The thread-sketched portrait of Casper is finished and has been shipped to my customer, Maureen. I didn’t finish the edges, because Maureen is going to incorporate Casper’s portrait into a pillow for her granddaughter.
When I last posted about this portrait, the thread-sketching was almost complete. Last week, I finished thread-sketching the chest area, added some details around the eyes and ears, and added a chin line and a few white whiskers.
As I was stitching, I pulled my threads to the back and left tails of about 1″, but I didn’t tie them off. When I was finished all the thread-sketching, I fused a layer of Presto Sheer stabilizer to the back. It’s a very light-weight stabilizer and anchors all the threads, and adds just a bit of stability to the hand of the fabric. You can see in the above photo what the back looked like before I fused the stabilizer.
Below are two photos of the finished portrait, in different lighting conditions. You can see the thread-sketching better in the first one.
By the way, most of my portrait quilts are fused applique, with some stitching or thread-sketching. But for this portrait of Casper, I printed a photo on fabric, then added the thread-sketching. Because the thread-sketching is on a photo printed on fabric, the photo shows through. The thread adds more color, and texture. While it’s important to use the correct value (light, medium, dark), it’s more important to stitch in the right direction to simulate the fur.
As long as you have a good photo as a base, this process is certainly quicker than creating a portrait from scratch with fused fabrics.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other creative and inspirational projects.
Looks Great Terry, I would have thought thread sketching would be very time consuming. How big is this portrait and do you have any idea how long you spent on it?
Awesome!
I so much appreciate you sharing something that was not immediately successful and why–and the fact that you are putting it away for a while. That is SO MUCH MORE HELPFUL than reading about (other bloggers’) success after success. It makes me feel better about my own nearly-constant lack of initial success and encourages me to persevere. Thank you.