Planets

Next I decided to go on to researching planets and then just to start with have a go at cutting out some circular shaped planets out of card or paper and then experiment with some acrylic paint and try to create some nice effects or textures. 

These planets were not based on any real planets they were just experiments. 

Some of these were cut out of card, some were also cut out from my last two pieces from before so they took on their own style and compositions. The black planet I had cut out of black card and actually painted myself using a cleaning brush and wiping the paint around the edges.

These were the next set and the planet in the top right was done using a marble effect which was done by adding water to the paint and then pouring it on all at once and then left to dry. The paint then blends together leaving a marble effect.

I decided to make more planets and instead of just using card i decided to use cardboard. So i cut out three separate circles and then coated two of them with emulsion and one with black acrylic paint. Once they were dry i then wanted to try spinning them to create a swirly pattern, so for this i would have to find a quick way of doing that. I did find a banding wheel which is used in ceramics and allows you to put your piece of clay onto it and then you can have a 360 degree spin on it. 

I then attached my planet shaped pieces of cardboard to the wheel using white-tack and then i got a selection of acrylic paints. I then spun the wheel as fast as i could to really get it spinning, however it did slow down quickly and it was hard to paint onto it while it was still spinning. Also, i realized that the spinning wasn't constant enough. I thought about asking a classmate to spin it for me whilst i paint onto it. Another problem i came across was that the acrylic paint was not liquid enough to spread across the surface of the cardboard so i had to find something that would spread a little better. Finally i decided to use indian ink which was better.

These are the end results:

I believe that the one with the ink worked best, however all three are quite different.

Once i had finished i then thought that it could be really good to use this idea and then look at Damien Hirsts' spin paintings and combine my initial ideas with spin painting. Maybe I can look into this idea and see how Damien Hirst does them.


I decided to continue my research on planets and i wanted to have a go at making some models. I thought about materials and my idea was to try using some gum tape. Gum tape is sticky on one side and smooth on the other, it's a bit thicker than masking tape.

I found a mould from ceramics that would give me a planet shape. However i will have to make it in two halves.




 






The first step was to rip the tape into small strips and then get myself a pot of water so that i can then dip the tape into the water and soak the tape. This then will allow me to stick it to the mould, i also made sure that the shiny side of the tape was facing the inside so that when it's finished i will have the smooth side showing.

I would repeat this method until it becomes strong, you have to make sure you do enough layers so it does not fall apart. I then did the other half.

This is what it looks like after 2 or 3 layers I will now leave it to dry and then try and paint it.

Now i have my two halves and now I can paint them and put them together in some way.

Here i'm just making sure that they do fit together, all i have to do now is paint them, I can try acrylics, batik dyes or even watercolours.

While the models were drying I decided to take the planets into a different direction by experimenting with fabric and batik dyes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I have my piece of fabric where as you can see i have drawn my planet shape on by drawing around a plate.



 

 

 

This is the next stage, I painted around the planet using black acrylic paint and being very careful around the edge of the circle because i'm leaving it for the batik dyes.

The black background represents space.

Next i'm going to fill it in.

 

 

This is the last stage. I used orange, yellow, crimson coloured dyes and splashed them all on at the same time so that they would blend together. I found that it turned out really well so afterwards I heated up some liquid wax and poured and dripped on the wax. I left it to cool and then later I could melt off the wax by ironing it out. The wax will then leave white areas where i have poured it on. I'm really pleased with it and I only wish I had more time to make more of them.



I'm now going back to my model planets and now i'm going to try and paint them using the wheel in ceramics, ive decided to stick with the spin art technique because it has worked really well.



 

Here it is on the wheel, now i have had to keep the planet in place on the wheel so it didn't fall off while it was spinning with a cylinder tube and kept that in place with some small soft pieces of clay. Again I have chosen to use the poster paints which do spread really well. The planet I was try to make was the sun. So I chose yellow and brown coloured paint. I used the slip trailers to sqiurt the paint onto it while it's spinning. I did one side and then blasted it with a hair dryer to dry it quickly and the n flipped it over to paint the other side.





 

 

This is the end result and a close up of the inside. The problem i came across was that all the paint floods to the middle and just creates a huge mess inside so it is no good and I will not be making anymore. I will stick to two dimensional planets, they work better.