Planet Ruby Starrs

Its the last days of snowdog crowdfunding appeal https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/ruby-starrs-1   and unless no one wants poor old Wor Geordie we ain't going to be able to bid.. a tad disappointing but we would like to thank all the many friends, family and all the people we don't know and the anonymous persons (I expect you know who you are) for the generous donations they have made and we are able to give around £300 to St Oswalds Hospice. While I knew I was being extremely optimistic hoping to raise the money, I stick with my motto nothing ventured nothing gained.  As a group we are proud to be able to make the donation to the Hospice and have loved every bit of being involved with the Wild in Art Project - from designing to painting and even visiting Wor Geordie on the street... The auction is on Tuesday next week and I will post the results, fingers crossed for generous bids for our lovely Snowdog.

I had an extremely productive but in places frustrating couple of days at college last week - in fact I would go so far to say that in spite of a near Photoshop total meltdown over prepping my screen print (dealt with and survived!!) layers it was probably the most enjoyable couple of days I've had since I started back this term... This is because it involved drawing, mixing paint, playing on the light box, getting hands on stuff done, heat pressing, getting painty, looking at colours, more glorious laser cutting and everyone in the studio seemed on good form - and that's even on a hand in day!  I eventually settled on a finished design to work on, a rather wild and busy complicated piece using three different layers of totally unrelated drawings from my summer sketch book.  Each drawing has been further embellished and tidied up and then combined together both by hand and on photoshop... the problems started when I had to scan the images in to make screen positives and th

Another incredible busy day at college, its non stop and the day flies by.  Today we were preparing drawings for three way colour screen printing next week.  I had a slightly unsuccessful attempt at this last week - just need practice, I haven't done any screen printing since this time last year so I'm really looking forward to it. I spent a lovely hour mixing paints to go with my colour palate - its joyful to play with so much colour and its gloriously messy too ! I only mixed three colours for starters - I worked hard to avoid falling into the orange I always use 'trap'  ha ha - but my  yellow is looking a bit sunshiney - it may need damping down a bit I'll look at it in day light tomorrow.  I've picked lovely dynamic but slightly dirty colours this time.  They looked so lovely as I was mixing them, its a shame they cant be used like that.   they came out quite a bit darker not no less vibrant.  There is something really satisfying about the process of fin

I feel like I've turned the corner with CAD..at last... It doesn't come naturally and like everything else it needs practice and patience neither of which I have had in any generous measure to date, but I will not admit defeat and finally think I'm getting somewhere.  I've had a lot of help from fellow students (infinite patience) and now the pressure is off i.e. I don't have work to hand in that relies on the process, I have a more relaxed attitude to learning the actual programme and it is starting to sink in.  I was very excited last week to spend the whole day (completely of my own violation!) playing with Adobe Illustrator - doing extremely basic and simple things but keeping doing them until they felt 'natural' and easy and extremely basic and simple... now time to move onto something harder!!! I find Youtube tutorials very varied but on the whole useful, easier in the long run then being in a noisy crowded CAD suite with too many people asking too man

I know there is a rumour that if you start Christmas too early Elves strangle baby reindeers or angels wing drop off but hopefully that's all rubbish as sadly I think that Christmas may have just about started and it's only halfway through November!!! I am trying to get into the festive spirit and believe me I'm doing better then Dr Fred!!! Today the glorious scent of Christmas filled the house as having soaked the dried fruit for a week in a lethal cocktail of rum, brandy, port and more... I made my Christmas cakes using the time tested and honoured Delia Creole cake recipe.  I've tried various different fruit cake recipes over the years but nothing comes close to the Creole one. Its only drawback is as Delia states, is it's too rich to be iced and requires a glazed fruit and nut topping which personally I prefer but Dr Fred misses the marzipan and icing so I'll prob do Delias simpler ordinary cake as well. But, what really made it feel like Christmas wa

Totally totally torn between which colour palette to use with my next piece of work... love this collection..... page from my sketch book but love this one as well.... page from my sketch book both very pink - I'm trying to keep away from the more natural orange / blue colours I usually go for, but it's autumn and hard to get away from those beautiful combinations!!! I've been looking at old photos and reminiscing about past travel and feel like I could gather some stunning colour inspiration from India ....... but just cant decide.

The American presidential election result defies comment... so I'm not wasting time making any - instead I'm getting on with what interests me and currently directly affects me - I'm not so naive to imagine that decisions made in the scary world several thousand miles away wont impact on my life but for now I'm concerning myself with the fact that I've made it through rush hour traffic to college and no one else is here - ha ha do they know something I don't? We get our 'skills for making' brief today - this should be a welcome change from all the computer based work which we have been so tied up with over the last few weeks, I'm looking forward to it. tall ships Last week we selected some drawings to be working from, currently I've chosen some line work of bridges and Amble Pier but I may change my mind when I get actual brief. Fellow students finally turned up and its hands on for the next project.. watch this space!

I've had a bonfire halloween week, we had a brilliant firework display courtesy of a Newcastle friend - on the beach on Druridge Bay, BBQ, bonfire and the best fireworks and pyromania I've witnessed at a private event. It was cold and windy and I have to say I was a wimp, I didn't venture down much before the fireworks and then came back home to  fire pretty much straight away!! Dr Fred helped set up and clear away but I'm very pleased I managed to get it together and brave the beach for the main event. I was in a very excited mood having just - finally - booked our flights for our intended adventure next year. Its official at last, we fly into Vancouver mid July and out again when we have trawled around the Rockies, across into the US of A done a few more rocks, national parks and enjoyed the 2016 total Eclipse of the sun visible from somewhere down that way...  we don't plan too much as it's more fun to see where the road takes us. Needless to say I'm ve

The dreaded computer modules at college are drawing to a close... or at least I have nearly completed the work!!! I have worked madly this week figuring the work has to be done what ever so just best to get it out of the way. It's not all been trials though - some of it has been fun and I have almost finished my Creative CV - it just need a little bit of knitting to tidy it up.  I pleased with how it works - bearing in mind I think CV's have to tailored to individual job applications and I haven't actually got a job in sight!!!  I've made a Flexigram - a kind of folding thingy which twists eternally and lets you see different bits with each turn.  It's hard to illustrate on here and the photos don't really do it justice but it has worked quite well and showcases my wonderful Ruby Starrs CV and some samples of my work techniques I've also got my business cards, postcards and stickers back and I'm quite pleased with them... the colours are