My Interpretation of How to Do Pieced Interpretations and Appliqued Interpretations of a Photograph

I have freely borrowed from my class with Ruth McDowell although I have done my own interpretations.

 How to Do a Pieced Interpretation of a Picture

1. Choose your photograph.
2. Make sure you have at least an 8 ½ x 11 inch copy in color as you will want to refer to that when piecing.
3. Convert to black and white to see how much contrast you have
4. Posterize the photograph.  I use Picasa  but you could use Photoshop if  you have it.
5. Trace over the whole photograph trying to get all the key areas of changes in value resulting in a detailed outline.
6. Blow up the traced photograph to at least double size
7. Start deconstructing the image by determining the strongest and longest line you can draw. Continue to place lines in developing some large sections and no y seams.  Continue until you can start to see the original image somewhat. First you break down into big areas and then you sub-divide those large areas into smaller areas.
8. Take your now deconstructed image to Staples and get blown up to the size you want. They can only go to about 24 x 36 so you may need to break down your image if you want it bigger or use an online program to do this. I make two copies, one to use as a master copy and one to cut into sections as I work in sections.  Ruth McDowell auditions fabrics over the whole image which I don't do.  Mary at my art quilt group suggested putting the image in Excel which will tile it!  I had thought of it but didn't follow through.
9. Tape together enough freezer paper to complete cover your new image. Trace the image onto the shiny side of the freezer paper.
10. Turn the freezer paper over and mark the intersections of pieces with x's and put matching marks along the sides.
11. Outline the large sections with colored pencils or pens and slowly number each piece with a section letter and a number. The numbers should more or less correspond to piecing order. Number and outline the sections on your master copy. Also you can begin to hint at colors you want at this point.
12. Get into your stash and get as many fabrics as you can find that might work  in the piece.  You won't use them all but it's nice to have choices.  Ruth uses a lot of different interesting fabrics.  I tend to use a lot of my hand dyes and "create" fabrics by sewing a bunch of fabrics together and then using them like one fabric.
13. Decide which fabrics go where – make a guide if you need to.
14. Iron freezer paper onto the back side of colors you are using and roughly cut around leaving room. Trim to ¼ inch and then start assembling pieces.
15. Pin each assembled section onto the master pattern on a design wall of some kind.  Make adjustments in colors or pieces at this point.  Leave the freezer paper in as you may want to take out pieces and change.
16. Final assembly is sewing the big sections together.  

This is the back of the above piece (upside down which I didn't notice!).

If You Just Want to Use Raw Edge Applique of Your Picture  

1. Do Steps 1-4 Above.
2. Blow up the photograph to the size you want your final piece.
3. Trace key areas onto clear plastic.
4. Trace the clear plastic drawing onto the shiny side of freezer paper. If there are layers, you may need to trace onto more than one piece of freezer paper (face outline on one perhaps, with the features on another).
5. Number the pieces on the plastic as well as the back side of the freezer paper.
6. Iron freezer paper onto double sided fusible. Iron double sided fusible onto the back of appropriate pieces and trim.
7. Use the plastic copy on top of the background to make sure the pieces get placed in their proper positions. 

You can see the steps in the above piece which I called Colin Deconstructed.  It always amazes me with this piece that you can see Colin even in the very beginning panel.

For a closer look with some pictures, go to the blog entry called Picture Piecing Steps which is has a  link on the left side of the blog under Popular Blog Entries.  I use this myself to remind myself of how to do this.