Time-lapse video

Have you guessed what it is yet?

Crows flying over Glastonbury Tor.

What do you think it symbolises?
What does it mean?

My Inspiration - part 1

Here's a FREE novel for you all, you don't need any fancy devices to read it, you can read it on Google; for all of you who bought the paperback version of this novel I must just tell you that it is now out of print and I will not be printing anymore, so the copies you have are the only copies on the planet, when I die they will be worth a fortune so look after them x

One for Sorrow is the first story in this series of stories, this novel is where it all started, it is where my writing turned into something that I could publish. My other stories were personal; I used make believe characters to tell twisted rambling stories about my personal thoughts and feelings to work through issues I had with my life, but this novel is different. This is the first novel I wrote for someone else.

The inspiration behind this novel was a little girl who was scared of death. The little girl had spent her life living with her mother and watching her father leave her to go to foreign countries and fight wars, he was a soldier. Then one day her father was in an explosion, but he didn't die. The stress of watching his friends die in front of his eyes was too much for him so he was discharged from the army. A few months after her father returned to England her mother was killed in a car crash. Even though she hoped her father would be safe as he fought in our wars, she was always ready for the news that he had died and she was elated every time she saw him as she knew it could be the last time, she never expected her mother to die. Her mother was everything to her, she was always there for her with loving open arms, ready to wipe away her tears and make her feel safe and secure, but all of a sudden she as gone. The little girls world changed in the blink of an eye and where she once felt the warmth of her mothers hugs she was now left with a traumatised soldier who was just back from Iraq and under psychiatric supervision. The little girl learnt at a very young age that in a matter of minutes your whole world can be turned upsidedown and at the innocent age of 12 her biggest fear was death.

It deeply upset me that the little girl was scared of death at such a young age and I realised that other people must be scared of death too, so I thought I would write a story to put everyones mind at ease, in the hope that it may help the living that the dead leave behind. It is a story of fiction written to help people, it is not beliefs, it's simply a nice idea.

As a lot of you know, I grew up with lots of animals, which obviously all died at some point, everything dies, that's just nature. When our animals died we burried them in the garden, so I never questioned where they had gone. I knew where they were, they were in the garden. I may have been told a story of heaven when I was a child, but I can't remember being told about that, and I never really listened as child, so in my brain the dead were burried in the garden, full stop. Due to the fact that we had so many animals and they died all of the time i've never feared death as I saw it as part of life, everything dies, so it was a huge deal to me to hear that a little girl was scared of death.

Fearing death seems strange to me, fearing death is like fearing breathing. We breath, it's a fact, we die, that's a fact too, so why waste your life worrying about it? Worrying about things is like praying for bad things to happen.

I feel incredibly lucky as religion was never discussed in my family, there were no arguments for or against religion. It wasn't a dodgy subject, it just wasn't ever bought up as I knew where things went when they died, they went in the garden, so as a child my brain was completely free from other peoples religious views. It was taught at primary school, but I wasn't listening, I was just looking forward to blowing eggs for Easter or making colourful stained glass windows out of crate paper and glittery cards and decorations at christmas. At secondary school I always made sure my violin lesson was during Religious Education lessons, if I timed it right I could leave 5mintues after everyone was settled in class and return 5 minutes before the bell went. When I was older I took some time to read about many different religions, regular religions, spiritual religions, witchcraft type religions, etc, but there was nothing which agreed with what I thought about God, so I never took one on. With that in mind, I was able to make up anything I liked about what happens after death to appease the young girl, my mind was free to roam, so it did.

***

One for Sorrow

Edward had carried the engagement ring in his pocket for over a week as he tried to pluck up the courage to ask Nicole to marry him. Had he known that he would die before the question would leave his mouth he would have asked her sooner. Edward refuses to cross over to his new life on his path to enlightenment until the deed is done, even if he has to return to earth as a ghost and risk his very soul.

Edwards actions are driven by Love, but what is it that drives Tim's? What is it that drives him to treat Marie the way he does, and what is it that makes her stay?

Find out here...it's FREE!

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=m7JdB6lIL-AC&lpg=PP1&ots=XrxIm-Hhzn&dq=one+for+sorrow+stacey+clarke&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false

***

We Come in Peace is the sequel to One for Sorrow and written for my boyfriend as he wanted to know what happened next.

My inspiration - part 2

The reason I started writing this novel was due to a comedian who was moaning about police brutality. Basically someone filmed the police beating up a man - a little, i've done worse! - and then the press went mad and made everyone unhappy with the police yet again.

In my brain the point of the police is to make people feel safe, safe in their homes and safe when they walk down the street, that's the point in the police. And when the press continually attack them it not only makes the police look bad, but it also makes people feel unsafe and that's no good to anyone.

How can the police be seen as a figure of authority if they are constantly 'told off' like little kids for their actions. They're either in control or they aren't, if they are supposed to be a figure of authority then let them get on with their job and do it.

I say bring back the 60's/70's cops that set people up and beat the crap out of people just to get a confession. At least then they could get things done, these days they are strung up by red tape and can't lift a finger to help, then they get told off for not being able to do anything. That's got to be frustrating.

If it wasn't for all this red tape then maybe the police would be able to get to places quicker, hopefully before someone is beaten to death. The whole situation is ridiculous. Society has made the police accountable for their every little action, so it is society that is stopping the police from doing their job and getting to places on time, and it is the very same society who is complaining about the situation that has caused the situation by complaining.

Personally if I had a job where I had committed myself to serve and protect people, then I got harrassed by people as I walked down the street and made out to be worse than the devil by the press, then I would say 'f&ck you' to the people I was protecting and I just wouldn't bother or I would wait until such a time that I could beat the crap out of the people I was trying to protect and then let loose when I thought nobody was watching.

You can't expect someone to show you any respect if you don't show them any.

At the end of the day the police are human beings and if they are faced with 1000 angry people screaming in their faces, ready to trample them to the ground, then they are well within their right to attack and fight back. The police are human beings and just because they are wearing a uniform doesn't mean that they don't get scared. I have nothing against a fellow human being defending themselves or even attacking someone when faced with a mob. I have nothing against that at all.

Fair enough hold them accountable for their actions, as you would with anyone else, but don't make a song and dance about it. All that does is promote fear and make people stop respecting someone who is supposed to be in authority.

You can't have it both ways, either stop complaining and let the police get on with their job, or keep complaining and stop the police from doing their job.

I've been wrongly arrested and treated incredibly badly in a cell, but I refuse to tar every police officer with the same brush just because I was faced with a Nazi police officer who was obviously bullied at school and hated women. You can't judge everyone on the actions of a few.

This is not a third world country, we should be able to trust the police, we should also be able to trust doctors, but the press wont let us trust either of them and instead they use their voices to poison our minds with disturbing stories. We should loosen the leash we have put around the police's neck and see if society has trained them well enough to behave properly, because if we make this leash any tighter we are going to strangle them and then they will be no use to us at all.

Rant rant rant

Anyway.

So, thinking about the relevance of being informed about police brutality made me wonder "is ignorance really bliss?" Do we really need to know every single little thing that happens?

I knew if I wrote the above piece of writing on my former blog then it would cause a blog riot about the police and people would entirely miss the question, so I decided to change the question and ask "if a bloody big comet was about to hit the planet and we were all going to die, would you want to know?"

I explored this question in the novel. The whole novel is a metaphor. In fact it's not a metaphor, it's a simile as the police are not mentioned in the novel at all and in order to be a metaphor they would have to be.

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/We-Come-in-Peace/dp/B004LROOIM

America: http://www.amazon.com/We-Come-in-Peace-ebook/dp/B004LROOIM

I think I just don't understand why we are being told about something that we can't change, tell me news that I can do something about, tell me about the tigers and how to save them, tell me about the childrens hospital that needs people to raise money to buy new equipment to save little babies lives, tell me how to stop racism, tell me how to house the homeless and feed the hungry, tell me things that I can help with, that I can change, but don't waste my time by telling me that men are fighting, because that's human nature, men fight, I can't change that, nobody can change that.

Tattoo

www.thegallerio.com

You don’t have to be an Artist to be a Tattooist.

At present I am a self-taught professional artist and trained tattooist, I am not yet a ‘Tattoo Artist’ as that takes years of practice.

I have been working as a full-time artist for 4 years so far and I have sold my artwork all over the country. My main mediums are acrylics and watercolour painted on paper or canvas. I decided to change my medium to ink and my canvas to skin as I wish to be able to financially support myself with my skill and even though I have sold over 50 paintings and held my own small private exhibition of 1st edition prints, it simply isn’t enough to substain myself financially, therefore I decided to look into tattooing and the more I learn about it the more I love it.

I finished my tattoo training in October 2010 and I am looking forward to the future and becoming skilled enough to move out of my home studio and into my own shop. I have lived all over the country and in the summer I will be touring in a campervan around Cornwall and tattooing as I go. I am also an avid writer – I have written 7 novels so far – and on the ‘Tattoo Studio’ page of this website I intend to write about my travels around Cornwall and the people I meet tattooing.

After my travels I wish to open an Art Galley and Tattoo Studio where I can practise tattooing and exhibit my artwork. Some people find art galleries intimidating and some people find tattoo studios intimidating, so when I bring the 2 together I may well have the most intimidating shop on the planet, but hopefully people will leave their preconceived notions of art galleries and tattoo studios at the door and come and explore my private little corner of the artworld.

That’s the future, but at present it’s practice, practice, practice.

Tattoo Design

www.thegallerio.com

I have just finished my first tattoo design for a customer, he asked for an angel that resembled Angelina Jolie for his back.

I looked over the internet for pictures of angel wings and Angelina Jolie and also asked my client to send me some images of other tattoo designs he liked to give me an idea of what he wanted.

The image below was my first idea for the tattoo. Big boobs, flowing hair and fluffy wings. I like this one as she looks vulnerbale and innocent. I managed to get out of drawing arms and legs by covering them up with hair and a dress.

It’s very important to get a tattoo design right as a client will be wearing the tattoo on their skin for the rest of their life. The first draft is only ever an idea, a starting point to work from, I never expect to get it right first time and I asked my client to be as picky as possible. After a short dicussion with my client he decided that the wings should be spread and he wanted her to be looking up. He told me which tattoo design he liked the most from the selection he gave me and I worked on that.

Below is my second design, I also like this one (I like them all – I can’t present someone with a tattoo design idea that I personally don’t like, I may have to design things I may not like, but I always have to be happy with the picture before I present it to someone, no matter what the topic is).

I like this design as she’s a ‘normal’ weight. She’s not too thin or too fat, she’s feminine, voluptuous. I realise the wings look different than normal wings and the feathers actually look like swords, but I still like the image, I think it works well as a tattoo. Art doesn’t have to be perfect to be right.

Now the angel was in the right position I showed my client the new design. He stated that he wanted her to be slimmer, her child bearing hips were a little wide, he also told me that the hair was too big and he was unsure about the dress, which was the perfect responce as now I knew exactly what he wanted, so I set about designing a new image. It was easy to change the image as I have the position correct and I finally found the correct wings that I wanted to use.

I asked the client for a picture of his back so I could draw the design in the right ratio. The design below is almost perfect. I much prefer the wings and the dress.

I then put this image onto the picture of my clients back to see what it would look like. I knew that this was the design that my client would be happy with so before I showed him the final image I tweaked it a little and added another set of smaller feathers on top of the larger feathers of the wings as the previous image would have been too plain for the large area of skin it needed to cover.

When I showed my client the new design he was very happy with it, but he wanted the angel to be bigger, taller and the wings to be smaller, so I altered the image in photoshop to get the size correct. The image below is the final image, which my client loves. I will straighten up any broken lines when it traced and transferred onto my clients back to make the perfect tattoo.

Ilove this design and I am looking forward to adding the shading and tattooing it, I am really happy that my client suggested that she was made bigger and the wings smaller, I think she looks much better bigger with the wings smaller. It’s a really is great when I am able to communicate with clients and we work together to come up with the perfect tattoo.

I will add the tattoo to my tattoo gallery when it’s been tattooed so you can all see it in it’s full glory.

My Philosophy

To thine own self be true – Willy Shakespeare (Playwright)

The most important thing in the world, ever, is to be yourself.

You are the only person who will ever really truly know you

You are the only person who you can ever really truly trust

You are the only person who can ever really truly help you

You are the only person who can even really truly save you

So it’s important to care about yourself, love yourself and be happy with yourself, because when the end finally does comes, which it will for us all, you will be alone, you are the only person you can take with you, and no matter where you are, heaven or hell, everyone needs to be loved and the only person who can honestly ever really truly love you for all that you are is you.

Life is short and if you want to cover yourself in tattoos, then do it

If you want to pierce every single inch of your body, then just go ahead

but, if you choose not to ever have a tattoo or get pierced, well that’s fine too

It’s your body therefore it’s your choice, as long as you are happy and you are true to yourself, then it is no-one elses business

Stacey Clarke 2011

The harder you try the luckier you get – Gary Player (Golfer)