NatalieParishPowertexGecko

Magnificent Luciferin Machine Natalie Parish from Bag End Studio

5/17/2020

Inspired by an Italian trip to a Leonardo Da Vinci Invention Museum I wanted to create a Mythical Steampunk Machine. Imagine my delight when I found Leonardo Napkins at Tamara’s Paper Napkins on Etsy! I also wanted to create a Sci-Fi vibe, so I did a bit research on fireflies. Firstly, I discovered Fireflies are not really flies but beetles from the Order Coleoptera. The light is from the compound Luciferin which is the most efficient light in the world and used in a growing field of medical research as well as gene manipulation in plants so they light up in our homes potentially reducing the consumption of fossil fuel based lighting. Now my imagination was set alight and a whole story lit up in my head of world where humans could harness that light and energy. Would it be fabulous world – maybe not?
Human Impact Report Lampyridae - (lightning-beetles).
Giant light emitting beetles from the Lampyridae family produce the most efficient form of light. Since mechanization and the ability to intensify oxygen concentrations, we harness beetles as a renewable source of light and energy including luciferase plant gene manipulation for creating indoor plants that service our internal décor needs. Additionally, luciferin extraction is now essential for gene technology, medical research, food safety, and forensic testing. As such the living Magnificent Luciferin Machines are now an important source of employment accounting for 80% of work in Machine Pasture Counties.
The expansion of human territories has caused habitat destruction for these necessary creatures and as we are still unable to force reproduction we rely on a natural source for capture and herding. Environmental Protection Zones have become a necessary norm. Visitors will be allowed to use the zones for recreational purposes within guided areas as the carnivorous larvae of these beetles are dangerous to humans. Therefore, the Luciferin machine industry by its very use of these creatures is protecting this species and large tracts of environmental parks for future generations to come.

Materials:

MDF Firefly & Steampunk Pieces & Cog Chipboard Mats, (I kept stencils for another project)
Box of Cogs from Bag End Studio Store - optional
Bulbs & Gauges (Dusty Attic) from Bag End Studio Store - optional.
Little People from Bag End Studio Store - optional
Powertex Universal Medium-colours of your choice. I used Terracotta, Yellow Ochre, Bronze/Black PTX
Stone Art – mixed with Terracotta and Bronze
Easy Coat Varnish - Glossy
Powercolours of your choice to embellish your work. I used titanium white, orange, and brown
Colourtrix colours of your choice to highlight powercolours. I used bronze, clear, and rich gold
Medium Balls
Triangle Hooks for hanging.

From your useful box:

Alfoil and Masking Tape
Masking Tape, waste photocopying paper, alfoil for form building
Wire or string
Skewers, toothpicks to fit through cog pieces
Masking Tape
Tonic Plastic Bottle – requires emptying first through the mixing with Gin and Lime followed by human consumption.

Equipment:

Plastic covered workspace and mixing bowls
Paint brushes (one for Powertex and one or two for pigment colours)
Lids for Palette (or alfoil).
Palette Knife, ﬂat spatula
Craft knife
Clay modelling tool
Washing up Container for cleaning
Gloves, Chux Cloth, Paper towel
Gladwrap (to wrap Stone Art clay and to cover opened Powertex bottles)
Air-tight container to store clay.

Step 1: Design Layout

Surf the internet or Pinterest for inspiration.
Push or knife out your pieces and play with positioning them.
I created a 3D mock-up of my beetle.
I attached it to a bottle which later would be housing for the fairy lights. I cut a small rectangle in the masking tape area to fit a battery pack. Make sure that the pack can be inserted and removed. Put masking tape over the sharp cut edges.
Note: the masking tape area at the small end of the plastic bottle will later be hidden by stone art.
I also included a temporary small container to hold the tail upright and a masking tape strap across the wings to hold the design in place.
Note: In hindsight, I could have sealed the MDF Boards with Terracotta PTX before playing with the layout.

Step 2: Make Stone Art

In a bowl with a medium amount of Terracotta Powertex Universal Medium (approx. 1/2 cup), add Stone Art (approx. 1/2 cup) and mix with a flat spatula.

Keep adding small handfuls of Stone Art until it forms a kneadable dough like mixture that no longer sticks to the bowl or your gloves. Remove the sticky ball and add a little more Stone Art to the bowl to ‘flour’ the ball. Knead well until the clay can be pushed into a textured surface and be removed again without sticking.
Keep the clay ball wrapped in glad wrap and in a sealed airtight container to prevent hardening until use.

Step 3: Making Compound Eyes

Make a flat based half sphere out of crumpled paper and masking tape.
Paint the balls with black Powertex and while wet dip the heads into the small balls. Let dry.
Re-paint the eyes with Black PTX.
Repeat the process if you desire more texture.
Finish with Dark Silver Colourtrix

Step 4: Seal & Colour Kit Pieces

Paint/Seal MDF, and chipboard steampunk pieces with terracotta PTX
I used extra pieces (Box of Cogs from Bag End Studio Store) Let dry.
Dry brush the kit steampunk pieces with easy coat glossy and powercolour. I used a mixture of orange, titanium white and dark brown powercolours.

Step 5: Make Beetle Body & Head

Make a flat oblong base and flat semi -circular shape out of crumpled paper and masking tape.
I created a crease in the middle of the back of my body to house the gears.
Paint and seal with Terracotta Powertex. Let dry.
Use a sausage shape of stone art clay around the base of your beetle body to attach it to your firefly body.
Similarly use a sausage of clay to attach each side of the MDF body to the bottle.
Use a stone art clay attach an MDF Circles and Clock to create a head. Spread the clay out around the head piece and texturize with one end of a skewer.
Seal all the MDF firefly pieces with Terracotta PTX if you have not done so.
Paint inside the bottle where you can see the masking tape on the inside making sure you keep the bottom end clear.

Step 6: Create Gears

Using some stone art clay attach Cogs & Skewers/Toothpicks together to create a gear system to your liking.
Cogs can be separated with circles of stone art or held together with mock metal rivets – to illustrate I used bronze stone art clay.
I used extra-large cogs from Bag End Studio’s Box of Cogs as my centers and firmly secured my center cog into the back of the firefly using stone art clay. I used the largest chipboard cog piece at the back and attached it to the body base using stone art clay.
I left the masking tape holding the wings in place temporarily until everything dried.

Step 7: Stone Art the Bottle

Roll out Stone Art Clay. I used a texture roller and scissors to cut pieces.
Paint a little bit of Terracotta PTX on the back of the clay pieces before attaching to the bottle.
Attach the middle legs using stone art clay.

Step 8: Make Beetle Legs

Using Terracotta stone art clay, join MDF pieces to make legs. Leave to dry at least overnight and then attach to Firefly body using stone art clay. This is fiddly and time consuming but worth the results.

Step 9: Optional Gauges & Bulbs

Lightly seal the gauges and lightbulbs with Yellow Ochre PTX.
Let dry
Using Easy Coat Glossy embellish with Rich Gold Colourtrix.
Position and attach pieces to your own stylistic liking using stone art clay.
Do not forget to paint a bit of Powertex on the attachment surfaces to increase adhesion.
Attach the eyes at the same time in the same way.
I attached the chipboard pipes in the Firefly kit to the back of the firefly into the stone art clay and then used tiny pieces of stone art to secure. See photo in step 12.

Step 10: Optional Little People

Using small pieces of stone art clay embed little workers into your artwork.
Note: I attached the pipes in the Firefly kits to the back of the firefly over the bottle and used these in attaching the bulbs.

Step 11: Optional Decoupage Wings

Cut your napkin into four pieces.
Using easy coat glossy varnish and a paint brush, apply a thin layer onto the top of the wings and then decoupage paper onto the wings. Varnish the underside of your wing folding the napkins underneath. Carefully, seal napkins with another layer of varnish as napkins are more fragile than paper.
I used Leonardo DaVinci napkins from Tamara’s paper napkins. https://www.etsy.com/market/tamaras_paper_napkin
Finish off piece with a light dry brush of Colourtrix Golds (Rich, Bronze and Clear).

Step 12: Light Her Up Baby

Carefully, insert fairy lights filling the bottle bulb (firefly bottom) and turn on the attached battery pack and hide pack in the stone art covered front end of your fly. The K-Mart Lights come with a switch so I can turn it off and on without having to remove pack from the bottle until I need new batteries.

Congratulations you have finished
See you in June with some Anthropomorphic Nonsense.
Natalie Parish from Bag End Studio

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Steampunk Dragonfly by Erika Venter

5/1/2020

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Artwork & Blogpost by Erika Venter, Mareeba, QLDThe inspiration theme for this month is Steampunk and the kit is a Dragonfly which is now available from powertex…
I was super excited to get started!

Buy Dragonfly Kit

Materials:

MDF Dragonfly kit
Powertex Bronze 500g
White Paper Deco
Easycoat mat
Colourtrix (colours of choice)
Cogs, Gears and clock chippy shapes
Gemstones, old jewellery & chain
Paintbrush
Steampunk eyes.

Step 1:
Stir & shake Powertex Bronze well before use, assemble and paint the MDF Dragonfly. Use bigger gears and stick them with Powertex onto the middle of the body to hold everyting together. To create some texture measure and fit Paper deco onto the wings and tail. Spray mist the Paper Deco with water and tease it apart – don’t make it too wet.

Step 2:
It’s now time to use your imagination and play around with all the bits and pieces. My idea for the Dragonfly was to make it look like the whole body is driven by gears, chains, a compass for direction and the clock faces represent it flying in time. I imagined how the whole component would work – lighting up with gemstones and sparkly eyes.

Step 3:
I draped the chain in between and around the gears on the wings and also on the tail. Using Powertex Bronze to secure every piece on the wings and the tail. Then left it to dry completley.

Step 4:
I enjoy the Colourtrix metallic pigments so much and it’s always really hard to decide what colour scheme to use… I love the Colourtrix Magic Blue and used that as my base colour mixed with Easycoat mat and covered the whole Dragonfly with it. I then used Colourtrix Magic Purple to highligt some areas on the wings and tail. Colourtrix Bronze Gold and Clear Gold were used for the final touches.

Step 5:
Use Easycoat mat to glue the gemstones, eyes and clocks onto the wings and tail. Your Steampunk Dragonfly is now ready to hang it up where everybody will admire it.

This was so much fun and I love my end result!
This Steampunk Dragonfly project will allow you to make use of a variety of techniques using Powertex, Paper deco, Colourtrix and Easycoat Mat.
Join me on my creative journey with Powertex
Enjoy the ride
Erika

Buy Dragonfly Kit

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Steampunk Firefly

5/1/2020

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Author

Erika Venter Designs. - erikaventer.weebly.com/

The inspirational theme this month is ‘Living Light’ in celebration of the International Day of Light… and Erika Venter along with Powertex Australia and Cobwebbs Craft Studio has brought out a fantastic new kit for you to create at home – a Steampunk Firefly… it’s awesome!

There are so many ideas on the internet to get you started… but the best is when you use all bits of info and actually create your own idea. This is how I created my beautiful Steampunk Firefly. You can make one too…

Materials:
MDF Firefly kit, Powertex Bronze, Powertex Ivory, Stone Art
Metallic Pigments, Matt Pigments, Easycoat Glossy
Bister spray, Paper deco, Glass eyes, Container to mix clay in, Rolling pin, Plastic board, Hairdryer, Paintbrush
Step 1.

Buy Firefly Base Kit

Take all the bits out from the kit. Use Powertex Bronze and paint the back sides of the MDF Firefly and leave to dry.
Step 2.

Use the natural paperdeco and cut 2 pieces in the shape of the back wing. Paint the back wing with Powertex Bronze. Dip the paperdeco in water (not to wet) pull it apart to create texture and lay it onto the wings. Use masking tape to hold the body parts together.
Step 3.

Use Powertex Bronze and Stone art and make a soft clay. Roll it into a ball and press it flat on a plastic cutting mat. Sprinkle pigment colours of your choice onto the Stone Art clay. I used Powercolour Red Ochre, Yellow Ochre and Rich Gold. Use the rolling pin and roll the clay out so that the colours press into the clay. It should be very thin.
Step 4

Gently pick up the clay and tear it into the shape of the top wings. Paint the wings with Powertex and lay the clay onto the wings. Paint the rest of the Firefly with Powertex Bronze including the back wings over the paperdeco. I also used two of the round circles in the MDF kit to create a base for the head and the body.
While waiting for this to dry off start painting the rest of the bits in the MDF kit that you would like to use.

Use a little bit of Powertex White and spread it over the back wings into the groves of the paper deco and spray some Bister over it. Create a crackle effect by drying it off with a hairdryer on hot.
Step 5.

Mix Powercolour Yellow Ochre with Easycoat glossy and paint the tail and the centre piece of the body with brush strokes. Mix Powercolour Red Ochre with Easycoat glossy and paint the legs and the rest of the body with brush strokes so that you still can see the Powertex Bronze colour shining through.
Step 6.

It’s now time to get into gear and gear up your Steampunk Firefly. Use Powertex Bronze and all the bits that you already painted and start layering it onto each other. You can use some of the left-over clay to stick all the bits on if you are to scare that you will drip on your Firefly with the Powertex Bronze.
Mix Powercolour Yellow Ochre and with Brush strokes go over some of the gears that you would like to high light and do the same with Powercolour Red Ochre.
To give your MDF Steampunk Firefly a bit of a shine use our beautiful Rich Gold pigment and go over some areas that you would like to stand out. I really love this colour so I always go overboard with it! I also used 2 glass eyes to perfect my Firefly but there was still something missing in my project. Yes, it needs a light on the tail to make it a real Firefly. So, I used one off my hand torches and put it behind the tail and it just lit up the whole room.
This was so much fun and I love my end result!
This MDF Firefly project will allow you to make use of a variety of techniques using Powertex, Stone Art, Paperdeco, Bister, Easycoat Glossy, Metallic and Matt Pigments.

Join me on my creative journey with Powertex
Enjoy the ride
Erika