Subtle or Startling?

Monotangle (done in MapTangling style) of Betweed. Using Micron 01 in black; shaded with General Chalk pencils. Shadow tangling in the background just using a tortillion (same tortillion used for shading, so had some shadow color on it from the chalk pencils). Inspired by Zenjo's YouTube video.

I noticed my British friend and teacher extraordinaire,  Jo, has a YouTube channel (why didn't I know this before?) and I took a look today.  She did a lovely job demo-ing one of my old favorite tangles, Betweed.  I've loved this tangle forever and used to use it all the time.  Why did I stop?  Like a lot of things, it just passed out of my consciousness at some point and I haven't done it in years.  What a welcome reminder.

I had time to experiment this afternoon and decided to use her video to do this monotangle version of it.  Soooooooo relaxing.  But rather than do it plain, as she did, I used a tile I had previously prepped for MapTangling, and used that as a technique.  Well then I couldn't leave well-enough alone so I did some shadow work in a couple of the negative space surrounding the motif.  This was totally fun.  I liked the depth and subtlety.

Ah, but I thought I might run it through an app on my iPhone to see how it would look.  Holy crow!  It went from subtle to glaring.  You had better wear your darkest sunglasses for this version below (altered by the iPhone app).

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Same photo as above, altered by a filter on the iPhone app. Yikes! Very bright and the background shading is gone.

Once I start playing with the iPhone to alter a photo, it turns into a project all on its own.  Using another iPhone app, I came up with all of these:

Variation #1. Like the distressed look of this one.

Variation #2. Somewhat smeary but I like it, and can still see the shadows in the negative space.

Variation #3. This was a surprise! Much smearier and closer to a painting, but I like the altered colors and negative space shadows.

Variation #4. Also fun use of different colors and the effect it had not only on the tangle but also on the negative space.

There is something to be said for each of them.  Besides, it's so much fun being able to play with alternatives.  It's even more fun greeting an old friend--this tangle--one I haven't seen for awhile. 

I imagine we will all feel that way once the pandemic is over and we are able to see each other in person again.  We can Zoom, and that's helpful, but to be able to spend time with old friends and hug each other again...priceless.

“Friendship is the only cement that will ever hold the world together.”
– Woodrow Wilson
“A day without a friend is like a pot without a single drop of honey left inside.”
– Winnie the Pooh