Guest Post: DIY Top

Hello everyone, my name is Courtney! I am very excited to be guest blogging today here! I am a So Cal teen who aspires to be a fashion stylist/costume designer. I blog over at A Style Blog of Some Sort. There you will find OOTD’s, trend reports & occasional DIY’s! Please check me out if you get a chance :) Today I'll show you how to sew a simple top from knit fabric. Please refer to each diagram below for detail. You will need: 1-2 yards of knit (stretchy) fabric & matching thread, a sewing machine, pins, scissors, a marker, and a top that you can use to trace as a pattern, also made of stretchy fabric. 1. Lay your fabric flat on your surface. Lay the shirt on top of it. 2. Trace around your top with a 1 inch / 3 cm seam allowance and cut along the line. My top has attached arms so it is composed of just 2 pieces: the front & back. 3. Lay both pieces on your surface and adjust the neckline to the desired depth & shape if necessary. 4. Make sure the top is inside out! Hem the neckline on each piece separately by rolling and folding in the fabric. Pin & sew. 5. Now line up both pieces right sides together (inside out.) Pin & sew both shoulder seams. You can use a straight or zig-zag stitch. 6. Lay the shirt flat right sides together again. Pin & sew down the arm and side on each side. 7. Lastly, hem the arm holes and the bottom of the shirt. This step is optional because knits don't unravel easily. And you're done! I hope this tutorial was easy to understand! I also have a video tutorial on my YouTube if you want to check it out. If you have any questions drop me an e-mail at astyleblogofsomesort@gmail.com Thanks so much Annika for letting me guest post! Bye :D Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

Guest Post: Waxing Lyrical (DIYs and Star Trails)

Hi! I am another British schoolgirl - this blog seems to attract us like bees to honey - and I blog about clothes, books and general nerdy things over at Doxographies. (I know, I know, my username is so pretentious.) I like strange music that tends to leave other people confused, reading, winter and cats. I also like DIYs, astronomy and long-exposure photography, which, as luck would have it, are what this post is about. DIY MOON PHASE T-SHIRT Stars seem to be everywhere at the moment, with galaxy prints everywhere from t shirts to socks, but the moon has been sadly neglected. With this in mind, and also with an Astronomy exam coming up, I decided to do a little ‘revision’ by making a t shirt with the phases of the moon on it.  On this t shirt, the large central circle is the Earth, with the smaller ones around the edge representing the moon in different phases. In the picture below, sunlight is coming from the right. The blue circles show what each phase looks like to someone standing on Earth. I’ve also labelled each phase so you can impress people by explaining the diagram to them. The moon has different phases because parts of it are in shadow, while other parts are lit up by the sun. Interestingly, we only ever see one side of the moon because the way it rotates means the same side is always facing Earth. The ‘dark side’ isn’t really dark, though; at new moon it’s completely lit up. To make this t shirt, you’re going to need some fabric paint in at least two colours and a pattern, drawn out on paper. I made mine from looking at this diagram and traced it out full size with a black sharpie. Then, position it inside the t shirt and pin it in place. Hopefully you can see the design through the fabric of the shirt. Use the fabric paint to trace over the design and wait for it to dry, then fix the paint by ironing it for a couple of minutes and you’re done! STAR TRAIL PHOTOGRAPHY One really cool thing you can do with a DSLR camera is to take star trail photographs. Because the Earth is rotating on its axis, the stars seem to move in circles. If you have a really long exposure time - 15 minutes or more - you can capture this effect as streaks of light. Astronomers can use these photos to test if a site is good for an observatory- if the star trail photo is clear and there isn’t too much ‘skyglow’ (the reddish-orange colour that  street lights give the sky) in the background, it’s a good spot. You can also use star trail photos to calculate how long the sidereal day (the length of a day as measured by stars, which in fact is 23.93447 hours long) is. Stars move almost 15° in an hour, so they would take nearly 24 hours to complete a 360° circle. The little bit of time missing is accounted for by the Earth’s movement through space. You do need a tripod and a fancy camera with a bulb release for this, unfortunately, so if you want to try some light painting, which you can do with pretty much any camera, scroll down. First, find somewhere dark - preferably a field, with no nearby houses. If you’re in the northern hemisphere, you need to make Polaris (the North Star) the centre of your picture to get nice curved arcs. Contrary to popular belief, it’s not the brightest star in the sky, but you can find it quite easily. Find Ursa Major, the Big Dipper and follow the green line shown in this picture: Polaris is the first bright star you see when following this line. If you’re good with constellations, it’s also part of the Little Dipper, or Ursa Minor. In the southern hemisphere, it’s a little harder, because there isn’t one star to point your camera at. I’m not entirely sure, because I have never even been to the southern hemisphere, but you should probably find the Southern Cross and make the centre of your picture a bit below that. Make sure the camera’s in focus, take the ISO down to 100 and set the camera for an exposure above 15 minutes. Then try not to move too much so you don’t shake the camera and don’t turn on a torch! If you do, the photo might get over exposed and end up plain white. It’s probably a good idea to increase the contrast of your photo after you’ve taken it. Unfortunately, this will bring out any red/orange skyglow, but it also makes the stars look better. If you don’t have a fancy camera, don’t worry! You can still take awesome long exposure photographs; for example, light painting. Wait until it’s dark, fiddle around with your camera until you find the long exposure setting and dance around with lights; torches, fairy lights, anything. I did this monster with a point-and-shoot camera and a bike light in 15 seconds, the longest exposure available.  You can also ‘draw’ over people’s bodies with the light to get a weird sort of glowing effect. I think that’s probably enough information about moon phases and sidereal days to keep you going for a while, but if you’ve got any questions, feel free to ask me. Have fun, and try not to get pneumonia if you sit out all night taking pictures of the stars. Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

Update - Giveaway with Cichic! / CLOSED

Hey guys! (Now, don't worry, this is a scheduled post. I'm still in the process of packing my bags and moving and I'm being good! So you can't yell at me. ^_^) Many of you have already entered my blog's cichic giveaway, but as the number of prizes increases as more people enter the giveaway, I'm mentioning it here again. It's now become easier to enter the giveaway. There are now two mandatory entries and four additional ones for extra entries (but if you have already entered, all your past entries and effort still count, so don't worry!) Please use the rafflecopter below to enter, if you haven't already! a Rafflecopter giveaway So what's the prize? Well, each winner will get to choose an item of their choice from cichic. If 100 people enter, there will be 1 winner. 200 entries = 2 winners, etc. So feel free to tweet about the giveaway, share it on your facebook wall, etc - the more people who enter, the more winners there will be! Open internationally until the 30th of April. Good luck! Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

DIY Comic Print Cropped Tee (recycle an old top)

You guys. I shouldn't be posting on my blog. I'm supposed to be moving out of home on Friday - that's why I asked for guest bloggers to submit posts the other day. But it seems that whenever I have something important to do, my brain goes "let's make a DIY!" or "let's make a magazine!" or something equally as ridiculous and non-important to the thing I'm supposed to be focusing on. Anyway, this happened, and it can't be undone. Plus, now I'm all excited to blog about it  because it turned out so well. I'm sure you've all seen these kinds of shirts around lately: Own The Runway | Topshop | Topshop I decided that instead of buying one, I would make my own (because it's freeeee!) This is what to do if you want to make one for yourself! - an old top - fabric pens/markers - needle and thread/sewing machine - a printer (if you want to use a computer design or my stencil) 1. Cut your shirt to make it cropped. First, put it on so that you know where to cut it. Then put 3 fingers below this line, and cut there instead (trust me, you'll accidentally end up with a shirt that is way too teeny if you don't do this. I thought I was leaving heaps of extra fabric on mine, but this was the first cut!). Cut the bottom of the shirt off in a straight line.  2. Hem the raw edge of your shirt. To do this, you just fold the raw edge of the shirt up inside the shirt about 1 inch, and sew all the way around. Now if you just wanted a plain cropped tee, you could stop here! But if you want to add a design as well, then read on... 3. Make your design on a computer, or hand-draw it. I made mine on photoshop. I also made this particular design available to download if you want to use it (click here). 4. Print out your design. Cut out the shape on the inside of the black line (you will see why in a moment). 5. Place your design onto your shirt wherever you want it to sit. Make sure you pin your design on (to the front part of the shirt only) to stop it from moving around. 6. Place a piece of paper/newspaper/anything inside the shirt to stop any ink from transferring to the back of the shirt. Then, carefully trace around your design using a fabric marker, making the outline as thick as it was on the printed-out design. 7. Remove your paper from the fabric. I then also added a lightning bolt and coloured it in with a yellow fabric marker, because I accidentally made a mark above the "K" and it was annoying me too much. 8. Run an iron over your design (or whatever it says to do on your fabric markers) and you're done!  Now dress up like an undercover superhero: shirt - DIY shorts - a DIY project from way back shoes - Bodyline Now, please promise you will all YELL at me if I make any more blog posts over the next week before I've moved  (excluding my lovely guest-posters, of course. Don't yell at them). p.s. don't forget I've got two giveaways running right now! Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr

Guest post: Stereoscopy (The Illusion of Depth)

Hello there, and nice to meet you! I'm Cass, a British schoolgirl and wannabe scientist from my little corner of the blogosphere, Undercover Dress-Up Lover. Though faceless, I really am mostly harmless, except whilst practising violin or playing video games, when I make a lot of horrible noises you would probably rather not hear. While the lovely Annika is occupied with all the trials and tribulations of moving house, I'm going to do my best to provide you a crash course in stereoscopy, the illusion of depth. Grab a ruler and get in front of a mirror and measure how far apart your eyeballs are. Are you getting about 6 or 7cm between your pupils? This means each eye sees everything from slightly different angles to each other. Your brain is rather good at correlating these two images, one from each eye, to help you judge how far away things are from you. 3D films use stereoscopy - creating the illusion of depth - by simultaneously displaying two images which are polarised differently. The two lenses of the 3D glasses you wear are also polarised, so lets in one image into your left eye, and another into your right eye. What's polarisation? Visible light is a transverse wave, so it can be polarised. The particles in a polarised wave vibrate only in one plane. Below is an unpolarised wave on the left travelling right, going trough a polarising filter, and coming out polarised. So the light wave particles of one image of the film are vibrating in one certain direction, and one lens of the glasses only allow waves polarised in that plane through. This is also how those 'anaglyph' red and blue glasses work, except they filter by wavelength (different wavelengths are different colours) and aren't as good as polaroids because polaroids allow you to see the film in proper colour. Top: Your Eyes Lie Jumper: Bless x OXBOW Skirt: River Island Bangle: Chica Style Black Milk's 3D ribs dress makes me laugh. The skeletal element is interesting anyway, but if you buy this dress, you get free glasses too! From Fashionably Geek Why not utilise every glorious dimension of space through what you wear? Pompoms and ruffly flowers that stand out from the fabric are quirky and interesting embellishments that add a whole new texture to an outfit. Or, try something with a 2D stereoscopic print that looks 3D, with the use of anaglyph glasses or otherwise... || Chloe T. || Chai M. || Emma E. || || Joellen L. || Zoe Y. || Stephanie L. || I hope you all enjoyed guest-poster Cass' post about Stereoscopy, and learnt something new! Make sure to check out her blog at Undercover Dress-Up Lover (Cass has also started incorporating science posts amongst fashion ones, and I'm pretty proud to say that I inspired that in a small way :D) x Annika Bloglovin' | Facebook | Twitter |  Instagram | Chictopia | Lookbook | Tumblr