Here we are at the finish! The final step on almost any scroll is the outlining. It takes a long time and can be tedious, but the final result is well worth it.
Here's the first picture; if you look closely you can see that top half of the border has not yet been outlined, while the bottom has. It just makes the edges that much more crisp and helps clean up the overall appearance. The leaves and vine also get a bit of separation from the background. I don't really like the phrase "makes it pop" but, well, that's what it does.
And here is the border with the outlining complete. You also can see some of the filigree that I added to the smaller capitals.
More of the filigree and a better look at the smaller initial. The black chalice inside the letter is the badge of the award that the client earned.
The kingdom seal...
Some of the line enders. Now, when I first started on this piece, I forgot that I needed to gild two of the line enders, so I went back and used a flat adhesive rather than the miniatum, which gives a raised finish. Luckily, the parchment was a forgiving enough surface that I was still able to texture the gold, which you can see in the middle line ender.
And of course, the big initial D at the beginning of the piece, because I can never get enough of how well it turned out. I'm not sure if the outlining here is really visible, since it's around the dark blue and red, but you can see it around the outer gold "trim" as well.
And then it was time to finally texture the gold! If you live in the US, Michael's carries "embossing styluses" in a three-pack for five dollars. The smallest one is the only one I have used so far, but five dollars for a single tool is still a good price, let alone three.
The way I did was first to practice with a pencil, to get a feel for how to freehand the vine shapes. I've heard that other artists use a stencil and get the shape they want from that, which would be a terrific technique for a symmetrical design, but the Luttrell Psalter is more organic in layout. Hence the freehand drawing. Usually when I'm drawing ivy, I just sketch in a vine, drop leaves on it, and then draw the outer edges, but you can't do that with gold. There's no erasing a dimple in the metal once you've placed it. Practice with pencil first on paper to get the hang of it!
The way it worked best for me was to draw the line that made up the inside of the curve and leaf shape, and then go back and draw the outside of the curve as it sweeps in and becomes the inside of the next section of vine. I don't know if that makes sense. It would probably be better if I had video of the technique, but I don't.
Once practice was out of the way, I sort of eyeballed the shape of the gold to see where leaves would fit best. Then I started "drawing" them in by pressing dots into the gold in a curving line, anywhere I wanted the vine to be. If you do this, take your time, give yourself space for the leaves and for the outer curve of vine around the leaves, and keep an eye on your available space. I ended up adding a couple of extra curls here and there to fill in blank areas.
After the vine is drawn, you go back and fill in the background with lots and lots and lots of dimples. It's a little tedious, actually, yet painstaking at the same time, because you do want to pay attention so that the dimples are evenly spaced, or so that you don't over-treat an area and maybe break through the gold. As far as I can tell, I didn't do that, so maybe it's not as much of a worry as I think it is.
Finally, I went back and outlined my vines one last time, pressing a little harder than the background dimples, to help the vines stand out just a little bit more. And the result on that was terrific. Take a look. (Most of these pictures should be clickable to open larger in a separate window.)
Every bit of gold got some kind of texture, even if it was only a straight row of dots along the trim, or a bit of outlining in the gold surrounding each leaf.
And here it is! After a couple of months (minus a couple weeks for vacation), it's finally complete. I wanted to wait until the client had seen it before I showed all of you. But he's very happy to finally see a scroll for an award he received twenty years ago!
And all that was left to do was sign my name on the back.
Once my client has the payment ready to go, I'll hand it off, and he can get signatures from the people who were "king and queen" when he first received the award, and then it will be official.
Thanks for following along! I'll be happy to answer any questions you might have.
No comments:
Post a Comment