Steam Powered Dragonfly!

[mezcraft]

For Hoopla Swap  I made a "Libellulah Vis Fumo" which is kind of my very loosely translated latin meaning "Steam Powered Dragonfly". With the design I was trying to make it look like one of those old fashioned pictures with the butterfly displayed with pins on a board. (apparently this is called a vintage specimen) I drew it out kind of big and had to keep shrinking it down, and that is why I ended up doing such a big hoop (10") because any smaller and a lot of the tiny details might get lost.  I ended up taking a lot of the details out of the original drawing because I was crazy when I drew it that detailed.  crazy...  


see? crazy...


This was the first time I had employed the long and short satin stitch which sometimes worked well and then in some tighter spots my stitching got all fudgy, but I did feel I got better as I went.  

I did run into a problem though. I started the design with the some vintage thread I found at a thrift store. Not even really thinking I was going to do very much with it, then I found I really needed to more! So there is a lot variation of the colours which ended up being interesting but I will really have to think that out more next time!



I realized that in order for the "gossamer clockwerk" wing to look lowered and more detailed, I had to use a single strand of thread, to do all of the gears.  Although this worked it also was much less forgiving so some of my "round" gears look less than round, but this was a wonky dragonfly anyway!


I did have a lot of fun with it.  And I may try it again for myself because I really liked it!
Comments and Crits welcome!

[MissThing]

That is amazing i absolutely love it Dragonflys are my favourite motif
 both the design and the stitching is brilliant i am very jealouse lol

[lacetron]

Wow! 
It looks like you put a lot of thought into it and it came out great! Well done, it's beautiful

[crendon]

So pretty...well done!

[kalan71]

 love love it, it looks so professional, 

[RaeRaggs]

Great design. I really like this.  A dragonfly is a great object to steampunkify. 

[LimeRiot]

This is stunning!! You did a spectacular job.

[DawnsTrees]

This is gorgeous! Love the drawing of it as well - you should frame that too!
(btw - hitting "this rocks" )

[KLKing]

I'm impressed! You did an amazing job! The colors looked balanced, and very intentional; even if you say you ran out of floss. I think the shading is perfect, everything about it is perfect!   I love your sketch too... I hope you frame it in a giant hoop! Ohhh sew it down to a base of linen, just outside the artwork; THEN frame it in a giant hoop!

[Melladh]

It's not wonky at all, it's perfect! And it's all mine! MWUhahaha
If I was into the idea of actually getting huge tattoos, that drawing would be insanely cool to get across my back