ILLUSTRATED PHOTO MATS: Apples

Someone popped by and suggested I make some illustrations featuring apples, since I live in "Apple Capitol, USA" (according to some very old marketing before those fly-by-night places like the state of Washington showed up).  So here they are!

"Little slice, you are such an imp!"  "Eat me!  HAHAHAHAH!"

And during one of my "spring cleaning" sessions in the studio (an event that occurs year-round when I'm motivated to do it and/or procrastinating with what I'm supposed to be working on), I found these little brown cards with the window cut outs.  Perfect for an insert of juicy color!

ILLUSTRATED PHOTO MAT: Snails!

The official version . . .

Please note how very awesome the shells are!

BOUNDLESS BAZAAR: art while u wait!

I worked both Saturday and Sunday at the bazaar, shilling my wares but mostly enjoying the fine beach-like weather and people-watching.  At some point on Saturday I had a gentleman tell me "If this [photo mat] had a VW bus on it, it'd be sold."  Coincidentally, I just so happen to have a sketch of a VW bus. . . which (on Sunday) I added to two blank photo mats right there at the bazaar:

On the Road (Shenandoah Valley).  Sold the same day, WOOT!

A blurry On the Road (Southwest)

I'll repost with better shots later--totally running on adrenaline at this point (note the dry, rambling writing, it's a dead give-away).  I also had three requests for a beach themed version.  I smell a series . . .

AND I fielded a few other requests for/was inspired to create image themes such as apples, puppies, drive-in movie, and cupcakes.  And later: more Winchester themes, Patsy Cline, and German themed images.  It was a banner day for my right brain.

But wait, there's more!

Several weeks ago I had taken a casual request for a cartoon-style snail illustration in the same manner as my Charley and Kittens mats.  The illustration has been drafted and ready to roll for a couple of weeks, but my brain has refused to cooperate when it came to applying the image to the mat board; it just didn't want to do it, and instead kept wanting to do this over-the-top eye-popping color with flowers . . . which is how Garden Buffet came about.  Now that that image is out of my system, this morning (Sunday) I went back to the original snail cartoon and inked that tout de suite.  Sold the same day!

I'll work all these up into official templates and redo the mats, take official photos, etc., and repost each with it's own official blog thing.  Officially.  Until then, however, it's Miller Time with my jammies and sock monkey slippers. . .

ABSTRACT PAINTINGS

You know how sometimes you scribble in the margins and see pictures in the scribble?  This is sort of like that, but with paint.

Acrylic and Ink on 8x8" canvas.

SUNDOWN 2014: PEOPLE SKILLS (sketches)

You would think being an artist who can render still life images with near-photographic quality AND has a degree in biology would have absolutely, beyond any shadow of a doubt, NO problem drawing the human body.  Let me just tell you now that is totally not true.

It's like a furuncle in my gluteus maximus.  Every.  Single.  Time.

The running joke is that I "need to work on my people skills."

So, I worked on my people skills for approximately 10 hours at the first annual Sundown Festival, and here are a few of the results.

And here are two of the folks I drew that actually held still long enough for me to also snap photos:

And these are the good ones . . . so frustrating to know these were equal parts talent (natural) and skill (studied, educated).  I want to be able to nail it every time. . . which means more practice needed!  Not there yet.  Still working on it.  

Fortunately, I've got 10 hours of photos to work with now!

ILLUSTRATED PHOTO MAT: Garden Buffet (Snails!)

Lest you think the flowers are the subject of this mat, look again!

I've had MANY people tell me they love the cat illustrations I did, and would I please do something in a similar style for [enter other animal type here].  I don't take commissions (yet?), but I'm always amenable to a suggestion for future work!

So, a friend asked me to do something with snails.  I actually had a very different plan for the snails, which is still in the sketchbook waiting to be transferred to a photo mat, but somewhere between there and the actual inking I kept coming back to this over-the-top almost-abstract idea for snails in a flower bed.  As you can see, I went with the color bomb.

As a result of their VAST reduction in size, the detail in the snails was dialed waaaay back.

[Never fear, snail-lovers!  You, too, will have your zany cartoon snails . . . just not so much in this illustration.]

Here's an extreme close up:

Each snail is about 1/4" in diameter on the actual mat.

STUFF I PAINTED: Apple Blossom Crowns

Here ye!  Here ye!
These are the bee's knees AND the dog's bollocks!  In American Engligh that translates as: AWESOME²

My town has an annual spring celebration called Apple Blossom, which is not unlike a pink and green Mardi Gras with slightly less nakedness and fewer moon pies.  We usually have a swarm of A and B-list celebrities come through, and some celebrity offspring is crowned the Apple Blossom Queen (local pageant winners are the court princesses).  The circus AND the carnival hit town, waaaay too much carnie food and 50-gal drums of liquored fruit are consumed.  Thrills, spills, golf tournies, parades, buffet lunches, discos.  It's a complete mess . . . I love it!

I found these plain cast iron hooks on super-sale at Hobby Lobby (I think) and KNEW they needed to be painted.  Over a year later I rediscovered them buried in with my (rarely used) painting supplies and gave them a make-over.  Not bad (says I) for my first forays into under-painting and tonal values!

I have three.  What doesn't sell at the Boundless Bazaar (July 12 - 13 here in Winchester) will be hawked on Etsy.  Perfect for any Apple Blossom Princess!

ILLUSTRATED PHOTO MAT: Wheat & Lavender

Wheat & Lavender.  Pen & Ink on mat board.  2014

Two of my friends were married this summer in the Outer Banks, NC; this was the guest book.

I was given the following parameters: simple, beachy, natural elements, shiny periwinkle blue ribbon, must fit an 8 x 10 photo.  Viola!

My favourite part of this illustration?  Interestingly, it's the "plain" section of image with the browns, yellows, and greens of the stems with the blue ribbon . . . something about the color blending and combo of hues turned out perfectly.

Here's a few close ups:

ILLUSTRATED PHOTO MATS: Kittens and Charley

Charley.  Pen & Ink on mat board.  2014

Kittens.  Pen & Ink on mat board.  2014

For the true cat aficionado!  [Heh!]

All my cat illustrations are based on actual cats that [I own?] keep showing up at my house.  Please don't ask how many, only know they are all fixed, unadoptable, and rather like cartoons in motion . . . I just decided to capture the cartoon part of it all.

I kept messing around with the cat illustrations, trying to find some sort of groove that felt right: loose and fun, adaptable to movement and variations in each cat, yet with a zany "Bill the Cat" quality that suits so many of their personalities.  In case you don't know Bill the Cat, here he is:

Borrowed from the Interwebs

[I have one cat that resembles Bill, but only on brushing day with an OD on catnip.  Otherwise, he could be the star of his own animated "if cats were slightly tweaked college frat boys" series. . . which he will have.]

Anywho.  Yes, I am working on developing this style a little further, and yes there will be other cats introduced, and no, they will not all be on photo mats.  Some of them (like Charley) have their own mini stories on the to-do list.

In the meantime, here's a few close-ups of these first two illustrated mats:

Charley.  Yes, RL Charley has a perennial look of worry on his mug; he's the low man on the totem pole in our group.

Junior (L) and Snook (R).  Snook (shown actual size, ha!) is the feline equivalent of a Mogwai.  Really.  Also Charley's litter mate (brother).

SEPT '13 - JAN '14: STUFF I DID

For those of you getting the blog updates via Facebook, I apologize: you're about to see most of these pix for the millionth time.  Feel free to skip ahead to the next post.

The rest of you: here's what you missed while I was off thinking I was updating the blog, but, in fact, wasn't:

1.  WAM!  I started shilling my wares at a local art market one night a month.  Great for those crafty things I make, not so much for the photos and art.  I take whatever I have ready to go at the time: jewelry, knitted scarves and socks, prints, etc; left-overs go to local stores or the Pencilated Etsy shop.  If you're in the area, come by and observe yours truly perfecting her schtick (bowler hat antics and Charlie Chaplin wiggle-walk still in beta).

The Gap marketing dept. should totally hire me.

2. I made a Christmas Card.  If you didn't buy one at Winchester's Old Town General Store then too bad, you missed it. You'll have to wait until next December to maybe nab one of the few left . . . but by then I'll have the next one in the series out, which will only cause you endless grief and pain trying to decide which one of the two you neeeeeeed to buy so you should just plan on buying both.  See how I look out for you?!

Cheesy holiday sentiments are what you get when you start with an illustration then try to fit it to a pre-fab cardstock.

3.  I drew lots of bouncy houses.  Okay, really it was the same house lots of times because I was working on developing a style (am still working on developing a style) and in the end I had something that (in its draft form) resembled something Disney might have used as background in an animation.  I don't know how I feel about that . . . which is why I haven't formally advertised this for commissioned work yet.  It needs to be pushed more toward either outrageous or formal, or maybe offer both extremes.  I dunno.

4.  I tinkered with comic/graphic novel styles.  I've got a series of about five of these waiting in the wings for inking.  It's a tricky style to wrap my head around, as it's neither cartoon nor realistic but some weird pulled-taffy place stretched between them; I have a hard time figuring out when to back off of the detail.

5.  Tooned!  Building up from the simple stick figure to more advanced figure and portrait drawing by cartooning my friends and family... .completely bass ackwards from how I should be doing it.  Someday soon they may actually look like the people they're supposed to be (heh).

6.  I was inspired to write a children's story.  Not that I actually intend to write a book!  My brain is teeming with picture and story ideas that may never go beyond a one-line caption, but I've been studying Beatrix Potter (for the illustrations) so we'll see if that rubs off.  Here's one of the preliminary sketches. . . which will look nothing like the end result if I follow past precedent!

Also, I made this:

No, you can't have it: it's mine!

and I started these two projects (for the seventh time):

Sweaters!  These will be the hood pcs.

and I redesigned these:

Yup--my business cards double as merchandise tags!  See how clever I am?!

(Also, I stripped all the wallpaper off the dining room walls and insulated the garage in case you were interested, but I'm not including photos of that.)

And THAT is what I've been up to since September.

ERROR: SYSTEM LOW ON MEMORY

I may have mentioned this before, but apparently I live a rich, fantasy life.

And when I say that, I don't mean I have aspirations to pretentiousness . . . most of the clothes I wear are too speckled in paint or ink stains to get away with that kind of behavioural quagmire.  No, what I mean is I go around all "Oooooh, I'll blog about such-and-such on Friday," then get completely side-tracked but later somehow recall actually posting something.

Ergo: I haven't posted anything new since (holy crap!) September (!!!!) because I thought I had been posting stuff all along!

I don't even know what to say after that.  Except maybe: please don't put me in assisted living care!

Now I've got to go back and revisit my files to see what I've been doing since my last post!  I know I've done something but I can only remember back to about Christmas.  Probably time to start taking those memory booster vitamins I keep buying (but keep forgetting to take)!

The famous Pencilated Power Nap!
(This would be an example of what I HAVEN'T been doing since September. . . honest!)