July 2021 Quilt Challenge – Week 3 – Part 3

Hey there, I’m back for another installment of the Quilt Challenge – part 3 for week 3. If you missed the first two parts they can be found under Week 3-Part 1 and Week 3-Part 2.

I left off the last two posts with 2 small 5 inch blocks made from each of the line drawings I made from the busy feature fabrics I chose in week one.

Today I created another 2 – 5 inch blocks, but this time in grey scale. How did I figure out the grey scale of these fabrics. First I took a photo of the block and then edited it in my phone. Most phones have a grey scale option in the edit mode of the photo app. I had three options to choose from: monochromatic, silver screen or noir. I chose noir. I could also have used my computers photo program to change it or a program like PhotoShop. The thing about turning a coloured photo to black white is that you can then determine the value of the fabric. In a nut shell value is the lightness or darkness of a fabric.

I turned each of the squares to grey scale and then set about choosing black, grey and white fabrics to replace the coloured fabrics. I used the black version on my phone and was surprised to see that the middle blue fabric reads darker than the orange and blue on either side of it, but here in this photo that I turned to black on my computer it does not.

Curvy lines create this multi coloured block — Applique block

Odd shaped pieces in this multi coloured block — Pieced block

At first I found I was pulling out a lot of prints and having troubles making them work – not getting the values I needed. I walked away from it, went to visit a friend and on the way home thought I am making this too difficult, over thinking the whole exercise.

Multiple fabrics for grey scale version of block

I realised that I just want the fabric to be the value it doesn’t need to replace the pattern in the fabric as well. Once that was in my head then it was so much easier to create the blocks.

Once again I appliquéd this block and I love how the grey scale turned out.

greyscale fabrics — Applique block in grey scale

The second block was pieced and I didn’t quite replicate the block in the grey scale because I didn’t make templates for the piecing. So it’s close but not quite the same – almost.