Quebec P3: Sign, Sign, Everywhere a Sign

I believe I mentioned in one of my Ottawa posts that I tend to take photos of weird things on vacation... and yes, that includes signs! Signs and storefronts are so interesting, and one thing I loed about the old town and the old port in particular, is how fond they are of hanging sings like these for businesses and especially restaurants! I just think it has such old world charm, and love the bold graphics, often with high contrast and bright colours or metallics used to catch your eye.

I love the pig sign!! It reminds me of the movie Delicatessen, my favourite film directed by Jean-Pierre Jeaunet.  You may find his name familliar, as he also directed cult hit Amelie, also known as the most charming love story ever.  Until you see Delicatessen, that is. You could probably make that argument for just about any of his movies, but the post-apocalyptic setting of this love story is pretty unique.  It takes place at a post-apocalyptic butcher shop with upstairs apartments for rent. It deals with cannibalism and yet, it's really funny.  This is why Jean-Pierre Jeunet is one of my favourite contemporary filmmakers.

One of the things Ephraim and I were s amused with was the different signage for fast food restaurants, most notably McDonalds.  I guess due to signage bylaws, McDonalds has to have a deep green and low-lustre brass painted sign.  It almost looked classy.  Almost.  I didn't get a photo because I felt super weird about photographing people eating their burgers, and they were on busy streets! 

Have you ever traveled somewhere that familiar things were just a little bit different like that?

--Erin

DIY: Painted Canvas Photo Transfer

As promised, here's a little DIY showing the step by step process of how I made my photo transfer.  It was really fun to work on, though it was a touch time consuming.  Most of the work is pretty mindless though, so you can have yourself a little movie marathon while you work.  I know I did.  Aw yeah, The Two Towers and Newsies.  

Anyhow, I digress.

Here's what you need!

• Gel or gloss medium. I used liquitex liquid gloss medium, as I already had a (giant!) bottle.
• Canvas (your choice of size, I used a gallery depth 11x14")
• A computer with photoshop
• pencils
• scissors
• paper of appropriate size and laser printer
• paints and brushes
• washcloth or rag and hot water
• movies and/or patience.

 And now here's how it was done!

1. Edit the photo/s into the desired format, sized to fit your canvas.  For this project, I combined a photo the couple had taken at a convention, and the promotional photo for the new season of Dr.Who.  Why? Because the provided convention background was lame.  Moving on.
2. Using photoshop, convert the image to black and white.  Make sure that you have ti set to include as many white portions as possible, as the white areas will show the colour you lay down the best.
3. print out 2 versions of your image: one in the format you would like to see it in, and one that has been flipped across the horizontal axis.  The flipped image is the one you will use for your transfer, as the image will transfer reversed (and thus normal. Double negative style).
4. Using the print out that has not been reversed, cut out sections to create stencils based on the colours you want to paint.  I chose to use a limited colour palette, and let the shading of the black and white image spice things up for me.  Think of the finished product as being an Andy Warhol-esque screen print!
5. Paint in your colours block by block.  I started with the gold, so that I could keep checking with my stencil to make sure that the floating bits of red were lined up properly.
6. Continue on to your secondary colours, checking your allignment as you go.  It doesn't have to be perfect (a little shift looks super cool actually!), but you want it to be close so as not to look confusing to the eye).
7. Finish painting your colours and let completely dry.
8. brush on a thick coat of gloss medium, and press your reversed image printed face down onto the wet gloss.  Smooth it out and burnish it on with a blunt object.  Be gentle, you don't want to warp the canvas! Let dry over night.
9. Lay a hot, damp cloth over the paper, until the paper is soaked through.  Gently rub with the washcloth to remove the paper and reveal the image beneath.  Be patient, and repeat this step several times.  You can see in my image above that until all the paper is gone, the image will appear cloudy.  Don't despair, it's worth taking it slowly and making sure you've removed it all! Toward the end, I rubbed the paper off with my damp fingers, so as to avoid taking off too much of the transferred image along with the paper.
10. When the paper is all gone, brush on a coat of gloss and let dry.
11. Add some fun details on top of your transfered image! I added in the white panels on the Tardis, glowing eyes for the Daleks, a clean gold border and the Sonic Screwdrivers.  Have fun, and get creative!
12. Hang that sucker up!!

If you use this DIY, I'd love to see your project!! Feel free to leave a link in the comments letting me know how it turned out!!

--Erin

**This project and DIY were the first completed goal of my 4 simple goals before 2013.  Check out my list of goals HERE**

My Weekend in Retro Specs v.4

This evening, on a very special long-weekend-edition of My Weekend in Retro Specs, for your viewing pleasure, my Saturday, August 4th, in photos! A photo for each hour, even! (well, mostly...)

8 am

9 am Saw one of my favourite Singer decals on my way to a garage sale!

10 am breakfast of champions / 11 am surveying my purchases of the morn'

12 pm Twin Peaks on Netflix / 1 pm Farmers market!

2 pm back home with goodies for dinner and a DIY!

3-5 pm working away on a DIY (NO SPOILERS!!)

6 pm a little light reading (okay mostly just looking at the pictures, hah)

7 pm the most delicious of assembly lines

8 pm dinner time!

The rest of the evening was spent painting my nails and further developing my new found Twin Peaks obsessions. Ephraim and I are watching along together at a distance, and we're both equally enthused by how bizarre the show is.

Anyhow, this weekend was supposed to be spent at a cottage up north, but our plans fell through due to some work things. We tried to squeeze as much out of the long weekend as possible, with a trip for Indian food, going to see Total Recall (still can't believe Eph just saw the original. I mean, come on. "Get your ass to Mars!! or I guess "Get chyohr aaahss to Maaahhs!!" Oh Arnie. We also took a trip out to the butterfly conservatory today, but considering the epic amount of photos I took, that deserves its own separate post.

Oh, and not a single butterfly wanted to be my butter-friend.

Not.

One.

--Erin

7 Books That Shaped Me

Hi all,

I wanted to take a moment today to write about some of the books that I feel have helped shape me as a person. Whether they reflected something in my life, or steered me toward a new hobby, these books stand out to me out of all the books on my shelf as the ones that are so me.

I was inspired to write this post by Becky Bedbug's "Books The Shaped Me", which was in turn inspired by a recurring feature in Elle UK, 7 books that shaped me.  I tried to par it down to 5 like Becky, but I felt like I was being too exclusive, so I'm going to go with the original 7.

Because I am inclusive.

And not at all indecisive.

My Weekend in Retro Specs v.3

Hello and happy Monday! 

I had quite an eventful couple of days, which is why I slacked so hard on responding to comments (all caught up now!), reading blogs, and all that good stuff.  This was a weekend of determination and celebration, people! 

I apologize in advance for the text heavy nature of this post. I left my nice camera at home and took it all in in the moment this weekend (okay and some iPhone snaps too!)

I headed into Toronto this weekend, as my very dear childhood best friend had her bachelorette party.  I can't state enough how totally wigged out I was over this, and really, still am.  The girl I was sewn-at-the-hip to for seven years is getting hitched.  It blows my mind.  It blows my mind even more since we haven't managed to get face to face for like... six years...

I was so incredibly happy to be invited along to celebrate, because man, what an incredible milestone, and what an incredible lady she's become.  We're lucky in that though we haven't lived close enough together to manage to see each other on the regular in years (especially through university and doubly so now), I find it just as easy to talk to her as it was when we were 11 years old being major dorks together.  I'm so glad she's got a major-dork dude to nerd out with for the rest of their lives :). I actually got their wedding invitation in the mail today, and damn if that sucker doesn't have a TARDIS on it.  Nerd love, guys.  It's the best kind.

Since I knew that the bachelorette party would involve a big commute, I didn't fill the rest of the day with many social engagements (well, the whole weekend was pretty quiet socially, actually!). I managed to have some tea with my Mum, and check out a vintage/second hand shop that recently opened in the neighbourhood, where we both found some treasures.  If you're in Toronto, check out Gypsy on St.Clair west, it's a total goldmine and it's reasonably priced too! The weekend contained a lot of shopping actually, as I have a function on Wednesday that I had to purchase a special outfit for.  You can expect a write up and photographic evidence later this week! 

Vintage finds from the St. Lawrence Market

Sunday included a greasy spoon brekkie with my Dad, step-mom, brother and sister, a trip to the Art Gallery of Ontario (aka the AGO), some vintage shopping, and finally getting to see The Amazing Spider-Man.  Not too shabby! We went to the AGO specifically for the Picasso exhibit, whom I had quite the obsession with as a child.  Yesterday really reaffirmed for me that his cubist period is totally my favourite! There were so many inspiring pieces, and seeing them all with a non-artist was so fun; Ephraim claims that my insights into his work really affected how he viewed the exhibit.  Is there anything better to hear than that?  We spent the whole day downtown, with a brief stop at the St.Lawrence Antique Market, where I wasted no time in buying a scarab beetle ring, new vintage shades, and a gift for my Mum (haha you'll have to wait till December! Cruel, I know!).  Neither of us were particularly enthused with Spider-Man, but it had to be seen.  While Batman is my superhero (err hero-philanthropist?), Spiderman is Ephraim's, so it really wasn't a film we could miss.  And I do like me some Emma Stone. 

How were your weekends? Did any of you get to celebrate a milestone in a loved ones life, or have the opportunity to learn more about a hero of yours? Or, you know, just veg out and watch too much Buffy the Vampire Slayer? Yeah, weekends are the best!  

--Erin