matt Schwerin. Super unfinished.


Closeup.



I know what you're thinking: Unabomber.

Greatest garage sale find ever, ever.



This is my new embroidery inspiration. I'm going to start sketching tonight.

They're from 1974/75.

Fuck yeah.

So, I'm coming ever closer to finishing up my shit for this art show, which is quite exciting. I must say I don't think I've taken anything this seriously in awhile and it's nice to find something that I enjoy this much. I posted some in progress shots a little while back and I feel like I've come leaps and bounds since then with this project. I'm not finished as I still want to do some background work and some borders around the pieces to make them more suitable to hang but I have the bulk of the work (i.e. the actual portraits) done aside from perhaps a few minor details. Well, enough rambling, and on to the pictures!



I've been experimenting with tinting my fabrics in different ways. This one is all crayon, I believe.









Here is a decent closeup of the face and hair. I'm really happy with the way the hair turned out. The layers of texture there turned out better than I could have hoped for. These pictures are shot with a webcam however, and I'm afraid the detail just might not translate.





And here is girl #2. I personally love this one, hands down, a million times more than the first one. My boy-half and I had a discussion about it the other day, as he prefers the first one, and I think I've come to the conclusion that I like the sketchy look that the different stitch choice gave it. Not sure why, entirely.







Same technique for the hair. I will def. be holding on to that one.



The necklace is made up of french knots. The wires are double and single strand couching in multiple colors. I really wanted them to look like they were spilling out of her.







I was especially proud of the way that cigarette turned out, but I don't think these pictures do it justice.




More couching/wires. But more importantly, check out those areolas. The color is, like, perfect. I made sure to write down the color number. That is my new go to nipple color.







And here, kiddies, is why you never leave your embroidery lying around in a bag on the floor near an open can of Strawberry Crush when you have hardwood floors and you're enjoying some much needed "alone time" with your significant other in a bed frame that's on wheels.

DO NOT DO IT! Consider yourselves warned.

I will be carefully bleaching this soon.





All-in-all I'm happy with the results.