Gator Quill

Project: UF Gator paper quill
Approximate time: 16 hours or so
Skill level: Intermediate (but with a lot of patience)
Netflix Binge: Melissa and Joey

Materials:

Plus a couple of things not pictured because they are in the end stages:

• A frame (Like this) and paper to mount
• Elmer's glue (or any craft glue)
• Tweezers
• Plastic bag
• Paint brush
• Scissors

 Procedure

So this is my first post-blog-started project and I actually took pictures during the progress stages to give real instructions.  The first thing I did was print out the image I wanted to quill sized to the frame I was going to use- I made it 4X6 to fit the 5X7 opening with a little wiggle room in case it doesn't line up perfectly.


Once you have the image you want cover the whole thing with repositional glue stick.  It works perfectly to hold things where you need them while you are working.  It's especially good when you don't know what you want it to look like yet because you can easily change it.

I started with the teeth because they are one piece each that you can shape according to the image you choose.  The glue stick on the image keeping them where they are for this point is extra helpful especially for the next step where you surround each piece with blue.

The blue strips hold them with the correct spacing and give a great outline to fill in later.  The outlines themselves are several layers of mostly straight lines to give it the well-defined cartoon-y look that the logo has.

Filling in the outlines is where this gets tricky and tedious.  You first need to decide what you want it to look like before deciding which of the basic shapes to use.  For filling in the inside of the mouth I mostly used closed loops and tear drops as the majority of it was sectioned off.  For the wider areas I like open loops of varying sizes to give it more of a random look, But I will get into that more later. 
Odd ball things that make it pop:  So if you know UF colors you would know that the blue is actually a royal blue which didn't come pre-cut.  I used a dark blue and mixed in some pieces of a white strip that I had colored blue with a blue sharpie (front and back is important for consistency.  I only made a few pieces tho because it was a pain in the butt- so most of it is pretty obviously dark blue but with a blended look.  Since I was going to be doing that anyway I also put in tiny pieces of a lighter shade of green into the gator to give it some variation.   Also on the outline pieces of the Gator I slipped in a few teal pieces (if you can even tell) in effort to make it look like there was lighting on it.  It was mostly to pretend I had the right shade of blue, but it kinda worked out in real life. 

My next step was to make the other sectional pieces until I had enough to make a general outline.  The glue will hold it in place some but if there is a lot of pressure on any sharp turns don't worry you can fix them later when you go to fill it in.  It is also a good idea to reinforce the outline at this point too.  Stagger where the strips begin and end to create overlaps and place strips on both sides of all joints where the lines intersect to keep the angles close to what they should be.

Once we have the shape now we can start filling it in.  At this point I had the mouth filled in because I needed it to hold both jaws at the right angle to make the rest of the outline work.  Strategic note:  There are 2 ways to tackle filling it in- 1.) I know what I am doing or 2.) I have no idea what I am doing.  By that I mean you can either glue the pieces to each other as you go OR you can wait till you have a nice looking section and then remove them one by one to add the glue.  The first method is MUCH faster but you risk gluing something to a spot you may not like later on.  By gluing after or in sections you end up with something you know you like.


The more you fill in the more your outline is going to look like the shape you want- as long as it is strong enough to hold everything in.  I used fatter fill in pieces to reinforce and hold joints open to the right angles (mostly around the eyes and nose) and filled in at random from there. 

After you have a well shaped gator head the next part is the orange ring around him. I felt that it was best to make the ring with blue and then fill it in with the orange bits.

After all that I layered the outside with more dark blue (and some royal blue bits as well) until I had a good shaped oval.  Pro tip: leaving gaps between some of the layers forces the outside edge to hide any lumps or unshapely spots.

Once its all filled in and looking how you want you need to remove it from your outline paper and glue it to your background mounting sheet.  IMPORTANT! When it comes to removing the project from the printed paper with the glue stick- DO NOT just try to lift it.  It will chunk apart and you will lose hours worth of work.  I find that Dental Floss works great to separate the image from the paper.  Simply slide the floss in between the paper and the image surface to loosen the glue.  Trust me you will thank me later.

The best way to put glue on your recently detached image is to put some glue on a ziplock bag and spread it around with a paint brush.  If you need to you can add a few drops of water so it will spread, but don't add too much.  If it is too liquid the paper absorbs too much of the water and it gets soft and puffy. 


Move the piece around in the glue so the little bits get covered.  Once you are confident there is a good amount of glue place the image onto the final paper.

I chose a pearlescent white because it reflects some of the colors and didn't clash with the matting of the frame.  It is important you place it so that you'll have enough space around the edges to fit nicely into your frame without running short.



From there you just have to cut it as needed and center it within the frame.

Voila!