Watercolour meets Juicy Roo

OK so it had to happen, right? Creatively speaking, you can only temporarily escape what comes to you naturally, right? I've spent the last twelve months exploring a creative realm that, at times, felt very unnatural! Drawing realistic faces with charcoal...tonal studies..playing with pastels....it only makes sense that I would discover a medium that made me want to revert to my natural quirky sticky style of illustration.

But that is what happened. My life seems to be currently revolving around this formula:

watercolour + ink + juicy roo = fun

Colouring with watercolour is way more fun that adding colour in photoshop, which is what I've been doing for the last 10 years or so! The little girl and her dog in this pic reminds me of one of the early Juicy Roo greeting cards that read "you can never spend too much time with your dog".

I'm thinking of digging out some of those old designs and revamping them with my Gocco printer, (just the black outline of the drawing) and colouring using watercolour. But first, I am going to do an experiment with a quote from my very talented friend Christina.  I've been meaning to do this for, like, well...18 months or so.  Shocking. But I'm nearly there! Here is the print design in b+w:

I have a beautiful old quirky scale that belonged to my grandmother, and I've been instructing myself to draw it for the purpose of this print idea for many many, way too many months. It felt like every day I'd realise I STILL HAD NOT DRAWN IT, and then I'd be CRANKY because every day was another day that I hadn't started on this print idea. Here is one piece of evidence of the many notes I wrote to myself with instructions to pull my finger out and draw the scale:

Does anyone else give themselves written notes, slightly snarky, to force one to spring into action? Or is that just me *blush*
Anyway the good news is I'm ready for Gocco action. Hooray! I'm not even sure if the ink is waterproof for watercolouring purposes. But I'm sure I'll find out! And as I always say, I'll keep you posted!
xo

Gocco Hiccups!

K so there I was. I cleared away all other potential interruptions, and left the Queen's Birthday for me to roll up my sleeves and get busy printing.

Artwork prepared, Gocco unpacked and ready for action: Check.


Chair strategically placed at window to distract cat and prevent her from walking on fresh prints: Check.


Screen burned, ink applied to master, all going well:


Here is where things start going pear-shaped:


I've read about this happening. Of course I didn't consider it would happen to me, I envisioned a flawless print run....the carbon from the toner stuck to the screen, well more than the carbon stuck, even the PAPER stuck! Ouch. I knew this master was toast but printed a few anyway and quickly decided to have another crack with a fresh master. (Its painful though, every master you waste is about $15 worth of supplies!)


I remember reading that if your photocopied artwork has any moisture in it, the carbon may stick to the master. So I got out the iron, and turned off the steam and applied the iron to the artwork to dry it out. The second screen I tried to burn was better, but still had some major carbon sticking problems. No paper stuck though...so I printed a few more...(man the printing bit is heaps of fun, I had to force myself to stop b/c it was coming out all wrong...)

So its back to the drawing board - I think I have to make the photocopy lighter, I'll try that - I only have one master left so I think I'll get some more supplies before commencing the next experiment. Its a pretty amazing little unit, I so hope I can work out how to get a good screen, coz the printing part is super easy and heaps of fun.
So the rest of my day got freed up to do something with guaranteed results: I made a lined A-line skirt with a lovely piece of winter woolly fabric. Its nearly finished, I'll have to post a pic! Ciao for now. xo

Gocco Experiment, Here I Come...

I first heard about GOCCO right before I left Canada to move back to Aus in 2006 and have been coveting one ever since. Despite them not being made any more, I was slightly anxious about the concept of having one and then one day not being able to buy supplies any more! But as they say, I'll deal with that when and if it happens! It only took four years but a few months ago I purchased the PG-11 and its been sitting in my bedroom whispering to me ever since. So its time to bite the bullet and have some fun with it. I'm not very good at loving my experiments and given this is a whole new application for me, its taken a while to dive in. ANYWAY long weekend coming up = lets have some gocco fun baby. So I've prepped some artwork, the PG-11 came with enough supplies for 3 designs, so here is what I plan to experiment with:


I can't claim the rights to this phrase, I scribbled it in my journal after seeing it in a graphic design rag....so apologies for not being able to reference it correctly!

Hows this for a drawing with absolutely no point:


And this is an old design that I thought might be fun for printing on fabric one day. But for now I'll print it on paper and see what happens:


I'm terrible for percolating on projects and not having a finished product for weeks on end which is why I'm such a terrible blogger. So instead of sitting idle I thought I'd share that there is progress in the Juicy Zone! And hopefully after the weekend instead of black and white artwork I might have a pretty picture or two to share. Or at the very least some pictures of my cat covered in paint! xo