fanciful devices: how to do this

A Stone Is Nobody's

A man ambushed a stone. Caught it.
Made it a prisoner.
Put it in a dark room and stood guard over it for the rest of his life.

His mother asked why.

He said, because it's held captive, because it is captured.

Look, the stone is asleep, she said, it does not know whether it's in a garden or not. Eternity and the stone
are mother and daughter; it is you who are getting old. The stone is only sleeping.

But I caught it, mother, it is mine by conquest, he said.

A stone is nobody's, not even its own. It is you who are conquered; you are minding the prisoner, which is yourself,
because you are afraid to go out, she said.

Yes yes, I am afraid, because you have never loved me, he said.

Which is true, because you have always been to me as the stone is to you, she said.

Russell Edson

FAQs

1. Are you a Southeast Asian dancing girl from the 1800s?

No, sorry to disappoint. My avatar and banner images are from an ancient book I found in the depths of my grandmother's cabinets. More on that here.

2. How do you make everything look so old?

First, you need a good oxidizer to brush on every bit of metal you can reach. I'll tell you all about it here.

Then there's this wax. I first mentioned it here. You'll have to scroll down a lot.

3. How can you be so productive?

I'm insanely obsessed and I have no offspring. I do nothing else- I don't have a day job, I don't clean my house or cook, I spend all day in pjs, often completely abandoning personal hygiene... I only interact with other humans when I walk my dog. And I like people! But I prefer dogs.

And I'm sloppy- but I make that sloppiness work for me.

4. Any tips you'd like to share?

No! Except for these 16 posts about techniques and this one about how to find your aesthetic.

5. Would you be offended if I took some inspiration from your designs?

Well, I'd be happier if you outright copied them.

No really, imitation is how we learn. I have enough ideas to go around. And even if I don't- please. No one's going to do this obsessively enough to threaten my business. (Probably.) I learned by copying others and I've seen others copy me as a step toward developing their own voice. So feel free. (I'd love if you tossed me a link in my comments, so I can feel like a proud momma.)

6. What do you look like?

Why, what have you heard? Really? Wow.

12/16/10

how to do this

Though the more folks know how to do this, the less unique it'll be to me- my philosophy is 1-share and 2- transparency. Number 2 only applies to the clothes I wear, though. D'oh!
OK, so you go on flickr and download one of these:

arbus2 by {charlie}

Kodak Duaflex viewfinder by seriykotik1970

Voigtländer Brilliant I UK dust image not cleaned by heritagefutures

Olbia_2_Dust_Texture_1a by heritagefutures

Mamiya TTV by Jeff Rinehart (almost back in action)

As you can see there's an infinite number of them to chose from. More than I even realized as I go through them now. I chose this simple one from the original tute:

OK, download it but makes sure you know where yr downloading it to. Seems simple but that was a sticking point with me. Anywho, open yr photoediting software. I have an old version of photoshop elements. From here, I can only explain for that program. With several pictures on yr 'desktop' that you wanna apply this to, go to this picture and click the 'move tool' which looks like an arrow w/something behind it. You'll see a dotted-line square outline the picture and a sorta bullseye in the middle. Click the bullseye and just drag over to your picture, lining up the square outlines of the 2 images. You're now on your image you wanna work on, and the viewfinder has become a new layer. Now, here's the magic part. Make the layer 'multiply' mode. What the hell does multiply mean? anyone? cuz usually it turns everything dark, but in this case it makes the viewfinder transparent! but not in the faded way it would look if you turned down the transparency! It's magical. Then, you can fiddle with the hue/saturation if you want it less yellow and do the rest of the stuff you do w/yr layers and editing. The end. I know! So seeeeeemple!