Painting again

I may be near the end of this round of experimentation. Here you see the 3rd and last go round of the spiraling arcs fabric. I've added some cobalt blue with a little red mixed in it and also some red that was highly diluted. I was looking for a way to add more spots and blend the lighter areas a bit so tried different ways of spattering or sponging on a test cloth. Nothing was working. I finally took a dowel, dipped the end in the paint and used that to make larger dots around the darker areas. Then I spied the toothbrush I'd used to clean my shells; I'd totally ignored the most obvious and basic way of adding a fine spray of paint, a method learned in gradeschool, and all because I'd fixated on using spray bottles. I dipped the brush in the paint, stroked a plastic knife over the bristles and was amazed at how fine the droplets were and how easy they were to control. So I covered the entire piece with a spraying of the blue, then did the same with the red. I think it toned things down enough that I can use it, although the light areas are still a bit more of a contrast than I wanted. Enough with this one! Here's a close-up.

I also did more painting over that packing material, this time with dry unbleached muslin and a 1 inch flat brush. The first time I tried this, I'd stroked the brush back and forth. This time the fabric didn't stay in place, probably because it wasn't damp, so I ended up stroking away from me while I held on to the end. That worked very well to give me the crisp lines of texture that I wanted. I was going for a rippled sand effect and I think I got it. Not sure if the picture reads this way, but the fabric has a very "golden" look to it.

So more learned, more accomplished, more fabric ready to find its way into a quilt.