Tagged: rectangles

Sunday sketch #381

One of the things I’ve always loved about my Sunday sketches are the outlines – the thin black lines around the shapes. When I used to hand-draw all my sketches, they were all lines; now that I create most of my designs in EQ8, I don’t always show them. But sometimes I purposely make the black lines a feature (see Sunday sketches #265, #269, #277 and #348, for example), even though I’ve never really made a quilt with skinny strips (apart from Sketch).

Anyway, this week’s sketches are the by-product of a sketch that I haven’t shared yet. You’ll see the connection in the coming weeks, but for now, it’s fine as a standalone design.

And yes, I’ve done my usual sudoku-style colouring where each colour appears only once in each row or column 🙂

This is a block-based design using a standard layout, plus thin sashing. I used black to delineate the shapes in the first version, but colouring the same lines in the background colour means I can highlight some of the secondary shapes – those light grey rectangles. They definitely feel like they’re in the foreground, overlapping and connecting the coloured circles and squares.

Here’s a reverse colourway where the shape outlines are still the same colour as the background, and the connecting rectangles are in white instead.

There is thin sashing between the blocks, just to give a smidge of space between them. Here’s what happens without the sashing – this is just a bit too crowded for me!

And the same design works without any outlines. Here I’ve coloured each block’s outlines in the same colour as the rest of the main shape(s). That just makes the shapes look a little fatter. I quite like the connectivity in this one too.

This week’s sketches could be made using thin strips, squares, rectangles and quarter-circles (or drunkard’s path units).

I feel like there may be the potential to iterate this design a little more, but first I need to show you the designs that led to this one! That’s next week.

Sunday sketch #376

I’m still using the same block as the past two Sunday sketches, but I’ve removed some parts this week. (This is easy to do when designing; I just make bits ‘disappear’ by colouring them the same as the background. Obviously if I were making these blocks, I’d revise the design so there were fewer pieces in the block to begin with.)

So how did I get here from there?

Last week, I ended on a layout in which the blocks were set on point. Both the rounded and the squared corners in each block were coloured the same as the background, and the block had a leaf shape (also in the same background colour) in the middle. I didn’t love those versions.So this week, I’ve removed that internal leaf shape and replaced it with the square that was there originally. I left the curved corners coloured in, but the squared corners are still gone (coloured as background). And then I mixed up the colouring to highlight a different set of shapes within the design. I really liked these retro Xs, with their arms separated by the sashing in between blocks.

The four ‘arms’ of each X come from four adjacent blocks; each block has two arms in two different colours.

It’s quite a busy design when it’s multicoloured, so I tried a two-colour, alternating layout instead.

I liked that one, but I felt that the retro nature of those Xs really cried out for a standard layout.

And then I added some more space just to let the shapes breathe a bit. This layout’s reminiscent of Sunday sketch #373, too – two grids of 3 × 3 overlapping.

As always, I kept iterating this design, although that first version is my favourite. I tried colouring the sashing between the blocks, which ends up creating a plaid-ish effect.

That added colour removes the retro feel and gives this a more traditional feel. I still like it though!

Like the past few weeks’ designs, this week’s sketch could be made using squares, rectangles and quarter-circles (or drunkard’s path units). The curves would need to be pretty small – something I still struggle to do well – but the rest of the piecing would be pretty straightforward.

 

Sunday sketch #375

The last version of last week’s sketch introduced curves to two of the four corners in each block, but I felt like the centre of the block was a bit empty. So I added a new black shape: it’s square at the ends, to match the 90-degree angles of the black shapes in two corners, and rounded on the sides, to match the curves of the other two corners.

Colouring the background the same as one of the block colours ends up leaving the black shapes from those blocks just floating within the design, which I really like.

I switched yellow to black in EQ8, which made those ’empty’ blocks disappear into the background.

Here’s the full design again. I like how the blocks now seem reversed, with the key shapes being those in colour rather than those in black. Those leaf shapes in the centre of the blocks are now balanced with the circles and squares that are formed by 4 adjacent blocks.

I tried rotating all the blocks, and quite liked this version in which all the leaf shapes are parallel….

…and then decided I wanted to see what those leaf shapes looked like running vertically rather than diagonally. Setting the blocks on point changes the feel not just of the design but also of the blocks themselves, I think – possibly because I’ve used more in this version, and made them smaller.

Here’s another vertical layout.

I can’t decide which is my favourite! I think maybe the version with the yellow background – I like the interplay of the black shapes and the few ’empty’ blocks where the wrapped-lolly shape in the centre becomes more obvious.

This week’s sketches could be made using quarter-circles (or drunkard’s path units), squares, rectangles, and sashing.