Sunday, April 25, 2010

Crafting: Stamps!



Last night I attempted creating my first stamps ever. I used Speedball carvers a Speedball Speedycarve rubber block. It was surprisingly simple, as the carving block cuts like butterrrr. The stamps themselves look pretty amateur, but they stamp quite nicely (and I love the look of white ink, but unfortunately the pad I bought was super cheap and isn't ink-y enough):



I'm addicted! I've also created two trees, a skull, a mountain, and the letter F... which I'll have to re-do as I forgot the number one rule of stamp-making: always carve things in the reverse! Anyone have a use for a backwards letter F?

Saturday, April 24, 2010

English Country House



Also, I carved my first stamp today! I made a very basic one - a small lightning bolt.

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Faux Patterns



Some faux-patterns, inspired by Liberty of London and Julia Rothman. This image is a little blurry, I'll try to replace it with a cripser one later.

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Friday, April 2, 2010

Wedding Invites - Map



I was recently asked to draw the map portion of the invites - just a simple version of an image I was given. Here is the result. This will be *very* tiny, in the center of the invites, so detail was not too important or encouraged. It's pretty basic.

Friday, March 12, 2010

Thursday, February 4, 2010

Wedding Invites - Barn & Church



More work for Kendel's invites!

Monday, August 17, 2009

Wedding Invites - Rough Sketches

So, as I mentioned in my last post, I've been commissioned to illustrate a friend's invitations for her wedding next August. This has been kind of a daunting project for me as it's the first time I've ever undertaken a project for someone else (and one I am being paid to take on - doubly daunting!). Having never been to art school AND having given up on art in my teenage years only to pick it back up again nearly ten years later, I don't have too much confidence in myself as an artist (and wow, what a horrible sentence). So, though this project is kind of scary, I'm hoping the successful completion of it will give me that little extra boost of confidence I need. Also, I'll have something REAL to show for all my drawing and doodling! Finally!

The above is just a bunch of doodles I did while only half paying attention to what I was doing. I was trying to get a bit of a feel for the text I'm going to be using for the invitations. Messy, yes. I've come up with something a little better since this. And also - yes, I did absentmindedly misspell my middle name. Whoops.

Like the bride in the previous post, this groom was also for practice. What I learned from this is that I need to learn how to draw suits, as well as figure out what the heck the groom's arms/hands are going to be doing in the final drawing. I often end up shoving my character's hands behind their backs because hands are such a pain in the rear to draw, but it's such an unnatural stance.

As the bride and groom will be driving away in an old-fashioned truck after the wedding, they thought it would be kind of cool to feature that truck in the invites. I drew this a few months ago when I had no idea what the actual truck looked like, but this ended up being pretty close. If only I could photoshop the little b&g outta there I might be able to get away with using it, after I spiffed up the image a bit.

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Wedding Invites - Bride

So, I'm designing a friend's invitations for her upcoming wedding! My first actual commission. Exciting! This is a practice drawing for the "bride" - the final drawing of the bride will feature her in her *actual* wedding dress, which is a lot more detailed than this simple one I've drawn here. I'll probably use this speech bubble, though, as I really like the text.

Friday, February 13, 2009

Work in Progress

It isn't complete yet, but I haven't posted anything in so long that I thought a little "work-in-progress" post might keep things up-to-date a bit (for the record, however, I haven't made any art in months):



This is the second piece in a three or four piece series.

Saturday, October 25, 2008

Beware!



...and with a touch of shadow:

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Friday, September 26, 2008

Sketchbook Stuff


Drawing for this week's Illustration Friday - the word is "packed". Thus, houses packed together. Coincidentally, I drew this today, then realized it fit the theme for this week.

Also, some quick scrawlings of archways:

Thursday, August 28, 2008

Illustration Friday: Routine

Walking home from the bus-stop after a long day of school. This has been part of my routine nearly forever (really, I'm entering my fifth year of post-secondary now, will it ever end?).

This is a digitally coloured and added-to sketch I did nearly two years ago, during a period where I was obsessed with drawing all autumn-inspired things (for the original, click here). I didn't think I was going to participate in IF this week, but then I found this sketch and decided to experiment on it a little.

Monday, August 18, 2008

Illustration Friday: Detached

So, I watched A Brief History of Time last night, and I've sort of had space and black holes on the brain since then. Thus, my interpretation of this week's Illustration Friday topic/word.