Category: birds

taking pictures

April 13, 2007

by annwood

It did get a bit brighter yesterday for picture taking but I still needed a little artificial enhancement so I invested a total of about 15 minutes and 8 bucks in putting together a sort of simple light box I found at Make. I used drafting velum instead of interfacing and I had one florescent bulb and one incandescent ( wish I had two florescent) which were clipped on either side. I would have shown you the clip lights ( which I already had) but that would have meant taking a wider shot and revealing some embarrassing disarray here in birdville.

Here are a couple bird portraits taken in the box:

This is the daily bird abra

and nan. She’ll be in the shop at one.

Pretty simple and it made the difference in being able to take at least acceptable pictures on a lousy day in a place where I’m already kind of light challenged particularly in the afternoon.

april showers

April 12, 2007

by annwood

It’s pouring in Brooklyn

and dark. I hope it brightens up at least a little because I need to take photos for tomorrow’s little shop update. It doesn’t look promising though and I might try making one of these.

Here is Batina, today’s daily bird looking very confident on a much nicer day in Prospect Park.

and here she is in her official shop portrait looking far less sure of herself and a little suspicious of the entire affair.

spider attack

April 11, 2007

by annwood

A little band of marauding spiders. These guys will be on their way to Nest in San Francisco.

And the daily bird marybeth.

She’ll be in the shop in about 15 minutes.

the daily bird

April 10, 2007

by annwood

Beginning today and for an indefinite period I’m going to post one little bird for sale everyday in my shop Monday through Friday. At least for now they will each be one of a kind made from some tiny pieces of my favorite vintage fabric I’ve been saving. Sometimes the bird will be fancy and sometimes simple. The time of the post will vary but I’ll put a notice in the shop of the time the day before. The first daily bird is jane and she’ll be in the shop at 1PM. ( I would have given you more notice but wordpress was being all squirrely and weird this morning)

Elegant Bride

April 9, 2007

by annwood

I got pretty overwhelmed and accidentally didn’t post a single thing last week so this week I’m going to make up for it with a post every day. I’m still trying to get through a daunting backlog of work and email but there is a tiny glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. A long overdue shop update will happen Friday the 13th at 1 PM EST also I’m going to start ” a bird a day” tomorrow. I’ll post one new bird for sale everyday Monday through Friday.

I finished a cake topper over the weekend. This one is spoken for but I’ve got several in progress that will be in the shop within a couple weeks.

Some little birds had their magazine debut in the spring issue of Elegant Bride. The Designer is Matthew Robbins of Artfool.

beautiful day

March 27, 2007

by annwood

It was a spectacular day in brooklyn today. I wish I could have spent the whole day outside taking pictures. This is marymargret in Prospect Park.

I was hoping to start my “bird a day” program tomorrow but I’ve got an ad job that I think is going to screw that up.

Besides the gorgeous day today another nice bonus was finding pictures of fantastic paper mache from one of my favorite artists on Flickr here.

paper mache tea party

March 22, 2007

by annwood

Things got so busy around Christmas I never got to photograph Johnson’s Christmas window so here’s a little bit of it now.

* If I owe you an email – sorry and I’m hoping to get entirely caught up over the weekend. *

* I’ll update my shop as soon as I’m caught up on wholesale orders. In the meantime, I’m going to start posting one bird a day next week. More details on that later.*

* Earth Angel Toys has a blog now.*

spiders and birds

March 9, 2007

by annwood

I’m making lots of new birds and I’m planning on a little shop update soon.

Some spiders in progress :

It looks like they’re having a little brawl, a spider melee.

Most of these things are going to lovely Cog and Pearl in Brooklyn.

new creatures

March 1, 2007

by annwood

I’ve been thinking of making some more realistic (or at least reality inspired) creatures, especially shore birds. These are my first : a baby Loggerhead Sea Turtle and a Lesser Yellowlegs.

miss havisham

February 16, 2007

by annwood

This poor wretched ANCIENT wedding dress is destined to become birds and ship sails and cake toppers and maybe a white owl. The morning it arrived I took it out of the box and put it on immediately. This also happened to be the morning I finished the swiss dot fabric wedding cake and cake topper (below) and that was sitting on my big work table. If I had any balls at all I would have used the timer and taken a picture of that little miss havisham tableaux for you but you’ll just have to use your imagination.

I think the satin is mostly too damaged to use but there’s tons and tons of good lace.

happy valentine’s day!

February 14, 2007

by annwood

These are a few Valentine birds in progress last week doing a little Ester Williams synchronized swimming number for you. When they were finished they went off to Artfool to be part of a special Valentine arrangement.

wedding cake topper

February 6, 2007

by annwood

Yesterday’s glittery little photo was a little tiny top hat for a groom bird. Below are some of the other bits and pieces that became a cake topper I’ve been thinking about forever.

I love this antique lace so much I almost couldn’t use it. Luckily I’ve got a pretty deluxe stash of old lace for dolling up future bird brides. I’ll show you some time.

I had a ball making it. Here they are coming

and going

and on a swiss dot and seam binding cake.

The cake is sitting on a paper mache cake stand. I love a cake stand. The whole thing is in the window at Kim Johnson’s Shop on Orchard St. She has some new valentiney birds for sale as well. More on the bird madness at my shop this morning and other places you can buy a bird later. The cake toppers will be available soon in my shop and a couple other places, feel free to email if you have an immediate need.