iMixed Media

More schmincke, originally uploaded by carolsLittleWorld.

One of the great things about the iPhone is that it also lends itself to working with mixed media. Because it’s so easy to use as a camera, and because it’s so easy to get images from the Phone to the web (or to your computer) you can do stuff like paint on photos or print on odd papers. It’s also really easy to get square images, oddly shaped photos, and the like from the iPhone, which lends itself to mixed media very well. Sure, the quality of the resulting images might not always be twenty seven and a half megapixels but, for mixed media use, you really don’t need that anyway, so the iPhone holds its ground here.

One of the projects I’m working on now is an iPhone show. I’m going to have 25 small images on display, printed 6×6 and mounted on art boards. After the show is over, I’ll probably take the remaining 6×6 art boards and use them with encaustic medium, dripping wax over the surface to create an array of small encaustic pieces. I’ll then take these small square wax coated boards and screw them together, to make a larger installment or possibly leave some of them out to have smaller pieces. It will probably morph itself into another show, this time all encaustic-based. All of this made possible by the trusty little iPhone.

You really don’t need a “big” camera to do stuff like this, in fact, the iPhone is probably better at it then the “real” camera because, with the “real” camera you’d be fussing over light, color, contrast, and the like, not to mention having to process them for printing. The iPhone does a lot of that for you, not to mention it’s highly portable and created stylized images right from the start.

They have started to make some iPhone-enabled printers or printers that allow you to upload directly from the iPhone and print, without going through your computer. These printers that allow you to bypass your computer could be really handy when doing this kind of mixed media type of work, especially if they can handle different types of paper. There are a lot of people printing on odd types of paper now too, stuff like mulberry and the like, and this too could lend itself well to iPhone images.

So, if you’re a watercolorist, pastelist, encaustic painter, or if you just like to play around, the iPhone camera offers something for you. Try some mixed media with the little guy and see what you can come up with or trying taking some prints from your iPhone camera into another medium to see what they can do. It just be might loads of fun, so long as nobody tries to call you in the middle of it all.

Until next time…