Creativity In A Nutshell

**Today is the first day of the Valentines Day Sale at Callie's Creations!**
Be My Valentine Earrings Just $10.50
With Love Scrabble Tile Necklace Just $19.00
Hearts of Porcelain Set Just $16.00
Key To My Heart Set Just $20.00
Je t'aime Scrabble Tile Pendant Just $6.00

It seems like I have been waiting for ages to receive my package of goodies from Artbeads.com ! Well, today I got it, and let me tell you, these beauties are just fantastic!

What's The Plan, Stan?
I sadly forgot my wire snips at home :( so I could not get started on all the beautiful projects I had planned tonight. Instead, I will tease you with photographs of some of these darling beads n things, with links where you can find 'em.
** Sweetheart Sale: You can save 15% on orders of $60 or more RIGHT NOW at Artbeads.com - it's a pretty good deal, especially with free shipping. They have lots of great Valentines Day Beads and Findings to peruse through.





NECKLACE GIVE AWAY:
I also wanted to let you know about this great Valentines Day necklace giveaway over at Every Heart Crafts

C'est Fin!

More Stuff on the Information Highway:

It is a blizzard outside right now. No joke and no exageration. There is so much SNOW!

To brighten up my day, I wanted to show you a great option for your beaded creations!




MzuriBeads is a fantastic company that sells paper beads made by hand in Uganda
I have been intrigued by paper beads for quite a while, and even attempted to make them, but I wasn't very good at it. Ohhh well, these ones are environmentally friendly and buying them helps support Ugandan craftswomen. These beads are sold all over the UK online and in actual shops. Sadly, they are not sold anywhere in the US, but you can purchase them on their website. Take a look around, they have some really interesting stuff :) There is even a little guide to making your own paper beads!

I would love to buy a bundle myself and test them out, make some fantastic creations in my Etsy shop!
Let me know if you try em - tell me what you think!

C'est Fin!

Ok, so you've taken some great shots of your jewelry using some of the tips I mentioned in my earlier blog post, Photographing Your Jewelry but even the best pictures can use some extra help with photo editing software.

First of all, I would advise against any computer editing that makes your jewelry look different than it actually is. Don't alter the color any more than necessary to make the photograph accurate to life. Remember that your photographs will look different on a different computer, particular if your computer is a mac and the photo is viewed on a pc.

That being said, there are some basic corrections you can make to your photographs to make them look better and more professional, without giving your viewers a false sense of what your work is like. My editing process generally uses two programs and goes in three steps.

Step One: I upload all of my photographs (I like to photograph my jewelry in one lump to get it all done at once) and organize them into folders. Once this is done I do an innitial swipe to delete all of the blurry pictures, poorly composed or poorly lit pictures. As you become more comfortable and familiar with taking pictures of your jewelry there should be fewer of the these.
Step Two: I open the remaining pictures in Window Life Photo Gallery - formerly Windows Photo Editor. It's a nifty program with a lot of new accessories since it came out with Windows Vista. If you have Windows 7, this program will not have come automatically with your computer, however, you can download it for free at via Windows Live. It's seriously worth it. I do my basic editing - adjust lighting, heighten contrast, and cropping. At this stage I'm mostly concerned with composition and cutting down my photos. You don't need a million pictures of one pair of earrings. Be really selective and chose your best 5 or 6.
Step Three: Once I've narrowed it down to 5 or 6 photos, I edit them in GIMP. I like to refer to GIMP as Photoshop on steroids. It's completely free and easy to use. I use GIMP to fine tune the pictures, check color accuracy and tweaking brightness/contrast until I am 100% satisfied. Then I just re-name the pictures to match the piece of jewelry and tada! I'm done!

This week I'm jumping back into blogging, jewelry making and etsy-ing! It's been a crazy  busy month and I'm glad to have a month off from classes to get caught up with all the *real* fun stuff: jewelry!
And in honor of my return, this week is devoted to Bottle Caps!


What's The Plan, Stan?
For the day before the first of the week, I'm going to brainstorm some great ideas of upcycling with bottle caps. Check out these links for some sweet examples :)
Ingredients:

• Bottle Caps! There are so many options when it comes to your bottle caps
• You can buy some crafting bottle caps from a craft shop or a jewlery supply shop
• Do the good thing: Collect all of your (and your friend's) bottle caps. Save the interesting ones for some funky pieces
• Cruze around looking for some vintage bottle caps. You might find some cool ones at antique, consignment or second-hand shops. Or just search bottle caps on Ebay. I found some nifty milk bottle caps - you never know what you're going to find.
• Check out this sweet shop, Bottle Cap Co

• Step one: Start collecting your bottle caps. This can take a while, so multi task! Brainstorm your ideas. Sketch em out, then try em!

• Check out this sweet wall installation made with bottle caps, paint and acrylic

• You can drill upcycled bottle caps and use them as-is for earrings, pins, keychains, magnets
• You can sorta paper mache on them
• You can collage inside them, using resin to protect your work
• You can paint in them!
• You can stamp over them!
• You can draw on them with a permanent marker!
• You can drill all kinds of interesting holes in them!
  

Even jewelry and bead artists with some experience behind their belts can have a hard time figuring out just what kind of metal it is they're dealing with. Jewelry buyers generally don't know either, and this can lead to a lot of confusion. 


What's The Plan, Stan?

• I'm going to break down the basic details of the various metals you may come across in your jewelry travels.

Beading Metals:

• Stirling Silver is softer and more malleable than most metals. It is prone to oxidization, when the metal begins to turn somewhat black.
• Gold
• When you work with gold, you will work with different gold carats. The carat measures the proportion of gold to other metal alloys, which make up the actual metal. The higher the carat, the higher the gold content, the higher the cost.
• There are a few different colors of gold:
• Yellow: pure gold with copper and zinc
• Rose: pure gold with copper
• White: pure gold with white metals such as silver and palladium
• Rhodium 
• A white metal, very similar to Platinum and is often used to enhance the color of white gold
• Platinum
• A very pure white metal when used in jewelry. It is dense and heavy and wicked expensive.
• Titanium
• A silver-grey-white-ish metal and has a wide array of colors. It is very strong, and very lightweight, however, it cannot be soldered.
• Surgical Steel
• Refers to a stainless steel, of the same grade that is used for surgical implanted or tools. It's an alloy of iron and carbon with chromium, molybdenum and a wee bit of nickel. It's actually pretty similar to Titanium, but not nearly as expensive.
• Copper
• A reddish-goldish metal, very maleable and inexpensive. It's recently very popular in jewelry, but you have to worry about oxidization.
• Brass
• An allow of copper and zinc, so it's generally darker and not as brilliant as copper. The more zinc, the darker the brass. The more copper, the redder the brass. It tends to be pretty hypoallergenic.
• Base Metal
• May be gold or silver colored, and thus all the more confusing
• Plated Metals
• Plated metals has a base of a non-precious metal, such as pewter or brass, which is covered in a thin layer of a precious metal, such as silver or gold. 
• The good thing is, plated metals are cheaper. However, you risk wearing through the layer of plated metal. 
• Vermeil
• This is a type of plating process, however, rather than using a non-precious base, it uses a sterling silver base
• Gold Filled
• AKA : Gold Overlay or Rolled Gold Plated
• Has several mechanically bonded layers, in which a non-precious base is covered with the outside layer of at least 10 Karat gold.

Since I decided to relaunch my jewelry making business with new vigor, I have been intrigued with two ideas. The first – to make eco-friendly, recycled jewelry. Whether you believe in climate change or not, most people agree that everything we do impacts the environment. I feel that there are many small (and some big) things we can all do to help reduce this impact. I have been experimenting and researching various ways to explore this in my jewelry designs.Check out 'Recycled Jewelry: Idea Introduction."

Making jewelry is expensive. There is just no way around it. So, I'm going to start handing you tips and tools for making it much more affordable, and in some cases free. Remember, the goal here is saving a dime, but also saving the environment.


What's The Plan, Stan?

• Raid your (and your friends') recyclables and trash
• Ok, I don't necessarily want you to go dumpster diving, but keep and eye out for:
• Soda and beer cans
• Bottle caps
• Plastic water, soda, juice etc bottles
• # 6 recyclable plastic - it will shrink when you heat it up (a fun tutorial to follow in the near future)
• Go through your magazines
• Most magazines have some pretty sweet pictures (after all, most of us only look at the pics anyways! Use 'em to make some beautiful beads, like the Tutorial on Scrabble Tile Pendants and Charms
• Keep your eye out for cool text and stuff (a sweet tutorial using these little treasures is sure to show up soon)

• Rummage through your drawer of miscellaneous hardware
• Look for cool string-able stuff, like washers. Or look for funky little stuff that you can glue on to make fantastic designs, like steampunk jewelry.
• Broken Technology
• We all have broken or old technology around. Take it apart and find some really sweet stuff to make nifty, geeky jewelry with
• Calculators
• Keyboards
• Ancient computers
• Those annoying broken remotes
• Ancient and broken phones (if you have ancient but working phones, you really should donate them to people who need them)
• Broken Watches
• How many of us have stupid non-functioning watches just kind of hanging out in our dresser drawers in the blind hope that one day they will miraculously begin ticking again. I'm not saying you should destroy your Rolex, but old and not especially valuable watches have some really nifty parts in them.
• The glass
• Rotart parts, hands etc
  
• Chips etc, if a digital watch
• Old Board Games
• What happens once you lose one of your game pieces? You can't exactly play the game, so it ends up collecting dust in some closset or cupboard. Instead, raid 'em for some wicked sweet jewelry
• Dominos
• Mahjong tiles
• Checkers
• Scrabble tiles (of course)
  
• Use your imagination!
  

Do you have any cool recycling/upcycling ideas? Let us know! Leave a comment below, or email me at cagarp@plymouth.edu.

Here are some links to some great Resin Casting Tutorials and Information I have found. Check them out and let me know what you think:

http://blog.resinobsession.com/2009/06/how-to-make-resin-jewelry-with-swirly.html
http://www.ehow.com/about_5081532_twopart-casting-resin.html
http://www.instructables.com/id/Resin-Jewelry-Tutorial-with-John-W.-Golden-part-1/

This etsy store has some great pendant settings:
http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6047415