diva challenge no. 195: 'turning old into new: jailbreaking tangles'

The Diva's weekly Zentangle challenge this week: take a freeform/flowy/scatter pattern and stuff it into a grid, or use a grid-based tangle and break it out. If I hadn't been so tired when I wrote that challenge (late-night, last-minute as usual... 'cause that's how I roll), I would have realized that nearly all of my examples were stuffing tangles into grids and only one tangle pattern got liberated in that post. So I've got a few more examples to show you.

Just a few things to ponder (because I did a terrible job of explaining this in my original post):

• Putting a pattern into a grid is usually easier than taking one out. If you don't know where to start, try a grid first. Lines, dots... start with whatever you like to draw the most.

• Don't be afraid to only use a piece of a pattern you like; it doesn't have to be the whole thing. Picking a pattern in the first place is just so there is a place to start, a jumping-off point to get inspired.

• No grid doesn't necessarily mean no structure, unless you want it to. It just means you don't start with dots or lines in military formation.

Rick's paradox (Zentangle):

Starbarz (Jane Dickinson):

Sunflower (Anne Marks):

I loved this one so much it got its own Bijou tile. 

Drip-drop (Debbie Perdue):

Bronx cheer (Zentangle):

Assunta is the focus tangle on one of my favorite facebook tangle groups this week, so I'm giving it a little legroom too.

and Veezley, which is one of mine. Helloooo, Christmas trees! Very Seussy.

I know this is a tricky challenge and there isn't much zen to it... but it's fun to shake things up and I've already seen some really inspiring tangles out there. Thank you, brave souls...it makes me so happy that you're taking this challenge and running with it. 

Happy jailbreaking. :oD

• ❃ • ❋ • ❁ • ✿ • ✽ • ❀ •

Thanks for stopping by! 

Feel free to join me here, 

where I frequently share artsy things that inspire me, 

invite tanglers to share art,

crack silly jokes, 

and offer up the 

occasional 

tangle 

prompt. 

:oD

❀

SNIRCLES

I've been playing with a new pattern. Meet SNIRCLES. 

Named so, because they are drawn in a snircular shape. Obviously.

This pattern requires a little bit of concentration. It's not difficult to draw, but you have to pay attention. Just remember north, south, east, east, north, west, south, north, west, east, west, and you'll be fine.

Just kidding.

Some ideas and variations I ran with while working through the steps.

Some tips for successful 'snircling':
For maximum zen, draw all of your outer circles at once. Then all of the auras (step 2), then all of the inner auras (step 3), then all the 'tails' (step 4). It's easier to keep track of which lines are going in what direction that way.

When drawing the initial circles, go slowly and make a complete circle every time. Don't stop your line because you bumped into another circle because they will look more misshapen that way. A little bit of overlap is ok.

If you curve your tails rather than keeping them straight, your spheres will look more dimensional, which can be further enhanced by shading later on.

Keep your snircles small, or they'll run rampant. Just like children, the bigger they are, the harder they are to wrangle. ;o) And there's nothing worse than an errant snircle!

As you can see, the direction they face can make a big difference in the way your full pattern looks.

 inward-facing

side-facing

random (only 50% zen, requires some decision-making while you draw)

same one, only stringier.

I know that non-representational art is the whole point of Zentangle... but if it wasn't, wouldn't these little tulips look cute tucked into a tangle?? I couldn't help myself. Let's blame the fourteen years I spent decorating cookies for a living.

The red pen is quickly becoming the bane of my blogosphere existence. I swear, I try to remember to use it, but by step two or three I forget and have to start all over. Or I draw the wrong step in the wrong color. It is BUSTING MY GROOVE. See the basic steps I drew up, at the beginning of this post? I hope you like them, 'cause it took three tries to get the right parts in the right colors!

My theme song for this next attempt will be a really catchy song by The Afters, appropriately titled 'Start Over'. ;o)

*seven index cards later*

Sooo... sorry about the lack of red ink here, but here are the steps for the fancy border. 

I love this one. How could you not, when it looks like a breakdancing caterpillar? There's so much room for variation with this pattern. Look at the difference in the two borders at the bottom, just from changing the direction of the snircles.

...and there's so much potential in the SHADING.

That's it for now... thanks for reading! As always, I'm open to suggestions for improving the process. 

weekly challenge #65: UMT v.III

Every Monday morning, the Diva issues a new challenge. This week's contender is a Use My Tangle guest submission called 'huggy bear'. My interpretation of HB is on the bottom right. It makes me think of pincushions. Or doughnuts. Or cream puffs. Or pizza... or a banana fudge sundae with rocky road and extra almonds on top. Or my mom's meatloaf, with fresh green beans and crispy parmesan potatoes stacked on the side.

hmm... note to self... no blogging whilst hungry.

does this pattern make my Unbatz look big?

I came up with this nifty little pattern after I took my first zentangle class. I call it 'unbatz'. Lots of variations come to mind after step two, but this one is my favorite.

A couple of things to note:

Step 1: Try to keep your COLUMNS lined up. It will matter in step three.

Step 3: Start each figure 8 in the middle of the space so they're relatively symmetrical. If they're too high or too low, your step four will look wonky. And nobody likes a wonky unbatz.

•••••••

• ❃ • ❋ • ❁ • ✿ • ✽ • ❀ •

Thanks for stopping by! 

Feel free to join me here, 

where I frequently share artsy things that inspire me, 

invite tanglers to share art,

crack silly jokes, 

and offer up the 

occasional 

tangle 

prompt. 

:oD

❀

sunny on the inside

Back in December, I was inspired by some painted ceramic suns hanging in a local Mexican restaurant, so I got a few photos so I could play with the idea later on. At that point, I hadn't taken Sandhya's Zentangle class and didn't really know what it was. I just knew I had a thing for color and really intricately detailed ink doodlin'. I also hadn't started playing around with watercolor yet, but Santa knew I wanted to try it. :oD Santa knows everything! Especially if Santa is either your husband or a friend (formerly your boss) who has been around you nearly every day for about a third of your life. Yeah, I'm lookin' at you, Linda!

 A few weeks later - Arches cold press watercolor paper, a technical pen, and soot black india ink :o)

I didn't realize it was going to take me a week to finish this... it was a pretty ambitious project for my second painting ever. I learned a valuable lesson here: Just because you think your watercolor paper is dry does NOT mean the color's not going to bleed like gangbusters, even if the paper is just a TEENY bit damp. If freshly-painted watercolor paper feels cool to the touch, it's not dry yet. If you're as impatient as I am, save yourself the agony and use a hairdryer on it. For an hour.

For a while, I actually thought about leaving this black and white. I don't know what I was thinking. The color is just so happy. This thing matches every jordan almond* in the box ;o) I framed it today with a pristine white mat but since there is a micron pen in the vicinity I doubt very much that it's going to stay white for very long.

There is now a sky-blue (well, okay, according to Winsor & Newton it's cerulean) background with a little of the color lifted off with a damp sponge for an (accidentally) awesome cloud effect. I thought I had a finished picture of it, but since I'm an obsessive deleter, I'm pretty sure I know what happened to that.

*speaking of, if you ever stop at Buc-ees, go get a bag of their 'no sugar added' jordan almonds. All the yummy and half the sweet. (and thanks to my sister-in-law for cluing me in.)

Shrinky Dinks... not just for breakfast anymore.

Thought I'd try my hand at making some tangled earrings today. I went a little bonkers at the local craft store and bought several paper punches in different sizes and shapes (they were 40% off... it was like they KNEW), a few different kinds of blank shrinky-dink sheets, and assorted beading supplies. This is one of four different styles I came up with. These were made with the clear sheets/rough finish. I'm going to experiment with colored pencils and opaque white sheets next. As much as I like these, I think they'll be more appealing when I throw in a little color. Also, there will be a bracelet attempt tomorrow. That should be interesting!

Here are a few of my first attempts, though I ended up adding small black glass beads to the jump rings at the top to spruce them up a little. I like these because they're more 'tangled', unlike the ones I posted above with just one pattern per piece. I think I'll try drawing the string on a separate sheet of paper next time and tape the translucent earring material to the paper until I'm finished tangling it. The pencil string is so dark it looks like ink... remember everything's darker after you shrink it!

CADENT

Cadent study with watercolor. This is a good example of why we use ink instead of pencil... if I had been able to fix my mistake, I never would have discovered the variation on the upper right. Which I love.

INDY-RELLA, and all who love her.

Meet indy-rella. I like it because you can vary the shapes quite a bit and get different effects, and you can make it look darker or lighter by tightening up or loosening the strokes in the pattern, so it's pretty versatile when you're thinking about contrast within your tangle. Looks amazing when shaded... not hard to draw behind other things... aaand, it won't steal your wallet or tease the dog. WIN.

zendalas!

You're looking at my first zendala tile. The 21-tile tins haven't been officially released yet, but I got my paws on one at seminar. There are nine different pre-string round tiles (two of each design) and a few blank ones in each tin. They're a little bigger than the square tiles at just over 4.5 inches across.

Although I love the way this looks, it seems a little more like a tangle pattern sampler than freeform artwork because 1) the spaces between the strings are so small and 2) there are a LOT of spaces to fill. Compared to a square tile you'd probably put five or six patterns on at most, this one's got 37. Because it's so structured and the gaps between the strings are so small, I didn't feel compelled to 'color outside the lines' to make it more artsy. They are still beautiful and fun to tangle... but you're definitely not going to get through this one on your lunch break. :o)

I've mailed out twelve blank zendala tiles to some of my fellow tanglers. Once I get photos of all of them I'll post the collage here so you can see how widely varied and utterly amazing they are. One of them is even on its way to the Netherlands! Exciting.