Argh...I'm feeling stuck and don't quite know how to get unstuck so am asking for fresh eyes. I'm struggling with these hands, photocopies of my own, have cut out three different versions and nothing, no orientation looks quite right to me. Not to mention I have to figure out what fabric to render them in.
So this is what you are looking at: 1) the random placement of bubbles which is not complete yet, but I needed to get some up there to get the hands right. These are not fused so will fade a bit in intensity once that is done. 2) The paper pattern of the hands (I'll explain the double set later) which are smaller than life-size, copied at 80%. I'm wondering if part of the problem is that they are still too big, but I also don't sense they give the feel of palms-up hands. 3) Along the bottom and right edge are fabrics I'm considering for the hands. Some, you can see, let the dark of the background shadow through and thus alter their color. The lavender at the bottom feels the most right but obviously I am not 100% sold. It would be easier to tell I suppose if I cut hands out of each to audition but I'm trying to avoid "wasting" fabric. 4) At the top I am playing with the idea of borders to be on three sides only, gradating to a light value I guess I thought would help balance out the hands at the bottom. I have no idea how wide they should be. That light blue did not feel at all right for the hands but I may be wrong about that.
So bothered by those hands, I ended up sketching my own this morning - yes, I was avoiding that because I thought it would be more time consuming than just copying but I really didn't get this angle on the machine. A lot of what gives this cupped appearance is the detail lines, have yet to cut out the silhouette and see what that looks like. Maybe my paper hands would look better to me if I added those lines, which of course would be quilting lines.
So now it's your turn. What do you think? What would you suggest?
4 comments:
Go with your hand-drawn hand if you want the impression of palms up. The curves and the crease lines make all the difference. The other ones just look flat. Also, for the palms-up effect you need each pair to have the thumbs on the outside. You can work with shading them with paint, oil sticks, colored pencils, etc., if you don't want them to look flat. Don't worry about wasting fabric when you're auditioning colors because you can always use the rejects for another quilt or a fabric postcard. Hope this helps!
Have you thought about turning the hands around, palm side toward you, stitching detail lines and then placing them under sheer fabric? In other words, mute them?
Ok, I can see that what I'm showing with the hands has confused you. The palms ARE up/towards the viewer - the outer ones belong to one person, the inner ones to another (and they will be placed more one under the other in the final version). But I had not thought of putting sheer over whatever fabric I choose to mute it, Susan. Good thought. Sherrie, you have identified exactly what is bugging me about the current hand pattern - it does indeed look flat and I'm not sure stitching/shading would help that. Can't tell you how much I don't want a bunch of homeless hands hanging around - already have a pair from the first quilt! But I may have to bite the bullet here...
Thanks - this indeed has been helpful. Back to the drawing board!
What I kept thinking all the time reading through that is exactly what you said at the end. You need to see the lines drawn in. You know that already. :)
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