Post by peachfront on Jun 28, 2011 19:49:23 GMT -5
I have not done mosaics in 8 years, and I have never worked in stone mosaic. After some thought, I decided that I needed to start with an easy project. I got a lot of petrified wood slabettes in a Snuffy swap, and I remembered some old-time rock shops with petrified wood frames and, hey, a light went on that I could get some confidence by starting with a picture frame. Even if it comes out a little handmade and funky-looking, it's all good, right?
The old wooden picture frame was vintage, decade unknown, but the photo area was a non-standard size, 7 by 6 inches. I cut up the already polished slabs -- if there were a few pits and dings in some of the slabs, doesn't matter for this project, it's supposed to look like it's been around for awhile. The grout was dyed with an old bottle of Emerald Green colorant from Michael's and was much too vivid. I had to thin out some dark green and dark black acrylic paint and paint over the grout, plus sponge over the wood, so it would look more aged. I had an 8 by 10 cell phone photo of me on my horse in the Bolivian pantanal. The "glare" in the photo is not glare, it's water. You travel by horse because it's too wet to walk or to drive a vehicle, so it's still the world of the cowboy out there. The man leading me is normally a working cowboy but leading a crazy lady to see a parrot is easy work, so he jumped at that job, having some seniority on this ranch. There's really an old western feel to some parts of Bolivia, so I think the petrified wood frame fits the spirit. At least I hope it does. I'm going to hang it tomorrow...I see all the little imperfections and "could do differents" but the best thing about this project is that it can be imperfect and still do the job.
The old wooden picture frame was vintage, decade unknown, but the photo area was a non-standard size, 7 by 6 inches. I cut up the already polished slabs -- if there were a few pits and dings in some of the slabs, doesn't matter for this project, it's supposed to look like it's been around for awhile. The grout was dyed with an old bottle of Emerald Green colorant from Michael's and was much too vivid. I had to thin out some dark green and dark black acrylic paint and paint over the grout, plus sponge over the wood, so it would look more aged. I had an 8 by 10 cell phone photo of me on my horse in the Bolivian pantanal. The "glare" in the photo is not glare, it's water. You travel by horse because it's too wet to walk or to drive a vehicle, so it's still the world of the cowboy out there. The man leading me is normally a working cowboy but leading a crazy lady to see a parrot is easy work, so he jumped at that job, having some seniority on this ranch. There's really an old western feel to some parts of Bolivia, so I think the petrified wood frame fits the spirit. At least I hope it does. I'm going to hang it tomorrow...I see all the little imperfections and "could do differents" but the best thing about this project is that it can be imperfect and still do the job.
