#Inktober Adaptations to Tangles

Once you've learned the basics of Zentangling and mastered some of the "official" tangles (here's one source for reference), the Zentangle people encourage you to look for patterns as you go about your daily life that might be adapted into a tangle. Last week while paging through a magazine, I ran across a photo of crystals that reminded me so much of the tangle "reef" (used in the middle Zentangle here), the difference being that the crystals have pointed tops and more than one side showing while reef's tops are flat and the sides one-dimensional. I pasted the photo into my sketchbook and played around a bit with this idea for my October 25th drawing.

Continuing with this theme of adaptation, on the 26th I turned to my little notebook of tangles and the pages showing a pattern I'd clipped from a catalogue that I thought could be used as an alternate to the basket weave pattern on the facing page. Rather than use it as a fill across a wide space, I decided to try it in a border with great results. I added different variations of the tangle "rain" (honestly, the name makes no sense to me) in the center, without much thought to design aesthetics. I was a bit tired and uninspired that day once I tried out my border idea.

In for a penny, in for a pound as they say, I decided the next two squares would also be adaption tryouts. In 2013, Wisconsin friend Michele, who is into photography as much as she is fiber, sent me a photo of shadows cast by a lacy curtain, thinking it could inspire a Zentangle. I agreed and printed it out to file away in the cigar box where I keep my Zentangle supplies and printouts of step-outs. Well, this hasn't taken me long to get over its intimidation, has it? On the 27th, I broke down the elements, recognized tangle-like areas and started drawing swooping lines. I think I've stumbled upon a possible machine quilting design in there.

Finally, on the 28th I thought I'd see if I could adapt a snowflake image, found at the same time as the crystals. This was not very successful, partly because of the wonkiness of the center hexigon and partly because I tried to copy too closely the lines in the design. This needs work and simplification.

Here's what I was working from to try out these adaptions. Click on the photo for a larger view.

Speaking of Michele, she commented on a previous post, one where I'd taken a disappointing Zentangle and rotated it for a better result, that I might put four of them together kaleidoscope-style for an interesting design. As long as I had my photo software program open, I decided to see how that would work. What do you think?

And of course, I had to tray the opposite configuration. It's more of a fan design, and if I could scrunch each one up to meet along the vertical and horizontal center lines, I might have something.