This week I experimented with identifying a colour palette and laser cutting.
Tuesday I focused on colour. Throughout my research sketchbook there is not a clear evident colour palette and in my previous projects I did not take much time to consider colour. I chose 3 images to extract colours from. Two images from my secondary research and one from my primary. I did this because I want my project to focus on the effects chemicals have on the water and my primary research did not have this. From these colour palettes I experimented with block colour in Photoshop. Each blocks colour palette shows me what colour I mainly want my garment to be and the specific accents. This is really helpful because it gives me direction in terms on colour when designing. From this I was advised to test the textures of these palettes. Therefore I tested each palette on chiffon, a jersey scrap material and a rough polyester ;all recycled; from this I chose 5 colours that I wanted in my final colour palette considering what kind of fabric I want these colours to be. This provides me with more direction when sourcing fabrics as I will know more specifically what I am looking for instead of having hundreds of different textures I the same colour.
Thursday I focused on laser cutting. I decided to laser cut onto an old pair of blue denim shorts. Denim was one of the suggested fabrics to experiment with if etching instead of cutting right through. This is because it cuts away the darker layer leaving the pattern in the lighter denim. The pattern I decided to use was a shape extraction from a Phoebe English collection. This is because it resembled the netting I had captured in my primary research and I thought I could possibly take the pattern further if I liked the laser cut effect.
The process was not too difficult, the file needs to be saved as an illustrator file and then imported into the laser cutting software. Then the settings need to set for the type of material being used; telling the system what material it actually is in the drop down menu and the thickness. Finally before starting the laser, the pointer needs to be moved to the edges of the design to make sure it fits on the material. Each 1cm takes about 3 minutes to complete. My sample took about 12 minutes. This will give me a good estimate of how long varying sizes of designs may take.
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