Wedding Color Challenge!

Do you love keeping up with the latest trends? Well, I have a new wedding dress project that I'm starting for 2012 and I need your help! The drawing below is my depiction of what the wedding dress I am about to work on looks like!

IMAGINE that this is your wedding dress. It's a beautiful bright white, but you want to add some color to it. So, my question to you is:

What trendy color / color combination would YOU make the ribbon flowers on the dress?

Post your ideas along with your email below. For everyone who participates, I will send a coupon for 15% off anything in my Etsy Store at LoveMirandaMarie.etsy.com! 

I will choose a winning color combination, and reveal the real wedding dress with colorful flowers in my etsy store on January 1!

You may post as many color combinations as you'd like, but no matter how many you post, you will receive only one coupon. Don't worry if someone has already posted the color combination that you wanted to post. Just let me know that you are voting for that combination and I will still send you the coupon code!

Have fun! :)

Love, Miranda Marie

How to paint a 1950s girl retro purse

Hey everyone! I wanted to announce that I have finished my very first hand painted purse! Up until now I had never tried my hand at painting with acrylics, but I am pretty happy with the turn out!

 Check out the listing in my Etsy Shop: LoveMirandaMarie.etsy.com

Here's how it all began...

The other day, I found this gorgeous patent-red leather purse at a thrift shop and found myself thinking, "Why not try to paint a leather purse?" I have experience drawing on leather shoes only, so the challenge of painting on a purse, I just couldn't pass up. I bought it and took it home. It looked like this originally...

 

The problem with drawing on red leather with permanent markers is you can't lighten the surface of the leather to create highlights, so the lightest color you are going to get is the red. That wouldn't work for my envisioned design of a 1950s girl. So I needed to step out of my comfort zone and try painting. My idea was to mix a picture I took of myself from a couple years ago with a 1950s style painting. Here are my reference photos:

I started by painting the shape of my face on the purse with a mixture of white and peach acrylic paint. It took several coats of paint to get the base color light enough. I painted an aqua background similar to the 50s girl painting.

The hair and the lips, I decided, to leave the same color as the purse, so you'll notice I didn't paint those parts. Once the paint had dried, I began getting the facial details in with my permanent markers. I used a light brown to map out the features, then, I went back over it with soft pink and blue fabric markers. I got that soft look  by using a tissue to blend the markers right after I applied them to the painting.

The shaded the hair in certain spots with a dark brown. The darkest parts of the painting, like the eyelashes and pupils, I used a black sharpie. I used the same light brown, pink and blue for the rest of the face.

Note: When painting teeth, try to refrain from outlining every tooth. You'll notice that all I had to do was get the general shape of all the teeth together and shade with a very light blue to get the point across. If you outline every tooth, it looks like your teeth have spaces between them.

To finish it all off, I took a black sharpie and darkened the shadows in the hair. I'll probably also spray a fabric paint sealant over it just to make sure the paint won't scratch off.


So, that's how I created this hand painted 1950s girl retro purse! I hope it helped you in your endeavors to paint or use mixed media on a purse! Just remember to be creative and have fun!


Love, Miranda Marie

Sweets!!

Are you in the mood for something sweet? Come check out my new Treasury List on Etsy called "Sweetness!"

Here's the link: www.etsy.com/treasury/MTU4MDA2NzV8ODg0Mjk3MDI3/sweetness

Featured: Sweet Caroline Hair Clip by Positively Whimsy. PositivelyWhimsy.etsy.com

Enjoy!

Love, Miranda Marie

P.S. and while you're at it, come see my sweet Hand Painted Cherry Shoes with Ice Cream Heels!

Link: www.etsy.com/listing/83131538/hand-painted-cherry-shoes-ice-cream?ref=pr_shop

New Hand Painted Shoes! Koi Fish!

 

 Coming to my Etsy shop TODAY! These colorful Hand Painted Shoes with swimming Koi fish are a fun way to spruce up any outfit. See more pictures of these shoes at LoveMirandaMarie.etsy.com.

Enjoy!

Love, Miranda Marie

How to make a professional looking photo of shoes with your basic stuff

Long title, I know! Don't worry. The way I edit photos is not as complicated because I don't have Photoshop on my good-old laptop, just Windows Photo Gallery and Paint!

"What good can possibly come out of Windows Photo Gallery and Paint?" you may ask. Well, not much actually...unless you know how to take good photos to begin with. I found that the best way to take good photos of shoes is to set up a light box or in my case, two white poster boards at a 90 degree angle (since that is all I had to work with in the house) beneath a window that gets good natural light. Like this...

Don't I look adorable in white?! Well, there is a reason to my madness. The light will reflect better off of white clothes than dark clothes. Whether it ends up working well or not, I want to try to get as much natural light on my shoes as possible!

Once I take the picture from where I'm sitting, it looks like this...

It's still rather dark, but with some adjustments, it will look fabulous!

Next, I bring it into Windows Photo Gallery. There is a button in the top bar that says "Fix". I click that and it brings me to a very basic editing window.

 
The options are on the right. I typically start with adjusting the Brightness and Contrast.

The next thing I do is adjust the color. The picture looks too blue to me, so I change the Color Temperature and Tint.

Last thing I do is crop the picture, if it needs it. In this case, it needs just a little bit of trimming.

 

Et Voila! The picture looks much better!

 

Now, for those of you who are over-zealous, you can bring the picture into Paint. Add a circle, fill it with a color and set some type of your choice over it and it could look like this...

There you have it, my friends! That's how I make a professional looking photo of shoes with very, VERY basic stuff. You can see my "Exotic" Hand Painted Peacock Shoe listing in my Etsy shop here...

www.LoveMirandaMarie.etsy.com

Good luck making professional looking photos!

Love, Miranda Marie

Here's how I made my Fall Leaf Shoes

Can you believe that these shoes used to look ugly? Well, believe it! Here's a picture of what they looked like before I painted them.

These shoes were ugly, but practically brand new, and by golly, I saw potential! Since Fall was on its way, these peachy-orange shoes seemed perfect for a Fall Leaf Design. I prepped the shoe by softly wiping it down with a little rubbing alcohol on a cotton ball. The alcohol helps to take off the dirt and dust without hurting the finish of the leather.

If you didn't know already, my main medium I work with is Sharpie or Permanent Markers. I found that it creates an effect that looks like bright watercolors on the shoes. Plus, I have more control over the detail by using Sharpies instead of brushes.

Thus, I began coloring the leather flower.

Once the flower was done, I knew what colors to use in order to keep the design consistent. The rest was just figuring out how the leaves should flow and how best to fill in the space. That's when I thought of using blue water droplet circles and swirls. The blue was a beautiful contrast to all the warm Fall colors on the orange shoes!

Once I got the hang of drawing the leaves, I extended the design to the heels, added a few rhinestones and...

Voila! My Fall Leaf Shoes are complete! Now they are one-of-a-kind Walking Art!

Happy Autumn! Enjoy the leaves!

Love, Miranda Marie