Friday Night Art

My Muse is pushing me forward with Art and Soul's alterable doo-dad. I'm having a great time with it. Thanks for all the kind comments via blog and email! I love getting feedback. After fooling around with placement for the caps I got to work.

First step was to hammer the cap flanges? is that a word? so they would lay flat:

I love, love my new hammer purchased cheap at Harbor Freight. Next step, dyeing the caps with alcohol ink. Put caps in plastic bag, squirt some alcohol ink in and swish. That's it! :
Keeping it fishy, I decided to add some purple stain here and there around the cap edges. I used Starburst Stain in French Lilac Violet. Purchased on line, don't remember where. Label says "Lindy's Stamp Gang". I wasn't sure it would stick to the metal, but it did! :
Next step was heat drying because I am too anxious to wait for air drying. BTW I left those rubber things in the bottom of the caps. I tried getting them out but it took way too long and was damn near impossible. Next time I buy caps they won't have those rubbery rings inside. :

Next step was moving on to the fish body. I decided the head needed some texture. I globbed on Golden's soft gel medium in glossy. I like the translucency when this gel is dry. It felt "fishy" to me. I took a craft stick and grooved out some texture lines, and glued on the abalone buttons :
While gel dried, I carefully painted the fish body:

As it turns out, practically none of the body will show, but I didn't know this at the time! Here is the finished painted fish after the gel dried:
I used a thick line of Golden's Black Mica Flake (small) in a line behind the buttons, too cool. Used a mix of Golden's acrylics and my treasured Stewart Gills on the head. The glittery green accent on the face is Stewart Gill's Galactica texture glitter in Emerald. Good stuff. Here's a closeup, can you see the texture glitter? :

Now back to the caps. I raided my stash of assorted paper towels, baby wipes and text pages I hand painted, vintage wallpaper, and anatomy pages. Used a circular paper punch to cut out sequin waste to lay on top of paper. Here are some closeups of the caps:

Next step, gel medium the papers into the caps:
Added some Stickles Glitter glue accents:

Next step, fill in cap with Glossy Accents:
This morning I was disappointed to find that some of the details of the papers were lost due to the sequin waste and Glossy Accents. Live and learn. Still looks good tho. Next step was fashioning fins and tails with some of my leftover Fusion Collage paper towels made last year during Traci Bautista's class at Art and Soul 2007. I layered them with some sequin waste, fanned them and stapled the bottoms. I have yet to decide permanent placement of everything. Here is a pic showing possible placement:
There is more to come! I need to find a little easel to display him on, and have another idea cooking for him........stay tuned.