butterflies!

Hello beautiful person! It's time for my first progress report about the playing card project I have on Kickstarter, which I'm thrilled to be 50% funded after only three days!  Thank you to everyone who has helped me reach my goal!

I decided to launch into the two butterflies that will be used for the diptych card first. They proved to be very labor intensive, but I'm happy with the results. Using my handy dandy Butterfly and Moth reference guide, I decided to us the shapes of the Giant Swallowtail Butterfly and the Common Blue butterflies. I created some large templates in paper first, then traced them onto my wood.

As mentioned previously, these are going to be used to create two cards that will work together as a diptych--the body will be split down the middle to make the two cards. I decided to cut out some general shapes of tools to set the foundation for the blue one, and used some rosette moldings for the colorful one.

The finished butterflies are 14 inches wide. I am going to attach hardware on the back so they can be hung on the wall alone, although I think they'd be quite nice in a shadow box.

The blue one has already been reserved by one lucky Kickstarter backer, but at the time of this posting, the colorful one is still up for grabs!

Here's how they will look as the cards--remember that one butterfly will be on each side.

 Both diptychs are also available as high quality 8x10" prints as a backer reward. (sorry--I know the scale is off on my in situ simulation below, but I wanted to give you the general idea.....) I'll have a limited edition of these diptychs available for sale after the campaign ends if you have your eye on another reward.

Again, my heartfelt thanks to everyone who has backed the project so far!  I'll start launching into the birds this week, so stay tuned for my next update!