fretwork shrimp

[preprius]

I have a board that is about 4.5 ft long.  I attempted fretwork for shrimp.   i am doubting myself after 2 of 6 shrimps.  Do you think these look like shrimps?  I just found pics and spray glued them on the board then traced hilights. 

 

I am making it for a restaurant that just opened.  He needs better wall art. He opened up a fish place.  He did not have any shrimp decorations.   So I volunteered.  

Any suggestion to make it look like shrimp?  Shown below is half of yhe 4.5 ft board.

[Wichman]

I went to Google > "shrimp" > then selected - images -  then selected - drawing - On the fourth row down I found a good basis for a pattern from "freepik". You could print the image in light black and use a red pen/pencil to show where you want to cut, or go whole hog and massage the image with Inkscape into a pattern.

[preprius]

i have not made fretwork patterns before.  Do the already cut out shrimp look ok?  

they could be ghost shrimp. yep that is a real name of a shrimp.  

since this board is longer than my 26" scrowsall I can not do a relief technique.   

i also plan to glue a couple of cutout on top of this board. 

Maybe I should just stop trying fretwork and just paint these 2 already cut an orange tint.

 

[Roberta Moreton]

You could also add other sea life onto the board as overlays. Steve Good has a few that might work even if you have to reduce the size of them.  Just throwing ideas out there. 

Edited August 11, 2025 by Roberta Moreton

[preprius]

Well after a few days i just cut out shrimp and glued them on.

I selected the wood from scrap bin,  grabbing various thicknesses.  I did add orange tint to all shrimp.  To make the fretwork stand out more I tinted the back board. Not quite painting the shrimp.

4.5 foot foot long about 5.5" high about 3/8" thick.

The project is just ok. If I had to do it again i would lightly blue wash the back board. 

Edited August 25, 2025 by preprius

[Roberta Moreton]

It is quite interesting. It’s fun to experiment now and again!