For my sweetie

Designed a Valentine's Day card.  Had one of those online printing companies print it.  But I was forced to order 10 copies when I only needed one.  And because you simply can't send out Valentine's Day card to family and friends when it was a unique design just for my sweetie, I now have 9 copies sitting in a box.  Where they will probably stay way past their life expectancy.  Like forever.

The overuse of the glow effect is sickeningly sweet.  But it was Heart Day.  You can get away with such things.

Cute Puppy

Planet Practice

Just needed to practice a few skills in Illustrator, specifically using masks and/or coloring shapes within shapes.  I had a project coming up where I knew I'd be doing quite a bit of this and didn't want to look like an idiot.  So I took 15 minutes to create this planet graphic.  I realized that after that what I really needed was to learn to make better "star field" backgrounds.  Another lesson for another time.

Sails

I sat down with intent to design a set of prints for a friend who's big into sailing ships.  And that's what I told the recipient.  However, my true intent was to practice different ways of using transparency and layers in Illustrator.  So I got some trial-and-error practice in, and the recipient got a set of abstract wacky prints.  WIN!

Lesson of the Moth Part 2

In the first post, I introduced my rough sketch of Archie, the cockroach from Don Marquis's "Lesson of the Moth."  After creating a "rough cut" in Illustrator (now with color!), I decided to actually paint it.

And "Portrait of a Cockroach" was born.

The idea is that Archie is posing for his portrait.  The portrait artist included the "fabulous" wallpaper from whatever home Archie is currently stalking.  Since it's to scale, you can see how poorly the wallpaper was hung with the misaligned fleur-de-lys.  The artist took no prisoners here, people.

The rough cut

The painting

Not the Ace of Cakes

Our friend Shane was moving away and we wanted to throw him a going-away party.  But our friends Chris and Kevin were having birthdays at the same time.  And it was Christmas.  So what to do? Throw a Holiday/Going Away/Birthday Bash all at the same time since we're such gluttons for punishment incredible friends.

If that were not enough, I had this wonderful addlebrained idea to make each honoree a personalized cake. I started in Illustrator and designed the graphics.

I printed several copies of these so that I could cut them out to use as patterns for the fondant.  The hardest part was deciding which layers go where.  Having never worked with fondant before, I found it pretty easy to cut and sculpt.

I also threw everything together in Illustrator to make an invitation to show off send out.

The Way I Am

I love me some Ingrid Michaelson.  Love! Love! Love!  I don't think a day goes by when I don't listen to some of her music.  My ears.  Her voice.  We just fit.

In fact, I may or may not be listening to her as I write this.  You'll never know.

Anyway, the distressed messy look is not my style.  At all.  But I figured I might as well give it go, just to see what would happen.  I started with a lovely picture of my goddess.  Converted her into vectors (She liked it), then did all sorts of distressed messy things to it.  Can't say I was all that successful, which is why it's not my style.  She still looks great though.  And that's what counts.

Always getting myself in trouble

I'm terrible at wrapping presents.  I can't ever seem to cut the paper right or fold in the right location, so I end up mummifying the ends with tape.  So how do I make up for it?  By creating extra work for myself.

I usually wrap any gift in butcher paper and then spend hours and hours illustrating a unique design just for the recipient.

This design was for my niece.  I printed it to fill a letter-sized piece of photo paper, cut it out, and glued it on the top of the present.

Also did a gift tag.  You have to have a gift tag for wrapping paper that actually says the person's name on it, right?  RIGHT?

Really Bad Kitty: Work in Progress

I'm in the middle of a new Really Bad Kitty painting based on an illustration I did in Ai.  Developing...

IKEA + Cheap + Geek = Craft project

Was wandering around IKEA with the better half when I spied their wooden maquettes.  The Force must have guided me because I thought they would make really cool Star Wars figures.  Finished them in one afternoon while watching the Super Bowl.  Crafting during the Super Bowl? you're thinking.  Yeah, I'm like that.

Song Inspiration

One of my favorite musicians is Sean Fornier. And my favorite song of his is 'Falling For You.' Made this 'fan art' one afternoon for fun.