Passing grades

Often Spoonflower will do contests with a required set of colors, but usually there will be some kind of theme as well. For this one, we had to use coral, mint, black and white - these shades specifically:

Color by COLOURlovers

But there were no other parameters. So there were nearly 700 entries, the largest set ever. It made for quite a long voting process! I figured most people would use white as a background, so I immediately decided to use black instead. I was in the mood to make a floral, so I thought of making it like a calico. I used some of my favorite flowers: jasmine, honeysuckle, orange blossoms, and fuchsia.



This did moderately well - almost into the top third. There were a number of other florals/botanicals that I liked, as well as this cute little map.

Another contest was "rockets." Obviously the main focus was supposed to be on the space ship type of rocket, but I wanted to branch out from that. The word "rocket" can also refer to fireworks or arugula, so I combined those two things (the colors are from my previous space ship related design):



This made it well into the top third. My favorites were the control panel repeat and the abstract take on Apollo rockets.

One very specific theme was "Kittens in Mittens." I focused mostly on the mitten part, and did little paw-tread mittens in this color scheme I'm still trying to get a good use out of.



This got 155 votes and actually made it into the top quartile! My favorite entry was this one.

Well, *I* liked them

Continuing my ridiculous amount of catchup, here are some contest entries which I liked, but made little impression on my fellow voters.

For the theme "penguins," I did a little assortment of penguins hanging out on various levels of an icy landscape. The colors are some of the some from the fishing lures entry - and I'm much happier with how the color usage turned out this time.



This barely made it out of the bottom fifth. My favorite was this graphic Antarctic layout.

Moving on to another animal theme, there was another cat-related contest. This time, however, we had to try to do a "cubist" style. Hmm. I gathered up a few pieces of at least semi-cubist art here, to try to get away from the "The Dream"/"Nude Descending a Staircase" axis of cubism. I tried to convey the nonstop movement of kittens by having extra legs and tails.



The colors came from this set, which someone made in honor of their own cat:


Color by COLOURlovers

This placed about the same as the penguins. My favorite entry was this one - I felt it referenced the cubist style but still was pattern you could see being used somewhere.

Finally, there was a contest to make a cut-and-sew pattern for a plushie version of some mythological creature. I went with a changeling, as there's a longstanding family joke that I'm actually a fairy changeling, and the real Amanda is off somewhere with the fairies and elves. I had a lot of fun coming up with a whole playset, rather than a single stuffed animal.



Not only are there two babies (one human, one...maybe not), each with their own little bassinet and blanket to allow you to stage a little swap, there are a few things related to changeling folklore. There's a pair of iron scissors - if you leave them open sitting near the crib, it stops the fairies from coming and changing out the babies. Then there's a bowl of eggshells. If you suspect your baby of being a changeling already, you can leave the bowl next to the fire (as if cooking with it). This will eventually confuse the changeling enough that it's forced to ask what you're doing, thus blowing its cover.

I can't wait to get this and sew it together!

Anyhow, fond as I am of this, it didn't get all that many votes, and just squeaked out of the bottom quartile. My favorites were the Grim Reaper, Puss-in-Boots, jackalope, and cyclops.

Inspired by the deadline

Having spent a lot of my recent months in a bit of a time crunch, I've had several contest entries that I had to whip out at the last minute. And for the most part, it really shows!

One of the toughest themes to deal with was "marching band" - not one that resonates with me. Also it's hard to come up with something that conveys the idea but can still be quickly executed. My husband came up with the idea of having the band marching in formations that are themselves musical instruments used by the band. I also tried to go for a bit of an Ed Emberley look. Not super pleased with how it came out, but it's the beginning of an idea at least. The individual marchers are cute, but the layout is not very attractive.



This came in the bottom fifth of entries. My favorites were the ones inspired by the traditional uniform braids and the "self-marching band."

The very next week, I also had very little time. The challenge was to make a cat-themed damask. I went with a damask that could have been made BY a cat:



I made a brush in Gimp shaped like a paw print, and used that to outline a traditional damask. Since there's so much symmetry, I only had to draw a portion of it, then mirrored it, so it came together pretty quickly. This version, which came in the bottom quarter of the contest, is ginger cat colored, and I also made a grey tabby colorway. I was inspired by these cat-colored yarns, but got all my colors from this set:

Color by COLOURlovers

My favorite was this ultra-cute one.

But it's not all bottom-of-the heap. This year's Valentine's Day contest also had to have a steampunk theme. I had maybe two hours to make it from start-to-finish, so I used a clipart heart and a gear to get the shapes right, the colors below, and my pre-existing knit and isometric lines patterns.


Color by COLOURlovers



I got 147 votes for this, and almost made it into the top quartile. I want to make an alternate version that has the hearts rotated in all four directions so it's more usable, but haven't had the chance yet. My favorite entry was this one.