Penland On a Foggy Morning: work in progress

I've started a new piece,  Penland On a Foggy Morning.  I'm using a photograph that I took at Penland last fall when walking to class from my cottage.  I digitally printed the image on linen canvas.  Then I layered it with a piece of silk gauze that I "dyed" using an eco-transferring technique with marigolds from Penland. On the bottom third of the composition where the area in the image is covered in moss and ferns, I have gone in and removed areas of warp or weft in the silk gauze and moved some of the warp and wefts around to graduate the opacity.  I wanted to play around with changing the transparency of the gauze and trying to capture the fog through the fluffier silk threads of the gauze and how the tension changes as you stitch it.  By moving the remaining threads around after I removed surrounding ones, it created a really interesting texture and reduced the visible grainlines of the gauze.

For the stitching, I am only using basic stitches--straight, chain and back stitch.  I'm focusing on color mixing and really trying to use my stitches in a looser and more expressive way.  The threads are all Valdani variegated quilting threads so they have a nice sheen to them.  I cannot quite figure out if I like the quilting thread or the embroidery floss better for thread mixing.  I love the sheen of the quilting thread and it seems to sit on the fabric more proudly.  However, the embroidery floss blends a bit smoother as the strands stick together more and work more cohesively together.  The jury is still out and I think it may just be a situation where one is better for some projects and the other is better for the rest.  It is definitely something that I'm wanting to test more. 

I will be adding in some metals and lots more stitches so this piece is just in progress!

 Before any stitching or fabric manipulation.  Here you can see the imprints from the marigold eco-transfer and I've overdyed it with a tea stain so it's not too white.

These are some of the colors I'm using and the stitching so far.