Aye, Eye Captain - Project Quilting

"Aye, Eye Captain," 23" x 5", made by Pam Geisel for Project Quilting, Season 10, Challenge 4: Pixel Play, Feb. 2019 in Yellow Springs, Ohio

Challenge recap for "Pixel Play":

Be inspired by digital pixelation.

I had so many ideas for this challenge but I decided to kill two birds with one stone and make something for a special Sacred Threads exhibit Eye Contact: Creating a Connection where they are going to display quilts of human eyes. The only requirement is that the size be 23" wide by 5" high. (They are due May 31, 2019 so if you want to play along, click the link above. They can be any style and don't have to be pixelated).

I found a photo to use as a reference and I move the eyes a little closer to each other then I used Photoshop to pixelate the image. (Filter / Pixelate / Mosaic) and I played around with that. Since the high was limited to 5" I decided my pixelation would be with half inch squares so I'd have 46 across and 10 high.

Then I selected the fabrics. This is when having a large stash comes in handy. It took awhile to cut and place all the pieces and I also spent some time moving pieces around and swapping some out. I ended up using over 30 different fabrics and some of them I used both the right side and the wrong side.

When I couldn't decide if there was enough contrast between two fabrics, I'd lay them next to each other and cover them with a piece of paper that had a half inch square cut in it. If they looked too similar I'd get a different piece of fabric.

Since I don't have a design wall, I had the pieces on my cutting mat and when I thought I was close I'd take a photo then hold the camera away from my face and see if there were any places that I wanted to change.

I used a piecing method where you place the squares on fusible innerfacing then sew the pieces in rows and columns. Center Street Quilts has a good tutorial on her blog although I'd add that you should top or stay stitch 1/8" around the outside edges to keep those pieces from flapping up. Since my pieces were only half an inch when sewn, my back was lots of seams.

Seems like a lot of seams!

Because I tend to sew with a generous 1/4" seam allowance my piece ended up being a little larger than the 23" x 5" I was aiming for but I was able to trim off a few rows to make it the right size, which reinforces to me that I don't really like to make something to a certain size.

I only added minimal quilting with some stitch-in-the-ditch (not really visible on the front but you can see a little on the back and over my label which I like to add before I quilt but write on afterwards).

I usually like to use a knife-edge facing to bind my quilts but I was worried about the bulk from all the seams and I kind of liked having the thin blue binding along the edge so I did that instead.

I'm happy with the way it came out but I don't think I'm going to be doing another piece that has half inch squares in it.

More about Aye, Eye Captain.

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Click on any of the photos to see larger images.

To read more about Project Quilting, go here.

To see other entries for this challenge, visit the Pixel Play page.