I had a post ready for yesterday. I wrote it up before I started working on the novel. But I just didn’t actually feel like posting it. So I’m doing this today instead.
On Sunday I got together with a couple of people and we had a marbling party — where we marbled paper. I’ve done this for the last few years, made marbled paper over Thanksgiving weekend, to use with holiday cards to send to people.
One of the first things you have to do is stir the colors. If you marble right after you stir you have something like what you see in my icon (also known as a get gel pattern.)
After you stir the colors, you rake a comb across it. That’s the nonpariel pattern, and the simplest of them all.
After you make the nonpariel pattern, you start to get fancy with swirls, curls, fans, etc. You have to be careful and not overwork the pattern. You also have to lay down the paper to collect the colors sooner rather than later, or they’ll start to fade and drift.
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red and green A traditional nonpariel pattern. That actually is green, not just white between the red swirls. And this was the first piece of the evening. |
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Swirls Swirls created after nonpariel pattern established |
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detail Detail of above |
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purple and blue |
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red and yellow This was done with the other paper, so I have two pieces from this. |
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other half of the red and yellow Because the pan was so large we could do two pieces of the smaller paper in it. This is the other half of the other red and yellow. |
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red and blue A little over worked, not enough contrasting colors, but still pretty. |
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purple and yellow First half |
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Purple and yellow second half |
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red and green fans We ended up remixing the green because the original color never really showed up. This is the mixed green, (green, yellow, blue). With a bit of the regular blue thrown in. This is the first half. |
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red and green This is the second half of that same green and red. Amazing effects that you can do. |
Very nice!
Purty!
I saw a paper-marbling demo at the Paul Revere House in Boston a few years ago; it looked very cool!
gorgeous! love marbled paper. can’t help looking at those and thinking of the lovely hand-hade books i could make with paper like that.
Very nice!
Purty!
I saw a paper-marbling demo at the Paul Revere House in Boston a few years ago; it looked very cool!
I coincidentally saw instructions for marbling paper a few days ago and thought it looked like a fun thing to try. Yours look cool!
gorgeous! love marbled paper. can’t help looking at those and thinking of the lovely hand-hade books i could make with paper like that.
I coincidentally saw instructions for marbling paper a few days ago and thought it looked like a fun thing to try. Yours look cool!
a comment…
Hello!
My name is Cindy, ages ago I reviewed your book, Paper Mage, for…i think it was the SFSite.
Anyway, a person left a wonderful comment on my webpage. They think that I am you. 🙂
I wanted to let you know because it really *is* nice.
http://apenandfire.com/?p=4
Leah R. Cutter,
I would like to take a moment to thank you for writting such a wonderful book. “Paper Mage” was the only book I read this year. Thanks to you I am eager to pick up another book and go at it.
Sincerely
Edmond