This is one more guest post by the VZBRELO girls. You can find a list of all their "behind the scene" post here.
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Hi all, this is my second guest post here. In my first guest blog post I told you and showed our wooden sketchbooks. Today I would like to show the process of creating our the most ambitious work piece so far. Please enjoy!
I usually work on the topics that I know very well. I would not take on this project as I have not read the book or watched the show. However, my business partner Maria had done both, so we took that custom order. It was a challenge!
There are no pictures of our first step. We started with designing a layout of a map. Only Maria knows what it took to create that! After a several revisions it was finally approved by the customer, so we could start working on it!
Next step is cutting and finishing of a panel. The size of the panel is chosen by the customer, it was 40 cm by 90 cm
We slightly sanded the surface without polishing it too much. After all, it was an "old" map and it should look old and rough! We only worked on the edges. They needed to look worn out.
Each step of the work was challenging and exciting!
For example, here is the transition of the printed images onto the panel. Looks very simple! However, the size was what made the work extra challenging. It needed some brain work :) It was also scary to remove the carbon paper afterwards! What if some detail did not get transferred or something got moved during the process? Then we would have to sand the surface and try again!
We got lucky there and everything worked just fine! I was especially happy that all the fonts got transferred correctly.
I still have my first pyrography pen. I am so used to it that I have given up trying to get any advanced pyrography tools. We made friends and I am not sure that such good friendship could happen with any other tool :) All I do is sharpen my pen sometimes, but not too often.
First of all I drew all the big main sites: the castles, the coats of arms and the emblems. Then I moved on to the title. I am glad that after a number of revisions we have ended up with fewer names and titles. I am not really a big fan of the pyrography writing! :)
I began to work on the continents, when all the names got in place. Here is another challenge for me: all the separate components needed to make a unified picture. It was all about the correct shading. Challenging, but exciting!
The edges needed to look rough, ragged and worn. This is a "very old map"!
Finally we varnished the finished work. Then polished it and varnished it again. Hurrah! It is almost done! We cannot believe we finished it. Now we just need to attach the hooks and we are completely done!
I promised to keep track of the time (many curious people asked me to do that after we've finished our first big work), but I did not keep my promise :) It was really hard to do, as we worked on many other smaller orders at the same time. All I can tell is that it took a lot of time and we really loved working on the panel! :)
Here is a general view and here we are looking happy with the result :)
We hope you enjoyed our story!
Tatiana
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