Tuesday 29 November 2011

Cocopede


A couple of years ago, I had the idea of using coconut shell as a craft material. It turned out to be great to work with: virtually no grain, so it can be cut any which way, and it polishes to a lovely shine. This little fella is the most recent thing to have appeared. The body segments are coconut shell; the legs were cut from flattened copper pipe. I'll post some earlier ones over the next few days.



These 'in progress' pictures were requested at the time by @kaylawoi, who kept me company on Twitter while I sanded the ends off my fingers and stabbed my hands with pointy copper legs. Thanks also to @The_Holy_Log, and to @porridgebrain who came up with the name Cocopede.





Sunday 27 November 2011

Textures of Slate


One day last summer, visiting family in Cumbria, I had a wander around an old slate quarry nearby. The heaps of discarded slate offered a lovely range of colours and textures, none of which have been altered or enhanced with digital shenanigans. Honest.











Saturday 26 November 2011

Launchy Gill


One of my favourite places for waterfalls. A bit off the beaten track, on the west side of Thirlmere. I had the whole place to myself the day I took these pictures. If I'd been at Aira Force near Ullswater I'd have had to stand on a box to see over the crowd.