iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

Just saw an owl, a seal a few days ago, and a hedgehog last week. Life is still alive out there 💚

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 19/09/2026

Just found my old flat in Helsinki for sale and had very strong urge to try to get it back however possible, until noticing the renovations planned include 'emergency shelter deployment plan and tightness test'. What a world 😞 we used to keep our skis in the bunker, wonder if extra storage is […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

011

Reposted by Amber Griffiths

Then Try This @thentrythis.social.thentrythis.org.ap.brid.gy · 18/09/2026

Lovely week with the first Cocoon resident, Melanie Hyo-In Han, working with us and the UK Moth Virome Project gang led by @ben. Mel ran a moth poetry workshop (and one participant instantly recruited her to run another a few days later). We also had a […] [Original post on social.thentrythis.org]

Poetry workshop in a greenhouse with people sat around a long wood table. A small black dog is also seated at the table.

Three residents and moth expert crouched down, and various other people, around a very bright light at night, looking at moths

Mel with her first ever moth she caught, with another person in a head torch and a young person with their back to the camera

Mel's Instagram post with a photo of her first moth - which is called a Snout moth because it has a long nose

112

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 15/09/2026

Have done a slightly scary thing and added some things I've made to a *shop*! Here it is, only UK shipping for now while I figure this all out: www.drawingsaboutthings.com/shop

Heavy Topics print photographed next to a little cactus in a pot with a smiley face. The print is black on cream textured paper, and shows a stack of books with some legs sticking out under them, belonging to a squished person. The books are called 'Very serious book', 'Complicated', 'Things and Stuff', and 'Heavy Topics'

142

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 26/07/2026

Just look at the live fire map of US and Africa, and next year El Nino will be in top of this. Get your money out of the big banks and into triodos or co-op or whatever equivalent your country has, next to no effort and one of the most powerful ways not contribute to worsening this utter hell […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

011

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 25/07/2026

A few pics from my final MA show, more later when I'm less exhausted. Two finished little books, one made with etchings the other with wood engraving prints, all the original prints on display together with the original plates, tools, ink tubes and cloths […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Photo of room, dark blue table in a white space, with big zinc etching plates, wood engraving blocks, tools, sketchbooks and flowers, three big etchings are on the wall behind

We have mountains to climb book made from etchings, on a large log with a hole cut in the top, in the hole is a small curled up arctic fox model

Photo of stories in the stardust' book with embossing lit up by a spotlight

Bench painted dark blue with the words rest now my love on it in the same font as the etching book, and a cushion in the same blue with arctic fox etching printed on the fabric

244

Reposted by Amber Griffiths

Dave Griffiths @nebogeo.post.lurk.org.ap.brid.gy · 22/07/2026

Managed to find and curve trace some molybdenite: cornish-semiconductor.com/index.php… Which is satisfying because it's currently looking like the most likely post-silicon semiconductor: a thousand times less energy hungry. You can make […] [Original post on post.lurk.org]

Glossy hexagonal metallic crystals surrounded by grainy quartz

002

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 17/07/2026

Kind of shocked being in artskool for the first time just how much the students lean on the technicians for *everything*. It's to the point where the exhibitions are often really a show of the technicians' capabilities not the students'. If a student can't produce their own project, figure out […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

021

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 17/07/2026

Finishing up two little books for the authorial illustration MA, with our show only a week away. One is made entirely from etchings, the other from wood engravings. Quite surprised the cover band for the latter came out ok with the combo of a wood engraving […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Two books on a dark blue table. One on left is called 'we have mountains to climb', one on right is called 'stories in the stardust'

Book held up, the main book is plain dark blue, there is a vertical cover band in thick white paper with dreckle edges, on this is a roughly triangular wood engraving print with bubbles with things like DNA and cells in them. The rest of the band is embossed with bubbles and dots aligned to the print, and the title is also embossed.

131

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 11/07/2026

Current estimation is that finishing an illustration MA is about 4 times harder than finishing a genetics PhD.

000

Reposted by Amber Griffiths

Then Try This @thentrythis.social.thentrythis.org.ap.brid.gy · 10/07/2026

Dig for Dirt has gone live 🌱 We're looking for growers and farmers to collectively find out more about the microbes under our feet. Soil bacteria can help clean up the toxic pollution that is the legacy of mining in our area, but very little is known […] [Original post on social.thentrythis.org]

Dig for Dirt is ready for you! With an isometric illustration of crop plants on one layer and soil bacteria on a lower layer

Do you grow food, flowers or keep livestock in the South-West UK? This could be in a garden, an allotment, a smallholding, or a commercial farm of any scale.

With a simple illustration of some kale.

Can you provide a small soil sample to help understand how bacteria clean up mining pollution? You'll get a simple sampling pack from us for collecting some soil, with the return post paid for.

With a simple illustration of a trowel in some soil.

In return for your time you will have access to your own soil bacteria
results, and see how they compare to others in the South West. You will also receive a beautiful printed photograph of your soil bacteria!

With a simple illustration of an old mine engine house.

011

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 08/07/2026

This is great - showing how much hotter it is where you are compared with 'normal' (though the normal they use is quite a recent post-industrial baseline, within living memory for most of us, which as far as I understand it is increasingly being used as people seem to find it more […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

010

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 05/07/2026

Made some cushions today with my etchings. Squishy. #PrintMaking

Dark blue printed fabric cushions, one with big crashing waves and a breaching humback, another with a leaping arctic fox with stars in its tail. They are sat outside on a turquoise painted bench. The images are etchings digitally printed onto organic cotton.

120

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 24/06/2026

Two unis in the town here - one apparently issued 'your job is at risk' yesterday to entire dept who do climate/enviro stuff, and the another I was at today had staff working on heavy manual jobs all day but gave them a free ice cream van as recompense (complete with a diesel generator of course […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

001

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 21/06/2026

Books heading off to Bristol next week! Entirely illustrated with aquatint etchings, hand bound with matching waxed linen thread, and with double sided belly bands. Epic labour of love, only nine of them made for the Bristol Artist's Book Event. #PrintMaking

Pile of tall narrow books called we have mountains to climb. The front is an etching of a mountain, with a belly band with an etching of a person standing looking sad, all in dark prussian blues with matching thread at two binding points. The lettering is also done by hand.

Open at double page spread of a huge arctic fox with stars in its tail, jumping gently up to a person on a mountain top holding a star into the sky

041

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 21/06/2026

Happy solstice from my new little friend 💫

Ringlet butterfly sitting on hand with a bright blue shed behind

041

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 18/06/2026

“Young women are moving to the left more than young men are moving to the right,” www.theguardian.com/politics/2026/j…

000

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 14/06/2026

Beavering away doing book layouts with the etching prints I've been making over the last few months... #PrintMaking

Aquatint etching printed in dark blue, of a giant arctic fox with a tail filled with stars, he is jumping gently up towards a person standing on top of a mountain, and the person is holding a star up. The words 'we're here, away' are overlaid.

223

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 02/06/2026

Had a nice bit of news lately that I can finally put on here - one of my prints has been longlisted for the World Illustration Awards in the editorial category :D I am baffled and confused but it seems to be real […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Tetrapak print of a pile of books squashing a person flat. The books have the titles 'very serious book', 'complicated', 'things and stuff', and 'heavy topics'

082

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 02/06/2026

'The world must prepare for the imminent return of El Niño and the supercharged weather extremes it brings, the UN has warned... an 80% chance of forming before September... scientists have previously warned that it could be the strongest this century.' […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

000

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 29/05/2026

Back on my nonsense 😎 Turns out it's a thing to have bizniz cards at arty shows so just printed one on the pasta machine. I think they are pretentious things that belong in the 80s, personally, but here we are. #PrintMaking

Business card sized print of a badly drawn hand holding a business card that says 'very important bizniz card' on it

040

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 28/05/2026

Thought I should do an etch-along but obviously failed at that, so I'll start a few steps in and go from there until I catch up with where I'm at. Here's a zinc sheet that I've had laser cut into a wiggly edged shape. I polished it with brasso and jeweller's […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

A plate with ground on it, on a huge metal table, with printing presses behind

000

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 21/05/2026

Exhausting day trying to get a decent print from this large plate (A2), aiming for a nice consistent ink tone over the aquatint. Changed paper and moved onto this enormous press which I haven't used before, and it worked perfectly! As the technician said, a […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Very large printing press, cast iron, a couple of gears on it, with the metal plate sat on the press bed.

Print at a slightly odd angle because it is big and high up and I am short. There are crashing waves at the bottom, a large breaching humpback whale, a small figure climbing jagged mountains behind, and a tiny arctic fox peeking out right at the top of the mountains. Printed in a dark blue-black.

011

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 19/05/2026

OMG I got a thing and I'm not allowed to say what the thing is but I got a thing I had zero-to-minus-infinity expectation of getting :frogchamp:

020

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 17/05/2026

Tiny wood engraving print by Bewick from late 1700s-early 1800s. He engraved his own finger print at life size into this scene, the whole thing is about 4x2cm.

There is a detailed cottage on the right with a little fence, a rider on a horse is half visible with the front half under the carved fingerprint, there are trees behind. It is a black ink print on white paper, reproduced at the original scale in a book called Thomas Bewick, Tale-Pieces.

033

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 16/05/2026

Latest illustration project now has its own page on t'internet, really to be trawled by bots and copied for ai slop. Or if you're human, a minute or so of looking at a nice printing press, shiny metal etching plates, some prints in progress, and too much detail on how they're made […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

011

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 14/05/2026

Part of big A2 etching test printed today 🌟 Can't say I'm happy with the overall print but might have to learn to be ok with that with deadlines looming 🫣 we'll see. #printmaking

Front of massive arctic fox jumping up towards a small figure on a mountain top who is holding up a big star. Made with hard ground in zinc, three aquatint dips, using white ground and stop out.

Pic of the zinc plate with bits glinting in the light

040

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 09/05/2026

[UK Pol] My weak hope/lukewarm take for the UK is that these election results mean starmer goes out, burnham somehow gets in instead and can continue to push through a lot of the labour policies that are really positive (and already doing good things just, of course, not really making the news) […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

000

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 08/05/2026

Well I need to learn how to evenly ink big etching plates like this, but the plate itself seems ok! It takes a full hour to ink it up, and it's physically exhausting... I don't think I'll ever work with plates this big again after the 3 planned ones, but I'm […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Printed etching of a breaching whale above crashing waves

Full print shown at an angle with a hand for scale, the print is A2 on larger paper. The etching plate was laser cut into the outline shape of the waves and mountains.

Right at the top of the print there is a tiny arctic fox peeking out from behind one of the craggy sharp mountains

111

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 08/05/2026

Hot take, UK universities are eating themselves. They're making it SO hard to work with them, increasingly bad year on year, and I think it's just because they're scared of *everything*. So the research is getting shitter, the public engagement (everyone hates that term but here we are) is […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

003

Reposted by Amber Griffiths

Then Try This @thentrythis.social.thentrythis.org.ap.brid.gy · 08/05/2026

If you're in Bristol, Dave will be taking part remotely in a panel discussion today at the Centre for Creative Technologies Showcase, talking about Then Try This. It's free entry and happening at 1PM: Bristol Digital Futures Institute, University of […] [Original post on social.thentrythis.org]

Showcase programme 8TH MAY BRISTOL DIGITAL FUTURES INSTITUTE
[Temple Quarter]

112

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 07/05/2026

Little whale print which I'm calling finished, so one page of this book is done. This is a zinc plate etching, with hard ground, aquatint, lots of stop out and white ground. #printmaking

Small print, about A5 of tumbling waves with a whale tail, steep craggy mountains behind where a small figure is climbing up out of the sea

066

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 07/05/2026

Another day in the print room yesterday. First big A2 etching is off the press, lots I want to change about it if course, but happy with the cropped bit in the first pic 😅 #printmaking

Section of printed etching with giant stinging jellyfish floating above a tiny person, between dark jagged rocks

The whole etching plate with hand for scale. The plate is a sheet of zinc with a laser cut outer edge that follows the contours of the rocks and waves

The etching plate sat on an big old cast iron Rochat printing press, in a print room with a gnarly old wood floor, big work benches, hotplates and lots of drying scrim in the background

243

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 30/04/2026

Long day in the print room, first job was to test print this foxy etching plate...

Etching print in dark blue of three craggy mountains. On top of one is a small quite abstract person, on another, looking at her, is a huge arctic fox with a swooping tail full of stars filling the sky

120

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 29/04/2026

Finally managed to do all the print room things yesterday for first time since breaking ribs over ten weeks ago. Made this plate ready for printing later this week, all appendages crossed that it comes out ok 🤞🤞🤞

Photo of a zinc plate with etched snowy mountains. On the top of one there is a tiny figure, on the top of another is a huge arctic fox with an enormous swooping tail filled with stars. The fox also has a big star in its mouth. The outer edge of the plate was CNC cut so it isn't square, it follows the edge of the mountains and tail. The plate has had hard ground, aquatint, stop out and white ground on it, with 4 acid dips in total. There is also a sketched plan of the plate behind it.

131

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 25/04/2026

Turns out I measure lib dem graphs for kicks. As you'd predict, Reform vote over exaggerated by the column height, while conservative, green and labour under exaggerated, to make the point they are trying to make.

Leaflet saying it's lib dem or reform in Cornwall, with the mm per vote scrawled on each bar of the graph

001

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 23/04/2026

So the rescue hamster now has a pedometer and ran just over 10km last night - brings a new appreciation for the energy contained in the tablespoon of seeds, flowers and mealworm he gets each night.

032

Reposted by Amber Griffiths

Vivek Nityananda @viveknityananda.bsky.social · 17/04/2026

Come work with us! Wide range of topics: #insect #emotions, #mantis stereo #vision and prey detection, insect active vision, cognition across species in the wild, bee reward perception, insect #attention. If any of that appeals, get in touch! #fellowships #postdoc (p.s. It's beautiful up North!)

11311

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 20/04/2026

I'm chained to the print room at the moment... this little fox appeared from the zinc and acid last week 🌟 #printmaking

Etching of an arctic fox standing up, holding a star in his mouth. The etching is done with hard ground, aquatint, stop out and white ground, and a little digital colour on the star.

281

Amber Griffiths @amberfirefly.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 19/04/2026

Lovely photo article on the veterinary care at ZSL, captures the atmosphere and dedication of the place (I did my PhD there, with some training from one of the now-retired research vets, so am a bit biased) […]

mastodon.green

Original post on mastodon.green

000

Reposted by Amber Griffiths

Ian Dunt @iandunt.bsky.social · 12/04/2026

This is everything. With the super majority you can actually undo Fidesz' constitutional takeover.

2458692