The making of kelp! (a series of unfortunate realizations)
Step 1: Buy some Rowan Glace because it’s pretty and you want good stitch definition for this project.
Step 2: Open Photoshop. Oh wait, no Photoshop in this household! Open the Gimp instead (free baby, free). Curse at the Gimp, because ugh, it really sucks.
Step 3: Realize that there’s about seven fonts that the gimp has access to. Pick a nice one anyway, blow it up extra-large, italicize. Go get some knitter’s graph paper in your gauge (super awesome resource, btw) and superimpose the italic script on the graph paper. Fudge it around a bit until it looks good.
Step 4: Start some fair isle knitting (baby’s first fair isle!). Realize that your tension is crap. Rip everything apart.
Step 5: Restart fair isle. Realize that the font is too skinny and looks terrible and rip again.
Step 6: Repeat step 3, bolding the font to make it plumper.
Step 7: Fair isle knitting again. Looks like crap. Rip and redo in intarsia.
Step 8: Finally done knitting! Wet block it on some towels.
Step 9: Realize that you’re clearly unable to eyeball a rectangular shape. Print out a few sheets of the knitter’s graph papar, tape them together, place a sheet of saran wrap on top (so that the damp knitting doesn’t make the paper wrinkle) and reblock to a grid.
Step 10: Photograph. The camera does not want to represent the colors accurately in any way. Take a boatload of photos over the course of a few days.
Step 11: Realize that the stitches look like crap. Whose brilliant idea was it to use rope-like cotton for this, anyway? Photoshop it (with Gimp) to death.
Step 12: Crop the image. Wish that this was knit this much wider, so that the kelp! would be nice and small in the lower corner, surrounded by a sea of stitches. Regret not intarsia-ing “kelp! knits” instead. Realize that stitches still suck, and the p is leaning forward in an unflattering manner.
Step 13: Pause for a few months, get new website, finally put the banner up. Realize that banner is massive. Huge. Ugh.
Want to see some crappy intarsia? The heavily edited version is below - mouse over for the original:
I really shouldn’t be so down on poor kelp! up there, but I’m really regretting my choice of cotton for this - it shows off every single wonky stitch. I’m inclined to knit another one, because I Am Anal Retentive.
Well enjoy, and remember, kids - friends don’t let friends knit sloppy intarsia!
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Before I saw this post, I honestly didn’t think you touched it up! It’s hard to get fine lines of intarsia to look perfect, and even harder in cotton. Wool would have been a bit more forgiving, but you already knew that.
None of that matters now, because the final product looks really good. Almost perfect, actually. If it were any better, someone might think it was made on a knitting machine. (GASP!)
Since you’re a perfectionist, I can’t convince you of this…but there is NO NEED
DAMMIT. I was trying to turn off caps lock and I ended up submitting my comment before I was ready, with only two more words left to type. I’ll continue:
…but there is NO NEED to reknit.
I think the bits that you gimped (heh, double-entendre) will come out fine after they’ve had a little time to mellow and shake out. It looks great though! Great colour choices and good stitch definition. I agree with Staci, no need to reknit.
Funny, I was just thinking that it looked so perfect that I was wondering if you found some site that colored in stitches for you! But now that you mention it, I can see how it’s not perfect, but I still think it looks awesome!
Thanks for the story behind the banner! I think it came out GREAT!!! :)
you are so cute in your anal retentiveness
I think it came out great! I thought that it might not be real because it looked so nice. :)
I was really impressed with the fact that you knit yourself a banner, and then kept going after it wasn’t cooperating. It looks great!
The header looks great! Give the Anal Retentive a vacation :)
totally agree with jet. it looks great and no need to reknit anything. :)
maybe a nice wool will be better for it - cushier stitches and blocking will help more….I think it looks great! Kudos to you for all the effort!
I’m cracking up - I thought you had figured out a way to take a swatch of plain knitting and photoshopped the blue color on for the banner. But you knit it?!? Color me impressed. It looks fabulous, no need to reknit it at all!
LOL - very funny sequence! The final results look great; I’m impressed. :)
Hi! Just wanted to let you know that this submission made it into this month’s Yarnival! You can view the issue on my blog. Thanks for submitting! Have a GREAT DAY!
Haha, great story! And for all that work, the banner came out great! Don’t worry, my intarsia would have looked worse with the cotton.
I am definitely going to have to get this Photoshop that everyone is talking about if it can make my knitting look perfect! What version of PS do you use?
Even untouched your intarsia is quite well done, especially as it is done in cotton - no easy feat!
The GIMP does not suck! :P
That looks like a lot of work - but the results are great.