First there was a dolphin…

…there really was (read the About-page), and therefore this first blogpost should be about one.

First, a short story: Today I decided I wanted to start this crafting-is-creating blog. Setting it up, etc. blabla…choosing the title,…and there I was: I needed to have a dolphin. Juuust like that. Since I’ve never managed to take a picture of one myself, what now?

High-five to the internet, and thanks for all the fish, erm, dolphins. I would love to give credit to the photographer, but since the link behind the search result didn’t work, I simply can’t.

A black-and-white, enlarged printout later, I started gathering materials to transform it into MY dolphin:

craft knife (plus cutting mat)
tissue paint (white, black, blue)
paint brush(es)
shirt (non-stretch works best)
support carton
foldback clips
black-and white print-out on paper

I started by cutting out the shape to get a stencil dolphin (keep all the cut-out paper for later), and fixing the shirt to the support carton.

Next, time to put the brush and paint to good use. I took shimmer opaque black (pebeo, Setacolor) as the basic colour. Centering the paper, I brushed from the outside in. Then I carefully lifted the paper.

Already gorgeous in my eyes.
But a dolphin without the endless sea seemed wrong, so here came the horizon: I put a simple strip of paper under the dolphin, and used very little paint and soft strokes to add the “sea”.

Something was still missing. (Don’t get me wrong, getting as far as this on the first dolphin try was exhilarating). Some structure? Here came the structure and the “artsy” part: I mixed a bit of black and white paint and, well, painted. That the model was a black-and-white cut-out helped a lot:

It’s not very clear from the picture above, but at this point, it looked already very good. Another problem one might have:Where to put the second fin? Trick #317:

Cut out the fin and the eye from the parts you kept, let the tissue dry a bit and then…paint it! To make the whole thing look a bit more dynamic, I decided to add some splashes of “water”. I don’t know what the tool I used is called, I took it from my stash of crafting equipment.

Last step: As I want to give it away as a gift, find a simple picture frame for it. I also bolstered it up with leftover tissue and left out the glass plate. Done!

This “technique” isn’t limited to dolphins.