FOAS Bad Pet Art - Dwight

 

Dwight approves of his appliqué portrait!

UPDATE: FOAS Bad Pet Art Portraits - DELIVERED

 I heard from my friend that she got a note that her portrait of Dwight was delivered, and Newmie's mom reached out to me with photos of Newmie giving his approval of his portrait. 

How cute is that dog? I love him and I haven't even met him!

"Bad Art" Fundraiser Pet Portraits for Friends of Oakland Animal Services

In the past year, two really cute appliqué pet portraits have crossed my path - my friend Veronika made one of her cat Oscar, and a fan of a shop cat at Warner Mountain Weavers left one for Adrienne.  Naturally, when I saw a "Call for Artists" for the annual "Bad Art" fundraiser for FOAS, I signed up and decided to do appliqué pet portraits.  I looked at a few videos and instructional aides, but this one on Lorraine's "Quilting in the Fog" website gave me the simplest guidance for Pet Portrait Appliqué of all of them.  I printed the (sometimes cropped) photos to full 8.5 x 11" and used wax paper and sharpies to make templates. 

Here are the reference photos for Noomie the border collie, Dwight the ginger tabby, and Jojo who is a good boy (so said the note on the artist dashboard):

Here are a few WIP photos:

Newmie was the easiest -- his shapes were really clearly defined. As you see on the print out of his photo to the right, I had made some notes about how to approach and define the color areas, and then just traced with waxed paper using a sharpie and cut out the templates.  I pinned the waxed paper to fabric with Stitch Witchery already applied to the back side and used tiny scissors to snip it out.

He is a good boy!

Dwight was a bit trickier - I didn't feel I had enough fabrics close enough to his colors (my mac is not printing on my Brother CN3040 printer properly) but I think it worked out ok.  I know Dwight personally and wanted to give him a really good portrait.  Even though I was constrained by fabric selections (shockingly - I don't have a lot of beiges and browns in my stash), I used about 6 different thread colors (zoom in and you can see).

He is a good boy!

Jojo presented a different challenge:  the pose and the photo were a bit tricky to translate to "flat" without him looking like, well, roadkill.  I made his partly opened eye more open, added velvet to the belly and tail so he can be petted - and interpreted the words from the note "He is a good boy" so it's clear that this is a present tense Jojo!

NOTES AND TIPS:

• Stitch Witchery is the way to go; I considered using spray basting adhesive but that would have been trickier for smaller pieces.
• Use an unscented dryer sheet to clean off the sticky stuff from your iron.
• Iron - I used my small travel iron - just in case - and it was all I needed.
• Nonstick silicone cookie sheet mat worked really well to keep the Stitch Witchery webbing from sticking to my ironing pad.
• Velvet melts - lower heat and iron from the back to get the stitch witchery to stick or use spray stitching. 
• Upholstery samples are great backgrounds - just make sure to soak overnight and peel the paper from the backside.  I tried to sew through and broke a few needles. 
• Sewing:  my Singer 201 gives me the option to drop the feed dogs, which I did try with the embroidery foot but... without putting the piece in an embroidery hoop, it didn't feel right.  I just did this with the feed dogs in place, a transparent acrylic quilting foot, and lots of forward/backward on the stitch direction.

INSPIRATION:  

Visit the FOAS Bad Art Gallery and check out the portraits that inspired me!