Interview With A Pixel Artist Part 23: Clairefairy.h

Who are you? Where are you based?

I'm Claire and I'm based in Nottingham, England

When and why did you first start making your art?

I've always been very artistic and enjoyed craft based projects. Fuse beads is something I did as a kid; when it popped up on my Pinterest a couple of years ago I got really nostalgic and dived back in.

What inspires your artwork?

I'm a Disney nut; I love the characters, the songs, the art that goes into them and I love turning iconic movie moments, that I grew up with, into art. To look at something and immediately hear piece of music or a line from the film run through my head just transports me back to being a kid.

Do you remember the first piece you made?

When I got back into beads I made a range of Disney Princess sprites that I'd seen on Pinterest, then I decided to make more movie accurate princesses and additional characters from each film.

What's the biggest piece you've ever made?

My biggest piece is a scene from Beauty and the Beast; it was 60 boards and took ages to get the scale how I wanted it. I didn't want to loose too much detail so I resized it bigger 3 times.

What is your art workspace like?

I've just moved so my workspace is a bit of a mess atm. I have drawers of different coloured beads and I predominantly work on a tray with my iPad as a template.

What are the tools of your trade?

Hama beads are the main brand I use, they're reasonable and easy to get hold of. I like to shade so I need more colour variations than Hama do alone so I also use Perler. However Perler have stopped shipping straight to the UK so I'm thinking of switching to Artkal and getting the odd Perler colour from eBay when I need to. Other than that I use Perler pegboards and baking paper.

What's the most time you've spent on a project?

The most time consuming project was every card from card captor sakura; while the cards individually aren't that big there's over 50 of them and it took months! Wasn't helped by customs.

Can you talk us through your creative process? How do you go about planning and creating a piece?

Usually I pick the film that I want to work from next, rewatch it again and then pick a favourite/ iconic character or scene. After I know the subject I go on my iPad and grab as many references I can from Google and work out exactly how I want the layout to turn out. I mostly use my iPad as a stencil and just zoom in on a picture until the scale is what I want. Sometimes an exact pixelated copy isn't too visually pleasing so I then go in a tweak the bead placement; faces are usually the worst for this as features can get lost if you're too accurate.

What are the most common questions you get asked about your art?

Where do you get your designs from? Mostly I make them myself, by tracing pictures with my iPad but when I started I used Pinterest and often changed them for movie accuracy. 

Have you had any art-related disasters?

The big Beauty and the Beast piece I did was a complete disaster to iron  I was about half way through and a small section of Hama beads melted faster than I'd anticipated. I was using Hama and Perler and they melt at different speeds, I'd gone from doing a section with both to a section of just Hama and I over did it. That section throw out the rest of the piece and warped it to the point where I couldn't fix it and had to stop. Heartbreaking slightly but one day I'll remake it and have another shot at ironing it. I'm also going to try the masking tape technique with my next project and if that's easier I may use that method for my do over.

Do you have a dream project you'd love to make, but just can't justify yet?

I'm also massively into books and films and I'd love to make a massive Hogwarts castle and do a piece on each of the houses but I don't quite have the space right now. I'll probably do the houses and wait to do the castle down the line.

What was your most recent project?

With the move I had to stop making for a couple of months so my last piece was the big Beauty and the Beast scene.

What are your favourite experiences you've had as a result of your art?

Getting to know other artists, comparing notes on how we got started and what we've got in the works. It's a really nice community.

Do you have any projects in progress or in the pipeline right now?

I'm half way through a commission piece of the little mermaid for a friend.

Do you sell your art? If so, how can people find it?

I've not yet started selling my work but I'd love to start doing that in the future. I have done a few commission piece for friends. If you're interested in a piece drop me a message through Instagram.

How can people find you online? Drop your social media handles, websites etc...

Clairefairy.h is my Instagram handle

Anything else to share? Shoutouts, words of wisdom etc?

Words of wisdom is give it a go; you don't know if you can do it till you try and sometimes it's not gonna turn out how you wanted but learn from that and try it a different way, till you find the way that works for you