Artwork SPN_J2_BigBang 2020 - the first

[beelikej]

I was very lucky to be able to claim my two favorite summaries in the 2020 spn_j2_bigbang. This one lured me in with a description of a steampunky world. That's the style I wanted to capture in paper. An unexpected work-load sucked up a lot of my time and energy (both mentally and physically) so I had to adjust my wildest plans, but I still managed to create the city I imagined from the story:) Go read the fic to find out more about Jensen's theatre and Jared's ambitions to turn the town upside down. May I present:



Title: The Rising Tide [also on AO3]
Author: tsuki_no_bara
Artist: beelikej
Art Rating: G | Medium: Paper cutting & folding
Fic Rating: NC17 | Pairing: Jensen/Jared [RPF AU] | Word count: 30K
Warnings/Enticements: Blatant pro-labor sentiment. Vague understanding of the inner workings of theaters. Occasional Chad.
Summary: Jared and Jensen live in the big city at the dawn of the new century. Jensen manages a run-down theater with a generous but strong-willed owner, structural issues, and the occasional equipment malfunction. Jared works in a mill producing heavy-duty canvas for the airships being built outside the city. He's trying to convince his fellow millworkers to strike for better conditions, better hours, and better pay, despite the cops' tendency to break strikes up with violence and jail. But if that one works, he has a bigger idea – a city-wide general strike, involving enough people in enough industries stopping enough work to make the owners take notice and finally meet the workers' demands.

Or, the one in which Jensen runs a neighborhood theater, Jared is organizing millworkers, and everything looks vaguely late steampunk.

Dividers










Sketches & Set up

First doodles after reading


A rough papercut draft


I wanted high lettering to fit with the high buildings. A quick trace to figure out size and spacing.


Yeah, I think this might work.

Making the Dividers

I initially sketched simple theatre masks (happy/sad) and then made them more steampunky with mechanical elements.


Because the 3D header was going to be rather precise, I wanted to do somewhat freestyle cutting for the dividers:)


Steampunk theatre glasses (based on this funky pair)


Lost some details from the sketch with the papercutting, but I think it's still recognizable.


Sketched the cogs on the computer, then traced them with pencil for cutting, changing some of the smaller details.


Still tiny bits to cut out. Just like the glasses, the shuttle looses a lot of details in papercut form, I like the shape though:)


Dividers are done. Time for straight line cutting, starting with the text. (Using a print as a template)

Cutting the title



Tadaah!

Final cut- and fold test

The definite set up of the storyheader; figuring out all the different folds (with different colours)




No, I'm not burning the whole thing down; this was an experiment to create actual smoke-stacks, but as it turns out, smoke is really difficult to photograph. (I also got really nervous from the fire, so I quickly ditched that idea)




Transfering the definite set-up to the title paper. I wanted to use the cutlines to make a copy cut, but after the test folding it was impossible to get the paper flat enough to use as a template, so I ended up making a pencil copy for the final cut.


Trying real hard to cut neat little circles, pffff.


Ahahahaha, drew the windows on the front instead of the back of the paper /o\ Only made that mistake once. *kisses eraser*


Done!


Now for the folding...




...and sticking the background on.


Paper can be so wobbly, grrrr.


Photoshoot! Tried the background of New York, didn't quite work out.


A sneak peek of the support system with a white background. In the end I settled for a grey background. The last picture is the one I used for the final Story Header:)

Credits
FONTS: Smorgasbord (Title - some letters were slightly edited by me) & Thirsty Rough (Names)
References: Callis Cards Camden for paperfolding & Wikipedia for adorable old pictures of steam trams in the Netherlands:)


Thank you, tsuki_no_bara for the world-building and for letting me play with paper. Sorry we had to kill a couple of darlings behind the scenes, but I had fun working with you:)
Also a big thanks to wendy for organizing this fantastic fandom event again. <3

J.


P.S. This folding design was a further exploration of the technique I used for my BB2014. For my other previous paper projects, check the papercuttingart tag:)

More of my artsy fiddlings: Artmasterlist 2010-2018 | Artmasterlist 2019 and beyond

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