Fifteen Minutes and more

This week's challenge from the Diva (link on the sidebar) was to complete a tangle in 15 minutes. I've got one entry for certain, one that I think was about fifteen minutes, and one that has nothing to do with the challenge and is just a new piece.

So, for my main entry:



Although I intended to "cheat" by just a few seconds by drawing the square outside of the time limit (since mine wasn't on a standard ZT square and I knew I couldn't do anything worth posting in 15 minutes on the full piece of cardstock), I finished up the design with just under a minute to the timer, so I actually did get it in the limit. :)

I'm not overly happy with the shading on it, but I'm still figuring out how to shade some of these. Materials: the usual 4 inch square on a 4.5 x 6.5 piece of cardstock, black micron pens (I think on this one, I used the 1, 03, 01, and 005), and the 01 sepia pen, with black prismacolor for what little shading I put on it. Tangle patterns used were "L" and Sundoo with dots for filler.


I don't know if my second one counts or not. For one thing, I did it before the challenge. For another, I don't know how long it actually took, but I know it was in roughly the 15 minute range since it was done while waiting for dinner. Mom and I were at Romano's Macaroni Grill for dinner, where they have those paper tablecloths and crayons on the table. I just started doodling and ended up with a ZIA:



Picture stinks since it's from my cell phone, and this cell phone has a worse camera on it than my older phone. But, there it is anyway. Done on a paper tablecloth, with crayon. I didn't do it with any particular challenge in mind, more keeping in mind the more meditative aspect that you hear about with sand mandalas. Where they'll create the mandalas in incredible detail, keep them for a short period (Day maybe?), then dust the sand away. I have a very hard time letting go of things sometimes, so I'm trying to learn to do that a bit better.

Besides, I had paper, crayon, and time... what else was I going to do? *grin* I tried teaching mom a few of the techniques (she's an artist as well, and my primary teacher), but she has a hard time with the ZT process. She was drawing her own thing instead: butterflies, cats, roses, and trying to come up with strings that I could use. :D


The final one to post is another use of the meditation aspect of ZT. I was in a stressful meeting where most of my time was spent waiting. Those waiting with me said they didn't mind if I pulled out the materials, so I worked on this ZIA. Got about 90% done by the time the meeting was done. And, the meeting ended fairly well. I don't think there's any real symbolism in this one, unlike what happened with "Seeking Balance." But I do like it. It was also one of the first real uses of the colored pens.



Materials used: the usual cardstock with the usual 4 inch square, black micron pens, sepia micron pens, some colored Microns, but the majority of the color is from Staedtler Triplus fineliner pens. I had a small kit of them at home, but I've been wanting a fine grey pen that is not a brush tip, and found a good grey in the Staedtler 20 pack. And since it had several other colors that would fill in holes, we got it. I'm rather happy with them, actually. Oh, and the shading on this one is the cool grey Prismacolor I usually use.

Tangles in this one: "L", BTL Joos, Buttercup, Sez, Wud, Blooming Butter, Drupe, Chillon, whatever you call the fill "officially" used in the "L" pattern, a bunch of dots, and I guess that would be a variation on Opus