First Try

The weather has been absolutely perfect here and is starting to feel like summer.  I doodled this guy yesterday and decided to try and color it it Photoshop.  This is pretty much my first attempt at trying to take one of my sketches and color it in Photoshop.  I had tried awhile ago to do one but it was so far out there for me and didn't make any sense that it looked pretty much like garbage.  This one is a little better, but the big thing is that I understood more of what I was doing.  I still have a long way to go, but  I'm making progress!  Actually, only the guy was done in Photoshop and all the rest was done in Illustrator and then brought over to Photoshop:)

Editorial Scares Me!

Last week I was drawing lots and lots of faces and people in preparation for this weeks assignment for Make Art That Sells  Assignment Bootcamp.  I had a feeling that the assignment would be in an area that I don't feel very comfortable with  and I was right.  Editorial!  Yikes!  I don't have any experience with this type of illustration, but Lilla gave very good step by step instructions on how to approach it, which really helped take some of the stress away.

The article which you can read here if your interested, is called "How to Meditate:  A Primer for People Who Don't Like to Meditate".  My initial thought when I heard it was about meditation, was to have total peace and calm in the picture while she was meditating, but then I read the article.  The author knows meditation is good for her but she doesn't like to do it.   Her mind fills with distractions and excuses as to why she doesn't want to do it.   This really put a twist on my original idea.

When I did the Make Art That Sells class, I really froze up in the editorial week.  This time though, I knew I could do it and I really believed that I could do it.  There were a few moments when my mind wanted to try and convince me that I couldn't, but I quickly squashed those thoughts.

In the article she says "Meditation Scares Me", and so that was what I based my piece on.

It's kind of funny, Fischer had been watching this piece as it progressed, giving comments here and there.  I waited until he came home from school today to see what he thought about the final piece and he said he liked it except that it looked like she was floating on a magic carpet and that I should put a line in the back to show where the floor was and he was totally right.  I had forgotten to add the floor.  I had totally missed the obvious!

Happy Mother's Day!

I recently entered the Tigerprint Design Competition for designing a Mother's Day Card.  You could enter up to 5 designs.  I made 4  different cards and 2 of them made it to the shortlist which I was happy about.  I had fun doing this and I now have a couple of floral patterns to add to my portfolio.  I feel like these are a little generic, but once I figure out how to incorporate my illustrations and mixed media work in Photoshop and Illustrator, I think it will really add some nice dimension to my work.   I feel like I've come a long way, but I still have so much to learn!

More Faces

I just can't stop drawing faces and people!  I'm loving it! 



 Beehives,

 

Mustaches,

 

and dancing!

 

 

A Gentle Reminder....

Drawing faces

Make Art That Sells Assignment Bootcamp with Lilla Rogers is back this month.  Last month we had off while she did another class.  We received our mini assignment on Monday, faces and people.  I was very excited to see this.  I've been meaning to work on drawing people and figures.  I thought we would just look at a bunch of pictures of people and do some people watching, which of course is too straight forward for Lilla, instead she suggested we start by drawing vintage dolls!  At first this seemed a bit odd to me, but once I got started drawing them, I could easily see the value in it.  There is such a variety in dolls, from vintage pose dolls to kokeshi dolls, Bradley dolls and even homemade dolls.  This has been a wonderful way to explore drawing faces and experiment with it in my drawing.  If I were to draw instead from actual faces I don't think I would be able to open up and have as much fun.  This is a great way to play with the odd, quirky, beautiful and sometimes scary!
The first image is just lots of faces that are made up with a few that are pretty close to what the dolls faces looked like.  The second image is a fun doodle I did a few days ago of my own version of faces.

Cuckoo clock redo

I decided to redo my cuckoo clock girl that I did in MATS Assignment Bootcamp.  My original one was done as a collage but I wasn't happy with how it turned out but I still liked the girl and the idea.  My new version seems to "pop" more.  I also added a few coordinates to go with it.  I think I'd like to add some texture to her hat and maybe her collar but I haven't quite figured out how to do it correctly!



Here is the old version for comparison:

More Tea

This is my first attempt at trying to create a mixed media kind of piece in Photoshop.  I did this one while I was  working on my "Tea with Friends".  The background and roses are watercolor, the bird and tea cup are from tea bags and I scanned them in along with my sketches and this is what I came up with!  I had a lot of fun playing around with this and all of the textures.  So much to learn yet though, I know I've only scratched the surface!

Tea with Friends

A few weeks ago I went to my good friend Diane's house for tea and good conversation.  We have so many things in common and I always feel like we could spend the whole day talking and still have plenty more to talk about at the end of the day.  My friend Diane made some wonderful chai tea and served it in the cutest little aqua blue tea cups that rested on a matching plate and sitting on the edge of the plate was the sweetest little yellow bird.  The milk of course was poured from it's own matching container and then stirred with a little rose adorned tea spoon.  We talked for hours as we enjoyed our tea and sat on old wood chairs painted in a perfect lime green.  The time flew by and I was inspired by our morning together.

           "Tea With Friends"

I thought it needed some matching coordinates to go with it.

I kind of like  the teapots on white more, so I thought I would share it too!  I had a lot of fun working on this.

Jello molds

This month for Lilla Rogers Assignment Bootcamp we had to draw jello molds!  This subject took me completely by surprise.  It's something I would never have picked on my own, that's for sure!  I found this subject really hard and not very inspiring.  We had a week to work on our sketches and then last Monday we got the main assignment which was to use our sketches to make a design for bolt fabric.  I almost didn't do it, I wasn't feeling it.  The thought of skipping it this month just seemed to easy though, I knew I'd be mad at myself, but I couldn't find the joy in the subject matter.  I found that I didn't really enjoy drawing desserts.  I kept telling myself what Lilla always says, find your joy, do what makes you happy.  So I stopped listening to those little gremlins and decided to go for it, what did I  have to loose?  Even if I didn't like the results, I knew I would learn from it and grow.

Again I started out in Illustrator, but I didn't like where it was going, it was feeling too flat and way too digital, I then went to paper and started doing it in watercolor, but quickly I realized I didn't like where that one was going and went back to Illustrator.  I'm slowly figuring out Illustrator and Photoshop but it still is such a hurdle for me when it comes to developing my ideas.

On Monday Lilla posted some color palettes for us to try in our work, muddy pinks, purples, neutrals, acid yellows, to push ourselves and go beyond our comfort zone.  My current colors weren't working well for me so I gave hers a shot and I feel it is what made all the difference in my piece and actually made me feel excited about it.





I'm very happy with the results and how it looks.  A dark grey background is very different for me and I NEVER use purple, that was a hard color for me to work with but I ended up using it on the main character!

Here it is as a repeat:




I'm working on some coordinates to go with it, which is super fun to do.  I'm really enjoying learning Illustrator and Photoshop, it's getting a little bit easier, but I have so much to learn yet.  I want to figure out how to incorporate my mixed media work, but my skill level hasn't allowed that yet.  I have to remind myself to be patient, it will happen.