Pages

Tuesday, January 26, 2016

ARTFUL JOURNEYS - New Weekly Feature!

Starting today, Tuesday January 26, 2016, we're going to add in a new feature to your journaling activities. One in which you can use repeatedly in your journals!


INTRODUCING TANGLE TUESDAY!


Each Tuesday, we are going to submit a new tangle or official Zentangle (c) design for you to learn. We will start with some easy, basic designs to get you warmed up and progress to more complicated designs.

Zentangle designs are the "official" patterns developed for Zentangle and the term "zentangle" is a registered trademark.  Tangles, Dangles or other such generic derivatives loosely apply to doodles in general. 

Official Zentangle patterns are generally worked in black ink only. It is recommended you use a permanent ink  (see below for recommendations) in the event  you want to colorize in a variety of methods later.  Zentangles are traditionally practiced on 3.5" x 3.5" tiles (you can cut cardstock, Bristol, watercolor paper, etc) to size, use gridded or plain index cards, draw out in your journal or on a practice page or you can purchase these official tiles directly from Zentangle.  You really don't need any special "stuff" other than a good, permanent ink.

We do not intend to reinvent the wheel, and will be using links to Linda Farmer's TanglePatterns.com site because, primarily, the directions are clear, concise and easy to follow and her site is an excellent reference tool.  Linda is a certified Zentangle Teacher (CZT) -- yes, you have to be "certified" to teach these designs officially.  We're not teaching them. We are leading you to the water in hopes that you drink, and we can all learn something new to add to our artistic repetoire each week!  I will be learning right along with you.


Recommended Pens:  

  • Sakura Micron Pens.  You will ultimately want assorted pen widths, but an .05 is a good mid-range pen to start.  Perhaps select another that is extra fine, like a .01. 
  • Sakura Gelly Pen, in black.  This pen has a fine point, and works excellently.
  • Faber-Castell Pitt Artist Pens - Fine and XS are good choices
  • Signo Uniball Pen - micro and bold tips both work well
  • For practice work, you may also want a RED pen.  I use a Sakura Gelly pen.  Your choice.
You can use whatever you want, of course, but I know that these pens will not bleed if you are practicing on thin paper (I do practice squares in my Miguel Ruiz planner, which has very thin paper and is gridded (also helpful).  You could purchase some gridded index cards and practice on those, or just draw out the practice grids into your journal like I did.  I am accumulating quite a collection of separate tiles that I am going to ring bind for future reference as a permanent kind of thing. That's a project for later.  For now, my tiles are living in a recipe box.

When I do a design the first time, as I am prone to mistakes, I use a pencil in lieu of pen for my learning squares for the "black" ink.  I make the second and subsequent strokes with red pen, but you could use a red pencil.  By using two colors, you can see how each Zentangle is formed, step by step.  When I get to the final square, I work the whole pattern in ink, following along the instructions that I have just practiced.  Here's one I did last week in my planner:



There are a number of errors on this.  First, I got the tiles out of order. I didn't do an "inked" final, just the variation in ink.  As  you can see, I did all the study in pencil and ink until the last square. I had many erasures on this tile because I joined the "leaves" (for lack of a better term). I corrected my error and just numbered the tiles for future reference. 

Generally, you can set up a practice grid that consists of 6 individual squares. Each of these squares is 6x6 grid squares, inside a 3.5" x 3.5" "tile". 

Without further adieu, here is this week's pattern.  It's called 4 Corners and was designed by Barbara Finwall.   You can visit the site and read all about it HERE.




Isn't the full Zentangle with variations of this pattern totally awesome?

Please familiarize yourself with Linda's site for all her helpful tips and suggestions.  Start HERE

I'm excited to share this fun and versatile technique with you all each week, and as I said, I will be learning these patterns right along with you each week!

As always, keep your world artful.

ARTFUL CHICKS
~~Betty aka Arty Auntie


1 comment:

Your comment will appear shortly. Thank you!