DIY Paintings (without any paint!)

Last week in your Friday Phil, I outlined some strategy to picking artwork from my in-laws, with the caveat that we had never really put it to the test. The reason was, for most of the significant pieces of art we've acquired, we made it ourselves. I promised then to let you in on our secret of how we do that.

Now, let's be clear: I love colour and art, but am by no means an expert on painting or photography. I've heard the names Ansel Adams and Annie Liebovitz. I could recognize Whistler's Mother and that one with the melted clocks by Salvador Dali. But I am by no means an art critic or could even consider myself an aficionado.

(Side note: have painters ever considered doing mash-ups like musicians sometimes do? If so, how do we not have the "Screaming Mona" or "An American Gothic in Paris"? Well, we do now! And somewhere an art historian is convulsing uncontrollably.)

Are these the only painting inspired by Linkin Park and Jay-Z's Collision Course mashup album? If so, you're welcome, art world!

But I love colour, I love art in so many forms, and I love being creative, and here's a few ways you can achieve interesting results that fit your space without breaking the bank.

Idea #1: Actually get good at painting

Watch a lot of Bob Ross. Practice with The Joy of Painting (maybe even buy the 10-DVD set!). Buy canvasses in bulk to save on per-unit costs and practice your happy little trees. (Bonus points if you get into it and grow a majestic afro.) As a result, you'll have gained a really cool new skill AND you'll have made a new friend, may he rest in peace.

Idea #2: Find somebody who's cheap and good

Commission a painting from a struggling artist or a friend who dabbles. This way allows you less control over the creative process, so make sure you have a solid discussion at the outset in which you lay out your requirements. The result is a little less DIY, but you'll get a real original piece of art and have supported the local economy and/or a friend in need.

Idea #3: Photoshop 'til you drop

The following is the strategy we promised, which we've used twice to results we're very happy with:

Step 1: Go through your art store and find an theme you like. Maybe it's a picture of a carousel, maybe it's a famous landmark in your hometown, or maybe it's morning light filtering through a hazy forest glen. 

Step 2: Search the Stock.Xchng or EveryStockPhoto for a free or cheap stock photo that suits the theme you're looking for. Pay close attention to your rights as a user of the photo, particularly if you are considering selling your work.

(Alternative to Step 1 and 2: Skip this whole bit and find a photo you've taken in the past that you love.)

Step 3: This step requires Photoshop or a comparable product, which could easily be the most expensive part of the whole process if you need to buy it. (I've seen great results for free out of GIMP, but have never used it myself.)  

Import the photo, resizing it so it's at least 300dpi and the dimensions you want for your final piece. Then, save this as a separate file to preserve your original in its pristine, untouched state. (Why do I recommend this so strongly? I couldn't provide you with the step by step instructions of what I did both times we used this process because I didn't follow this advice myself.)

Step 4: Copy the base layer and start experimenting! 
Want a painted look? Try working with the Watercolor and/or Paint Daubs. 
Want an ink drawing? There's a filter for that too.
Want to keep the photographic look, but isolate a specific colour? Photoshop's Magic Wand or Magnetic Lasso Tools are great for that. Or (spoiler alert) do what we did in the bedroom, and take a black and white photo and add colours to it that suit your room!
Be warned though; most filters don't immediately produce distinctive, original results; experiment with different foreground and background colours until you get results you like.

If you're really brave, create a new layer above your artwork, select an appropriately sized/shaped brush, and try to recreate the photo. It's a little like Paint By Numbers meets The Internet. (If you try this, I recommend creating a new layer for every colour you use.)

Step 5: Once you're happy with the look, find someone who will print "photos" on gallery-wrapped or framed canvas. Groupon used to sell coupons for a bunch of these kind of printers, but for our money, we always used Costco Photo because they were very competitively priced, offer a 36"x24" size that we wanted (most don't go that big), and we can pick it up at our local store 10 minutes away.

Show and Tell

Now, this is useless unless we show you what we did. Unfortunately we don't have the original photos we used, nor a snapshot of the "paintings" in progress; at the same time, the process of experimenting with what looks good doesn't always yield linear progress conducive to step-by-step instructions. That said, here are the final products"

Our first fake-painting using this method.

For the first piece, we were inspired by the aforementioned idea of dark tree trunks in a vivid forest. I was hoping for more of a Monet-ish painted look (i.e. a natural landscape or image but not aiming for photographic realism) so I used the Paint Daubs filter a bit, and because we wanted it to fit in our living room, I worked in the espresso browns of our living room furniture as well as the blue of our condo's living room's feature wall (now the darker blue in our office). The result hung in our dining room at our condo; we haven't decided where it'll end up in Grandpa Joe's House.

Our second, calmer fake-painting. (Actually, more of a faux-tograph perhaps?)

The second piece we did we wanted to have a more calming influence. Inspired by a photo of the aforementioned forest glen, we filtered the photo (that was originally black and white) less heavily. I added in extra mist, but apart from that, the most I did to adjust the photo was add some blurring (as much to hide pixellation of a smaller photo as anything) and added the colour to the grass and tree. The finished result will hung over the espresso fireplace in our bedroom in the condo, and when we picture that in our house, we still like that idea.

One Way to take it to a whole. 'Nother. Level.

As a final note, if there's something a gallery-wrapped canvas print lacks, it's--no, not a soul, although some "real artists" might argue that point (and who am I to refute them?). It's texture. But I saw a Thomas Kinkade 60 Minutes feature (that you can watch online) once that showed the Painter of Light in a whole new, well, light. His was a very commercial enterprise that offended many art critics who felt that art should be about creativity, not formulaic cash cow exploitation, while Kinkade's defenders used a variation of the "subjective nature of taste" argument to justify the value of his endlessly-reproduced work; I'll let you decide where you stand on that.

But one thing I saw that I've been reminded of recently is that he had a crew of people who would take prints of his work and add spots of real paint to various sections (maybe highlight the snowcapped trees with some real white paint) to add texture and increase the value of the works when sold.

Thinking about it now, why couldn't I do that to some of the prints I've made? Not to add to their monetary value per se, but to add texture and make it feel more "real." I could match some real paints to the colours in the print, grab a brush, and spread it on thick. I've stocked that idea away for a rainy day, but we'll be sure to let you know how it goes, for better or for disastrously worse!

How about you? Have you created a painting for your home and get any interesting (perhaps even Pinteresting) results?

What We Want for Christmas

This past week, we asked what you wanted for Christmas. A majority actually wanted practical things, which is surprising, and certainly is not how Philip makes his Christmas list most of the time. I do like things of a more practical nature, but prefer if they're things I may not have bought myself or didn't want to spend the money on.

This Christmas, we're definitely hoping for some practical items as we've been dropping a lot of money lately and every little thing helps! Some tools for Philip would be great as we've been borrowing a lot of them from our parents, and any decor items are top on my list so we can keep accessorizing this place!

Now, on to our Christmas lists! 

Cassondra 3 Christmas Wishes

I have a lot of trouble making Christmas lists, my mom never bought us things off of them so putting things on a list was basically asking to not get those things. She always gets us amazing gifts, just thinks of them herself. So from there stems my aversion to Christmas list making. I did make a list this year, but I can't even think of how to rank them. 

1. Personalized Artwork

One of the projects I'm really excited about in this house is getting more personalized artwork up, I really want our house to be ours and show all the things we love. Philip is handy at computer artwork and things like that, so we'll probably end up making a lot of our own, but here are some artwork pieces that have really been inspiring me lately!

Jenna Sue Design will create a custom sketch of your house! 

This personalized love art totally floats my boat, from Silhouette Blue. 

2. Raclette

At Philip's parents house on New Years Day we always have Raclette. It's a great tradition and I love that kind of eating, where you sit around talking eating a bit at a time, sort of like fondue. I'm hoping to get my own someday soon so we can invite friends over and enjoy that tradition on more than the first day of the 2013. 

You melt cheese on the bottom and then put it over the grilled potatoes, meat, etc. 

3. Tickets to Something/Going Out Gifts

Since working on the house has taken up a lot of our extra cash, one of the gifts that I appreciate is restaurant gift cards, tickets to an event, etc. that Philip and I can enjoy without worrying about our wallets. We've definitely been low on date nights and so a night out is always a great treat.

 

Philip's 3 Christmas Wishes

In our relationship, Cassondra is definitely the Chief Listmaker. Her lists have lists. (“The 5 Lists in my Purse Right Now.” “The 8 Best Things About Lists.” “212 Ways I will get revenge on Philip for making fun of my love of lists on the blog.”) But at Christmastime, I take the lead.

In my family, my Christmas List is an annual event. I typically put an inordinate amount of time into them, cataloguing items by category, listing prices and places where you can purchase the items, and even theming the lists. (Most memorable was the Da Vinci Code-themed list from 2007.) I go beyond the typical list and research, catalogue, curate, and publish a veritable Christmas buying guide for me.

And then, this year, I scaled back. There are categories, but it’s all straightforward. There are no prices. No Amazon links. Just the basics. I grew up found a new passion, my very own castle to manage, repair, and upgrade.

But that doesn’t mean I didn’t submit a list. Oh no. Can’t leave something as important as my Christmas gifts up to chance. So without further ado, these are the top 3 things I asked for, in countdown fashion:

3. Sunglasses

If you’ve ever met me in the summertime, you’ve seen my sunglasses. Winnipeg is one of the sunniest cities in Canada, and for whatever reason (perhaps the Lasik I had done a few years ago?) my eyes are particularly sensitive, so I wear my sunglasses almost incessantly; if they’re not over my eyes, they’re temporarily flipped atop my head like a real cool dude poser dork (hahahaha! Revenge #1 complete. –Cass)

Problem is, the lenses on my Oakley Fives 2.0 that I Love with a capital “L” are scratched like crazy, and that model has long been discontinued. It soon will be time to send them up to the great, ummm, underside-of-a-ball-cap-visor (?) in the sky. And so as a pre-emptive strike, I’m hoping for some new shades under the tree.

2. Blue Like Jazz: The RELEVANT Special Edition on DVD

Blue Like Jazz is probably my second-favourite non-fiction book of all time. (I may have a list for that too.) And I knew author Donald Miller and Steve Taylor were working on a movie of it thanks to Miller’s excellent follow up book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years (which may also be in my non-fiction top ten).

But then, the funding didn’t come through. And the film was dead.

Except it wasn’t. Thanks to two enterprising fans and Kickstarter, the movie crowdsourced over a third of a million dollars, and I was one of the contributors to that effort who thus have their names among the credits as “Associate Producers.” (I have the t-shirt to prove it.)

Only problem is, Blue Like Jazz (The Movie) never opened in theatres in my city. And so I still haven’t been able to see the movie.

And to top it all off, my favourite magazine (RELEVANT) helped promote the movie, and as such has a special edition of the movie for sale in its store with exclusive features which may or may not have Donald Miller reading snippets of Christian romance novels aloud while wearing a snuggie.

And now that you know that Movies+Donald Miller+RELEVANT Magazine=my sweet spot, and it could only be theoretically topped if the movie starred my wife and/or the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, what could possibly be #1?

1. Tools

This one’s for you, folks. Well, technically it’s for me. But as this blog has become our way of sharing this renovation process with you, it’s also for you.

So far, most of the work that we’ve done has been done with the use of the graciously-lent-and-gratefully-borrowed tools our parents or friends own. And while that can work for a while, there comes a time for a man to step up and get his own power drill and drill bits, 7¼” circular saw, random orbital sander, electronic stud finder, staple gun, and more.

This is in direct violation of my one-time distaste for practical gifts. As recently as a year or two ago, I rejected the idea of getting such items as gifts. Practical gifts didn’t send me giggling with fits of glee because I was going to have to buy them myself anyway, so unwrapping them was just preventing me from having to go to the store myself.

In fact, I still see some of the logic in that. However, something has changed.

It’s called a mortgage. They’re called bills. They’re called “not having unlimited resources with which to buy everything you might purport to need.”

So now, I’m all on the practical gift train. Tools? Yes, please! Clothes? I’ll wear ‘em with a smile! A 4-litre jug of milk? Sure, why not, I’ll pour that on my cereal. Rolls of toilet paper? Okay, let’s not get ridiculous. But you get my drift. I’m hoping that, over the next few birthdays/Christmases, I can accumulate my own personal arsenal of tools and the skills to put them to use, making Grandpa Joe’s House into everything it can be.

Share your Christmas wishlist in the comments! We'd love to get some inspiration for the birthday lists we'll soon have to make (okay not that soon). 

This week we'll ask about your favourite holiday food, you know our mouths are watering already waiting for some of the delicacies we're going to feast on. 

The Art of Selecting, well, uh.. Art

For this week's Friday Phil, I want to talk about selecting artwork. Now, we're no experts on the matter; I'm not sure we've ever actually selected any artwork per se, which is why I want to talk about it.

See, my inlaws have a theory about this, and if they actually use it, it's worked for them. My father-in-law explains it something like this (not exact quotes): 

The thing you can't do is say "I like this," or "I don't like this." You need to say "This inspires me," or "This doesn't inspire me."

Well, you might say, isn't this just replacing one word, namely "like," with another, "inspire." And you're mostly right. But as far as I can tell, the primary difference is this:

Art is so subjective that what one person likes relative to another is often so inconsistent as to appear random. When we say "I like this," or "I don't like this," we pronounce personal judgment on a piece of art that, if your partner has an opposite opinion, represents your active disagreement.

However, if we put the responsibility on the piece of art to inspire us, then whether it does for one person or not is not their fault. If the Mona Lisa doesn't inspire me, my wife can't say "Oh, he's just disagreeable," she'll just have to blame ol' Mona's half-smile or Da Vinci's forgetting the eyebrows.

Or you can blame Dan Brown.
It's your call, really.

Now, that sounds like high-falutin' psychology. Truth be told, we have only halfheartedly tried to test this strategy in the past. I have to admit, the subtle distinction between liking and being inspired by art makes it seem almost laughable to put it into practice. That said, we haven't exactly been loading up on the art using our own methods. Maybe if we did put the theory to work, we'd be walking out of galleries and decor stores with so many paintings under our arms, you'd think we were auditioning for a part in Ocean's Twelve.
 
No, so far our strategy for selecting art and decor (primarily decor to this point) has been less evolved. To illustrate, we're going to do some mad-libbing, so need you to pick:

• a type of material (wood, stone, fabric, etc.)
• the name of an animal or religious figure (I guess in the case of the ancient Egyptians, this could be both)
• a verb meaning "love" or a word meaning "hate"
• an actor from the 1992 film Glengarry Glen Ross (or the original 1983 Broadway stage production, if you have to be different)
• a facial feature
  

Got yours all written down? Don't peek down before you have!

Good. So our strategy for selecting decor goes something like this:
 
Cass says "How about this [material] [animal/religious figure]?"
I say "I [verb for love or hate] it. Doesn't it look a little like [Glengarry actor]'s [facial feature]?"

 
I would say our method inverts the old 18th-century marriage proposal system, where "man has the advantage of choice, woman only the power of refusal," but this blog relies on Friday posts to bring the testosterone, and quoting Jane Austen doesn't exactly fit that bill.

Quick, gotta recapture the male audience's attention. Ummm, okay:
"Yo dudes, who's hotter, Jane Austen (above) or Mona Lisa?"
Okay, yeah, never mind.

I digress.
 
One thing that shopping for art has done is helped me realize how difficult it is to find art that both of us like that compliments the furniture and decor we already own. So my solution on a pair of occasions has been as DIY of me as I get: I make my own art (sort of).
 
Next Friday I'll share with you how I do it, but suffice it to say, if you've got Photoshop and a bit of a printing budget, you can make beautiful canvasses that you, your significant other, and your space will love.  

With or without eyebrows.  
 
Until then, do you guys have any strategies for selecting art and decor? How did your mad lib turn out? (Mine: Cass says "How about this Mahogany Platypus?" I say "I canonize it! Doesn't it look a little like Alan Arkin's jowls?")

In case you thought, hey, I'd buy a mahogany platypus.
Note: They're not mahogany, nor do they look much like George Aaronow, in case that impacts your buying decision. That said, they don't NOT look like Alan Arkin...

The Original Pinterest

In the words of Arthur the aardvark, having fun isn't hard when you've got a library card!

Last Friday I took a trip to the public library and found a treasure trove of DIY resources. Some of the books I took out even had pictures I've seen on Pinterest since. There's something wonderful about flipping pages in a book and marking them with a good old fashioned Post-It note (or--not that I've ever done this to a library book--a folded page corner). Here are some of my favourite finds after just reviewing two books. I'm definitely going to go back!

Better Homes & Gardens 501 Decorating Ideas Under $100 

Ceiling Medallion Wall Art
I saved this first one because I originally saw it on Pinterest a few weeks back, and remembered it. Such a clever use of a typical item that isn't that pricey, it would definitely add some visual interest to a wall.

Chalkboard Paint

If there is one major trend on Pinterest it has to be chalkboard paint.

I loved the idea of a dresser painted with chalkboard paint in order to label drawer contents. Perhaps for a playroom or craft room?

Another chalkboard paint use that I'm definitely going to try someday is painting the top of a table as a games table or for a kids colouring/craft area.

Canadian Living's Create, Update, Remake

Floor Cushion

Making some hassock pillows for the floor in my living room is an idea I love. We could use them for when we have big groups over or for watching movies. 

Knit Bolster Pillow

I'm dying to make a knit pillow of some kind, this one especially tickles my fancy and includes a pattern!

Anyone else rediscovered the library lately? I'll leave you with this, I don't know how I remember this song so vividly but it was from an amazing musical episode of Arthur forever burned into my memory. Easily the best animated hip-hop video about the merits of library card ownership.