Stain Book Text

Stain

(stān) Pronunciation Key

v.

stained, stain·ing, stains

v.

tr. 1. 2. 3. 4.

To discolor, soil, or spot. To bring into disrepute; taint or tarnish. To color (glass, for example) with a coat of penetrating liquid dye or tint. To treat (specimens for the microscope) with a reagent or dye that makes visible certain structures with out without affecting others.

v. intr. To produce or receive discolorations. n. 1. A discolored or soiled spot or smudge. 2. A blemish on one’s moral character or reputation. 3. A liquid substance applied especially to wood that penetrates the surface and imparts a rich color. 4. A reagent or dye used for staining microscopic specimens.

[Middle English steinen, partly from Old French desteindre, desteign-, to deprive of color (des-, dis- + teindre, to dye from Latin tingere), and partly from Old Norse steina, to paint.] stain’a·ble adj., stain’er n. Synonyms: These nouns denote a mark of discredit or disgrace, as on one’s good name: a stain on his honor; the blot of treason; the brand of cowardice; the stigma of ignominious defeat; the taint of vice.



As you can tell, just from the dictionary definition, stains are perceived to be negative, annoying consequences of our every day life. They have no particular form or shape and are entirely random. The random, unexpected creation of these marks is probably what causes them to annoy us so much.

No one likes surprise’s. Why is it that a clean white t-shirt isn’t viewed in the same way as a clean blank canvas ? The marks that an artist may strive to achieve with his paintbrush are often created entirely by accident in act of spilling or dropping food and drink on to any of our consumerist possessions. So why can’t we look up onto a coffee stained table and appreciate the symmetrical, water marked ringlets where our mugs once stood and think wow. If people can appreciate paintings that may contain nothing but one single block of colour then surely they can appreciate the random yet beautiful simplicity of a stain. Any artist or designer at some point or another comes across the need to recreate something from nature or a random occurrence, such as a paint splatter or a cracked piece of glass. Yet these are also two examples of things that anger people. Most people would greet a paint splatter on their brand new carpet with a tirade of abusive thoughts and sounds. Then why is it that the exact same splatter on paper can become art and instantly appreciated? Maybe some people just don’t like art and would rather live in a clean white utopia where there is no colour or clutter, but most do not. There’s few living rooms that don’t contain at least one painting or drawing, that’s met with a feeling of appreciation and wonder. So why can’t the entire surface of your living room be appreciated in the same way, and looked at with eyes wide open.

I think stains are beautiful.

Despite the word ‘stain’ having a negative definition, It’s still occasionally used in a normal positive way. When it comes to picking out laminate flooring for example, stains are used instead of renders or colour’s. So what is it that makes these stains more beautiful than the ones on your coffee table, if anything at all.

Is it the uniformity? Does a uniform stain fool the onlooker into thinking everything has been done and created intentionally? So if i were to apply this logic, I could spill a drink repeatedly down my top and eventually it would become a ‘design’. It doesn’t seem to work this way though.

Is it because It’s been bought? Is the stain on a bought product more appealing because it simply must have been carefully designed for you to have parted money? Maybe the modern mind just can’t commonly appreciate the unintentional any more, a good example being ripped denim jeans. There’s no good reason not too buy a normal pair and customise them, but nowadays that’s just not good enough. If you don’t have the branded ripped jeans then they can’t be good quality or appealing in anyway.

Maybe its because unintentional looking design has become so normal and standardized that we can no longer appreciate true unintentional marks in our every day lives.

So when do bad stains turn good? Here are a few examples of how marks and splatters have been incorporated into modern designs. The T-shirt at the top contains a very trendy paint splatter effect that is used all to commonly nowadays, along with the nike trainers below. The tea bag looking dress at the bottom is very much at the opposite end of the fashion spectrum, with a tea stained baggy look, that certainly won’t be seen in the nearest top shop any time soon. You have to wonder why this is though. A tea stain isn’t any more radical that a paint splatter but its not used in common design at all. I’m not by any means even saying they should be incorporating all manner of stains into design, but when you sit down and think, its really quite strange how we perceive designed marks and stains.

Whiter means Cleaner So despite peoples willingness to have t shirts with paint splatter effects, phones with multi coloured crazy cases and website designs with dirty grunge fonts/ colours, the idea stuck in every ones mind is that white equals clean. I don’t mean clean in an aesthetical sense, I mean in a biologically cleaner sense. When we look at a stained anything, we assume its dirty, when infact it’s exactly the same but marked differently (unless you fall in poo or somthing), The Daz adverts stuck in your head makes you wants you to wage a war upon any slight blemish until it’s gone. So is it because we, as analy retentive human beings, cant stand the site of a random stain? Or is it because we’re scared of how other followers of the Daz philosophy will look at us?

Stains are everywhere and everything As the dictionary says, a stain can discolour, spot,tarnish and taint. So if we define clean as being white or in its original state, then surly everything is stained. A blank page, a clean, t shirt, an empty sky or an empty space are all waiting to be changed by a mark, an image or a person. So stain really means change but we chose to have a negative literary sibling called stain, which implies a negative change. I want to tear away the negative connotations surrounding the word, and show its positive effects. I could delve deeper into the my sociological and philosophical perceptions regarding stains, but all I’m really trying to say is that i think stains should be celebrated. Stains are everywhere and give every day objects character and individuality. We find reasons to be annoyed about something new every day, so about we stop getting annoyed with stains and learn to appreciate their simplistic elegance and beauty. I want to document and share some of the stains that I encounter in my every day life, wether they result from my own actions, from nature or other people.

A subway mirror.

A childrens doll.

A peice of paper, walked all over.

A tables edge.

A stained floor.

A tea stain.

A paint splatter.

A tool box.

An ink stain.

A paint splatter.

A water colour splash.

A finger wipe.

A sticky mark.

Knife marks and paint ringlets.

A paint mark, drawn around.

Splat.

Knife marks and paint ringlet.

Finger marks on door.

Spilt paint on shelf.

Spilt paint on shelf.

Chewing gum on glass.

Writing on a wall.

A drawing on a door.

A drawing on a door.

Stencil on a wall.

An oven door.

A rusty wall bracket.

Bird poo.

A structural beam.

A floor slab.

A floor slab.

A town notice board.

A paint covered floor.

A paint covered floor.

A paint covered floor.

A work surface.

A cooker hob.

A cooker hob.

A work surface.

A sponge.

A cooked chicken.

An oven door.

Baking foil.

A plate.

A notice board.

A bowl.

Kitchen floor.

An empty jar.

A curry jar.

So What?

Ok so I’ve collected a load of stains, so what? Well I want every one to be able to share my views and ideas, so I’m going to create a photoshop brush set, containing aspects from all of my work. Ideally I’d like to make a website containing all of this information and imagery aswell as the brush set download. I could also make a free flyer with the brushes on disc, or even get a collection of memory sticks containting the brushes and a short text clip giving some background information. I just like the idea of being able to give away the work freely and easily. Having a set of photoshop brushes will allow people to see the stains in a new light. Before I took pictures they were just anoying marks, but now I’ve captured them they can be edited and procesed to be used and apreciated in an artistic manner in brush form.

Thus any one will be able to see stains in the same way that I do.

Making The Brushes To make the brushes from the photographs I first need to edit and highlight the aspects I think will make good brushes. So all the things shown here will need to be changed and fine tuned to create a black and white highly contrasted template. The template could then be inverted so you could make two different styles of brush if you want. This is on of my first attempts :

Brush Applications Here are a few examples of how the brushes can be used, obviously certain brushes will be better for certain styles, but heres a broad set of uses for my first one.

1

Above I have created a line of the same, with colour dynamics based on a red swatch. To the left I have simply stamped the corner of the page.

To create this effect, I’ve used the brushes pallet setting to change the shape dynamics and colour dynamics to quite a high degree, creating this grainy rough surface texture.

1

This is a colour version of the previous image, so again I’ve used shape dynamics, size dynamics and extreme colour dynamics. I’ve also layered a large white version of the stamp on top to contrast the crazy colours in the background.

1

1

To make this very textured look I’ve heavily layered the brushes with red colour dynamics underneath and white dynamics on top. The water ringlet in the brush design, creates this very uniform looking multi layered effect.

1

1

This brush would be more suitable for being placed in and around the middle of designs, as it doesn’t have clearly defined edges like the first brush.

2

2

Believe it or not this is still the same brush but I’ve used a technique in photoshop that allows you to have two brushes in one. So its got the outline of the original brush 2 but the stain inside from a different brush. This technique could be used to combine any of the brushed to create 100’s of possible combination.

2

2

2

This is a combination of brush one and two using the same technique. There are so many possibilities even when using just two brushes as you can change the size of either brush despite the face their inside each other. You can even make the brush have multiple layers of the secondary brush ontop. The brush’s can be used in many different versatile ways.

2

To be honest I didn’t even realize how versatile the brush options where in photoshop. The posabilities for their applications are just endless! When I started making the brushes I was concerned about how well the brushes that had edges were going to work apposed to the ones that where just say black paint splats like brush 2. But now knowing how well they work in conjunction with each other, it just doesn’t matter. I think most of the test pieces I’ve shown so far work well with their own right, as proper pieces of art. I’d like to think that I’ve created them in a way that corresponds to how the original stains were maid; with a bit of luck and random occurrence. I shall continue to edit my photographs and see what other crazy designs come along!

All this with just two brush’s!

More!

This is a complete set of the edited photographs, and therefore brushes. Most of them look better on a much larger scale, but its nice to just to see them all together and see how they work as a set. Part of me wants to edit them down to make a better, neater, consistent looking set. But they work so well in random combinations that its almost a shame to get rid of any.