Carmen McNally's Art

  Several layers ready to be laser cut Below are some examples of my layers that are ready to be laser cut. I am so happy that I have managed to complete them as even though I enjoyed adding new and intricate detail to some layers, I also felt the strain of how long this was taking whilst still juggling other projects. I look forward to seeing all the layers cut out and I hope that the layers line up together. I will be putting a 20mm border around the outside of each layer to give it structure and integrity. Everything that is black in the background will be cut out. Everything that is white will be attached to the border. Above is an A4 and A3 test piece of the new sketches. I did this to check the borders worked and were in proportion.

Not giving up Below is an annotated video explaining my process of having to redo all the layers again, correcting mistakes I made. Redoing the layers taught me a valuable lesson: never give up. At first, I was frustrated with myself because it felt like a setback. But once I started again, I realised that redrawing the sketches allowed me to add even more detail, making them better than before.

  Using Pro Create to trace I have created 15 layers on acetate that I have scanned and emailed to myself so I can work on them in Pro Create. I have used Pro Create before but it was quite a while ago and I am not familiar with it so I had to watch a few videos on YouTube. Below are some before and after photos out of the 15 layers I created. They show how I tidied up the line drawings by lowering the opacity of the original drawing, then tracing over it on a new layer. Looking at the finished tracing, I may have to make the lines thinner somehow as they might be to thick when going through the Trotec software that's used for laser cutting. I had this issue with the lines being too thick with the test pieces.

Creating layers on acetate Below is a annotated video of me creating layers. I found using a Sharpie fine liner was the best pen to use as all the others smudged.  I once finished, I plan to scan to email all drawings so I can tidy them up on photoshop.

Sketching my landscape scene Below is a annotated video of me sketching a layout and problem solving.  

  Sketching I plan for this sketch of the vines to be my top layer. I was going to leave the railings in that the vines were wrapped around, however I like the idea of the viewer to also be able to see through the negative space of the vines. This adds to that feel of trying to look around something or being nosey, peaking over the fence. I will be using the laser cutter like I did with the proto type. I am looking forward to seeing this layer being cut by the laser cutter as there is alot of intricate detail. Even though cutting each layer out by hand is a timely process. With the space that is removed reveals where you will sketch your next layer and so on. I wont be laser cutting one at a time so I now need to work out how I am going to build the scene layer by layer. I think I will try using acetate to sketch on as its clear.