Friday, July 27, 2018

A Round Head



Happy summer, friends!

Today's photos are brought to you by my cellphone camera. 

Translation: no photoediting. 

So this is my hypothesis: if I take photos with my cellphone instead of my DSLR, I might be able to blog more frequently.

Supporting (anti-)evidence: I have SO MANY photos sitting on the computer that I offloaded from the DSLR that never made it to the blog because I didn't have the time to process them. 

This is not to say that I'm never taking a proper photo with the fancy camera again, incidentally. There is a place in blogdom for edited photos, certainly. Tutorials and patterns and other things require them in particular sizes and sharpness and exposure and odd depths of focus. But for the random, everyday Look What I'm Working On shots, I'm postulating that a cellphone camera will do the trick.

Speaking of Working Ons, here's my current WIP: a round head.

Head shapes are very important in Toydom, and round heads, especially, bring joy to their beholders like no other head shapes do. Yes, I am aware that I sound shape-ist. And yes, there are always instances (such as a momentary lapse in reason) in which a person might opt for, say, a flat or oblong head over one that is beauteously spherical. Yes, I've done it. It is tragic, but life is not perfect. People aren't perfect.

Round heads, fortunately, are.

This one belongs on a new doll I'm making. I considered including ears, but ears stick out. Eventually, this round head will be crowned with yarn hair, anyway, which will hide the ears. This was how I rationalized away any protuberances that would disrupt that pristine curved profile. 

Except the nose which, if you stare long enough at the center front seam, you might be able to see. Factoid: I modeled this nose after the slightly-upturned nose of one of my kids. When I tell people my children are my inspiration for my crafting, I wasn't kidding.

Unrelated, here is another WIP that's been going on forever. It's perle cotton on faux suede. It has round shapes in it, too. I started this last year. My goal is to finish it this year. Which would make it about 2 years old. Which is fast, as far as my WIPs go. 

How long do your WIPs languish under your sewing table before they see the light of day once more? I think my record is 29 years (and counting).


15 comments:

  1. Oh my that is a wonderful head.

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  2. I think I still have some fabric that I cut out to be a dress for myself when I was about 14 years old. I'm now past 60...

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    1. Isn't it fun (and maybe a tad bittersweet) to look back and think of how early we started sewing? I'm thankful, but overwhelmed at how quickly time passes, imagining when my own kids will no longer be little.

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  3. Oooh! Cute little upturned nose..very clever.

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  4. My record is also 29 years and counting! Or thereabouts.

    I saw the upturned nose right away. And I absolutely know what you mean about your kids inspiring your projects. I have noticed that, even when I follow the patterns of others, they have a tendency to somehow look like the child they are intended for. I think cell phone photos are fine for this. I used mostly cell phone photos for my travel posts this summer. DSLR photos are stunning, but cell phones have come a long ways, and there was something very liberating about giving myself permission to leave the nice camera home and accept less perfect photos in exchange for a more free feeling experience.

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    1. Yes, MaryAnne - you've said it exactly right: it's liberating to just shoot-and-post. In some ways, it trains me to be a more observant photographer. Because I can't (or don't plan to) crop or edit, I find I'm paying more attention to composition and lighting than when I'm using the DSLR. Ironic, but in some way I feel like I'm returning to the old dys of film cameras, when we couldn't "cheat" with photoediting programs. Obviously, a cellphone photo can still be edited if we want to do so, but I'm choosing not to.

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  5. Your photos are fine... I appreciate how you generously share your images and ideas...the more the merrier! Love your doll's roundness.. For some reason I think he/ she looks lovely without hair.... I make dolls too so it feels odd to suggest that this one is wonderful without hair....Friendly, sweet...and just a bit different....your doll is wonderful ...as is... I look forward to seeing you developed your ideas!

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    1. Susan, I, too, thought the bald head looked quite nice, in a peg-doll sort of way. Once the hair goes on, it looks very different! And the roundness gets hidden, which is a shame. Price to pay for having hair, i guess.

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  6. Yay for more posts, it's so nice to read them! I'm all for the phone camera. Lets us use our imagination more anyway, to imagine the pictures even more beautiful than they appear ;) thank you LiEr!

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    1. You're welcome, Shoshana! And thank YOU for your encouragement!

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  7. I cleaned out a lot of the old WIP, because they were getting in the way of the things I needed to do now. I had a piece of embroidery JUST LIKE THAT, I finally cannibalized it for a patchwork bag gift. It was a win-win all around.

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    1. Yay for you! It's still early enough for me to use my piece of embroidery for the original purpose (a bag) so perhaps there is still hope for me!

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    2. You are so brave!!! I just frogged a three year WIP so I can use the yarn on something else. I only had the cuff & button band to knit, but I hated how it hung so I just bit the bullet & I already love the sweater I'm knitting so much more. I am sad to see the fancy cable go away though.

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  8. Your blog is where I first heard the term WIP, and that you had boxes! Revelation moment��! I even think I remember you writing that you limit yourself to how many you have. Until that moment I just had random stuff shoved anywhere I could find. Which sometimes made for fun re- discoveries, kind of a time capsule of my interests. Anyhoo, not quite willing to settle on a number of WIP I'll allow myself, but seeing my boxes gives me options when I go to sew/craft based on the time I have to spend and my whim.

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  9. I have a dozen pillow case aprons cut & only two or three assembled, started 5 years ago.
    I have a quilt that I cut a lot of squares out for to use a ton of my stuff up & I only have a few squares finished from also probably 5 years ago.
    I have a skirt I measured & cut 90% of from this winter.
    I have a sweater on my knitting needles I started a few weeks ago.
    I have a million puffs that I started knitting 6 years ago for a beekeepers quilt. That I'm not worried about because the point is to make them here & there as I feel like it & just watch the pile grow till I have enough.
    Yesterday I cut out fabric for a new Charlie Caftan. I want to make it nursing friendly. We'll see if I ruin the whole thing or not with my hack. I'm so excited to wear it!

    I should finish some of these...

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