In January my Out of the Box group drew names for a swap project. Assignment: Portraits.
Wednesday night we spread the projects out on a table to see if we could guess who was who. Each ended up being recognized by the person they were made for.
I took a semi-easy way out by pulling up a photo I’d snapped of Gladys, doing a bit of Photoshop editing and printing onto White Kona cotton. I didn’t treat the cotton so the permanence of the ink is anyone’s guess. Final size is approximately 12″ x 14″.
The face was most challenging for me. Ultimately I think I gave Gladys has a few too many wrinkles! If I did a project like this again I would copy and paste the face multiple times and print them onto a piece of cloth for practicing. I ripped stitches a few times but the holes created by that process was mutilating the cloth so I just stopped.
I found some absolutely spectacular portrait quilts (one and two) during my research. I’d really like to understand the process for creating the black, cut-out version. If you know of a book or an online tutorial for doing that please let me know!
The one I received is absolutely fabulous. My goal today is to take one picture so you you guys can see it!
This is a great portrait. It is a lot of quilting and it makes the picture in a way. Have a great week end
wow! that is so impressive. Well done!
Amazing work, well done!! You are so talented. Wishing you a marvelous weekend!
This is SO COOL!
Portraits are really hard — and you did a wonderful job, extra wrinkles and all.
Your two inspirations are beautiful. You might want to check out Diedre Scherer’s work just for fun too. You are almost there in figuring out how the black and white one was done: use Photoshop to “posterize” your image (each color or step representing one fabric) and then print it out at full size and use that as your template for cutting the fabric (with or without seam allowance depending on whether or not you are going to do fusible or needle turn applique). I don’t know of any books on this technique — it’s just what I would do if I wanted to make something with that look.
Wow! This is truly a work of art! It’s wonderful!
this is fabulous! wow! as soon as i read your post i knew i have to make one. this would be a great idea for my husband’s birthday gift. he keeps asking me for a copy of our wedding picture and i can make one like this. i need to google instructions. how did you print it on kona cotton?
Wow, very good! Portraits are hard so this was a wonderful challenge, I’m sure.
I can’t wait to see the one of you.
Oh my gosh – that is beautiful! Not only is the portrait gorgeous, but your fabric and design choices for the border are wonderful too. Lovely!
My friend Rochelle Stibb has a book on creating portrait quilts. I have seen hers on exhibit and they are fabulous. Here is a link to the book and DVD made from her appearance on PBS’s Sewing with Nancy. http://www.nancysnotions.com/product/sewing+with+nancy/dvds/picture+perfect+quilts+dvd.do?search=basic&keyword=picture+perfect+quilt&sortby=newArrivals&page=1#
What a neat project! I’m SO glad you mentioned that you printed the photo onto the fabric! I just took one look at the picture and wondered how you put out such a fabulous piece on your first try! Portrait quilts are so amazing. Great job, Kathy!
I think the black version you asked about looks like they used the “stamp” filter in photoshop to get their template/pattern. I tend to use the “cutout” filter/effect.
Wow, you took a challenging and difficult project and did a fabulous job! The shadows are subtle and lovely. great work!
Mary Lou Weidman
I love your portrait. It inspires me to try to make one of my dog.
The lady who made the Frieda portrait to which you linked gives step-by-step instruction on how she made it: http://pamhollanddesigns.typepad.com/pam_h/portraits.html
Read each step through the links down on the right-side of her blog. It is a very intense process, but the results are amazing.
thanks for liking my portrait quilts! They are really a blast to make…I always feel like I have so much to learn still to make them even better than the time before, but I enjoy it.
I do make the templates in photoshop, using the cutout filter and lots of tweaking. I don’t print it on fabric but just use the templates to cut out all my fabrics…like someone else said, you can either add seam allowances for needle turn or not for fusible.
this quilt is great, i’ve always made the black cut out images using the threshold application in Photoshop, can’t wait to see what you do next!
What a beautiful job! The program at my sewing group yesterday was just on this very thing. Sandi used the same ‘posterizing’ method described above. Check her work out here: http://www.hissyfitzdesigns.com/Gallery.htm. Also for another example check out http://www.carolstraus.com/ in particular ‘Willie’s Boat’ and my favorite ‘Garden Fairy’. I am not aware of a book either.
Beautiful job on the portrait and on piecing the quilt. Fantastic!
I saw this post looking at portrait quilts. I have been using the process and technique from a DVD by Maria Elkins. It uses the posterizing method with lite steam a seam 2 and fuses 4 layers (or values of fabric) together. The results are quite striking. It is really easy…I hope this helps