Explore different approaches to choosing a photo for fabric art, thread sketching, thread painting, art quilting, and appliqué projects.
Use digital images from your holidays, local parks, urban scenes or even household items, along with portraits of family, friends and pets.
This is the third video of a series exploring various aspects of art quilting and embellishment. This video looks at how to choose a photo for fabric art.
If you missed the two previous videos (where we explored how to make super simple layered landscape art quilts, and thread painting techniques to add texture and dimension, you’ll find the links at the end of this post).
Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links, which means I may receive a small commission (at no further expense to you) if you click through and make a purchase. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases from Amazon websites.
Choosing a Photo for Fabric Art
In this video tutorial – Choosing a Photo for Fabric Art – we’ll explore:
- What to look for in a photo.
- An overview of composition.
- Using just part of an image by zooming in and cropping.
- Eliminating unnecessary detail.
- An approach to using digital images to create a fabric collage or art quilt.
Explore your photos
Over the years, most of us accumulate thousands of digital images.
Although there are distinct advantages to being able to store and keep our treasured photos in digital format, one of the ‘downsides’ is that the best ones never see the light of day!
Rummage in those files today, find the gems and the special memories, and recreate them in fabric and stitch.
Think about interpretation
There are so many ways photos can be interpreted:
- As simple thread sketches using outline stitching.
- As freely-created thread paintings, taking the design idea from the photo.
- Digitally printed on fabric and ‘remastered’ as exciting and vibrant thread paintings.
- Art quilt collages and pictures.
- Abstract or interpretive designs using shape, colour, feelings, or mood.
Take a look at the video below and be inspired about how you could use your photos.
Choosing a Photo for Fabric Art: Video Tutorial
Learn about different aspects of composition and how you can use your photos in your art quilting and other creative work.
Thank you for your very useful videos. They have helped me enormously in learning thread sketching and painting. I really appreciate the effort you are putting into making these available. As a handweaving teacher I have posted a series of videos of my own and know how much work is involved. So I just wanted to let you know how useful and helpful yours have been in helping me discover another way of creating textile art. I have recently become a fan of Inktense sticks, also through learning from you. Please keep the videos coming!
Thank you, Jette, for your generous comments – especially coming from another creative teacher. I’m glad you find my videos and tutorials useful. Yes, they are a lot of work, but I know that people appreciate them and I do enjoy making them – most of the time! (-haha!-). I just wish I had more hours in the day. I will do my best to keep the videos and articles coming …
🙂 Deborah