Get Moving

Like so many people this time of year, I'm finding it hard to get outside and exercise. Brr! It is COLD! Sometimes, you just need a friend yelling in your ear to get out there and do it :)

I turned my friend's encouragement/taunting into a fun hand-lettered reminder. Hope it gets you moving too!

Now Live On Etsy!

My Etsy shop is now open for business, selling prints of my favorite illustrations. I hope you'll hop on over and take a peek!

www.etsy.com/shop/erinsARTworks

Please let me know if there are any sizes or other products you would be interested in seeing. And thanks, as always, for the wonderful support and encouragement!

Sketching Letters

Whew, is it really OCTOBER? Pardon my two month disappearance! I have been a busy bee, hard at work on all sorts of projects, sketches, ideas, vacationing, home renovations, you name it.

After my First Steps of Hand Lettering class earlier this year, I completed the follow up course, The Final Steps of Hand-Lettering: Color & Texture. This class was taught by the same awesome instructor, Mary Kate McDevitt, and it really was inspiring to see how she works. Though I didn't get around to formally finishing my project on the site, I did see one sketch through to completion.

Since then, I've been quietly practicing, observing and putting ideas down on paper. I thought I'd let ya'll take a peek into the ol' notebook. Please give me some feedback :D

Remember that vacation I mentioned? Guess where we went?

I wouldn't mind doing some more refined sketches with this one, and trying out some Miami-inspired colors. (No, I didn't go to Miami, but I'm not really what kind of colors Ocean City, MD brings to mind, do you?)

For the first part of vacation, I sadly was not feeling 100%. In fact, I was downright miserable. But at least I put my misery to work and came up with a nice drawing. This one I definitely plan to refine and ink! 

And finally, as I am a giant running nerd, I always go back to my passion. Here are some simple sketches. Just need to figure out which ones to move forward with.

Thus ends my tour de notebook. Up next, I'll share some of my work from the Lynda.com 21-day drawing challenge. Boy was that super fun! I'd also like to do a new tutorial soon. Taking suggestions!

Coastal Watercolor Cutout Series

 

Ahoy friends! Without further ado, I am very proud to present a small series of illustrations I've been working on over the past year. Since time seems to be a rare commodity these days, I've been slowly, ever so slowly chipping away at these, making refinements, adding and subtracting for what seems like forever. But I think they are at a good place now.

I was very inspired by the watery textures and soft colors in my darling daughter's paintings, and thought they would lend themselves to a coastal themed series. I snipped and nipped and played with negative space. I love that they are perfectly imperfect.

What do you think? I'd like to keep expanding on these and would welcome some ideas. Prints will be available on Etsy soon!

A First Encounter with Skillshare

Have you ever clicked on an ad that pops up in your Facebook feed? I tend not to, but a while back, I started seeing irresistible ads for Skillshare classes. They offer very specific, online courses for creatives. You go at your own pace, they are affordable at $15-30 a pop, and there is a very diverse range of topics, taught by other experienced creatives. I decided to give it a try, and enrolled myself in Mary Kate McDevitt's The First Steps of Hand-Lettering course.

The way the classes work is that you watch the instructor's videos, look through his or her example material, and then apply the lessons to your own project. The classes are broken down into digestible sections, and you can go at your own pace. You start a project page to share your own steps and final product, and you can view (and comment on) other students' work as well.

For better for for worse, I was hooked on this project. I spent hours doing sketches and brainstorming. I developed a few ideas, drawing and redrawing. It felt wonderful to be totally invested into a project just for me. Now my house will tell you it was a little neglected during this process, but we've made amends :-P

For a theme, I wanted to focus on the homey, comforting ritual of sharing a cup of coffee. In my family, coffee is a vehicle for conversation, sharing and relaxing. I look forward to coffee time every day, and aimed to capture these ideas in my project.

My word list, if you can read my chicken scratch

Mood board with old-timey, farm house vibe

Lettering warm-up

Thumbnails

Thumbnails

Refined sketch

Refined sketch

At this point, I was struggling a bit, but I pushed through, did a lot more sketching, rearranged my composition, and wound up with this:

Finalized sketch, ready to ink

Inked sketch, ready for scanning and color (which I'll learn more about in the follow-up course)

In the end, I wound up with a piece that I like. But more important than the final drawing was the experience of the project in its entirety. I've found myself sketching a lot more often as a result, and look forward to learning more. I'm currently enrolled in Mary Kate's follow-up course to the first one, and hope to dive into that once I finish up some freelance projects on my plate. But that's the beauty of Skillshare: the course doesn't expire. So I can log on to the course whenever I want...next week, next month, next year, and complete the project as I have time.

Have any of you tried Skillshare yet? How was your experience?

The Sochi Olympics Logo

The Olympics are just about here! Every two years, the world turns their attention to a new locale, and a new celebration of the world's best athletes. And with the entire world watching, the organizing committee must come up with a logo to put a face on their Olympics. That's a tall order! The logo appears on every broadcast, every venue, merchandise, the website, and much more.

The Sochi Olympics logo is surprising in its simplicity and lack of illustration (aside from the Olympic rings). It is also the very first logo to feature a web address. Russia has a rich cultural history of intricate, detailed art. Religous icons, nesting dolls and scrolling floral folk art come to mind. So for the host city to choose a modern-looking, very simplified logo is quite daring. I like how the letters "o" "h" and "i" in sochi are mirrored in the "014" below and the blue color hits the right wintry note.

As can be expected, there has been some outcry that the logo does not call any attention to Sochi's heritage.  As you can see in the logos below, many previous host countries took the opportunity to showcase various facets of their culture.

While I agree that the logo is a great place to showcase a city's heritage (I just LOVE everything about the Vancouver logo above), I think the Sochi's logo works. It presents the Sochi Olympics as of the digital era and shows innovation in it's simplicity.

What do you think of Sochi's logo? Plain Jane or just right?

AG & Co. Trade Show Banners

The folks at Alan Gaynor & Company, an architecture firm, approached me recently to design a trio of banners for use at a trade show. Trade show booths are an empty canvas and it is up to the occupier (and/or their designer) to transform them into an inviting space. Alan and Michele wanted a lively, professional backdrop to their booth.

Our goals were to feature the company logo, contact info and association logo on the central banner, and display their scope of work on the side banners. Using the angular shapes associated with their brand, I created a framework of shapes to place the images in. I was supplied with a large variety of portfolio images, and took great care paring the selection down. I looked for images that contained dynamic shapes, which played off the angular framework, and bright, bold colors to pop against the black.

Photo courtesy Alan Gaynor & Co.

An interesting tip to keep in mind when designing these: make sure the main focus of your design is in the upper half of your banners. When looking at the photo above, it's probaby a no-brainer as to why you would do this. The bottom of the banners fall behind a table, often with people in front of them. However, when you are designing, with only your template open before you, it's very easy to forget the environment, and get lost in the details of the design. I had originally placed the company contact info and association logo down at the bottom of the central banner. It looked more balanced there than in the current location, but would never have been visible after placement in the booth. Always remember your end use!  

Michele and Alan working their magic at the trade show. Photo courtesy Alan Gaynor & Co.

Alan, Michele and the rest of their team were very happy with the end result! It was a pleasure to work with them. Banner printing was done by banneraholic.com.

Flag Garland Illustrator Brush

The triangle. Have you noticed how popular this simple shape has been the past few years? Search 'triangle bunting' on Pinterest and your head will spin. In this tutorial, I will show how to create a festive triangle garland in Illustrator, using a custom pattern brush. Once you've got the brush in your palette, it's easy to add some flair to your next project!

Let's start with a blank Illustrator document. Select your Polygon Tool (nested under Rectangle Tool), and click once in the drawing area. A box will pop up and you can enter 3 for number of sides and anything you like for Radius. I used 0.6944 in.

Click OK and voilà! Your triangle. It will automatically be filled with whatever your foreground color is.

Select the triangle, and go to your Brush panel. Click on the little triangle in the upper right of the panel and select New Brush. From the resulting dialog box, select Pattern Brush and OK. In the next dialog box, give your brush a name. If your triangle had its point toward the sky, like mine did above, you'll want to check Flip Across. For the Fit, I used 'Stretch to fit.' This setting has the corners of each flag touching one another. If you select 'Add space to fit,' there will be a bit of space in between each flag. Choose whichever you like best! (P.S. it is fun to play around with the other settings and options here, so go ahead and give it a shot.) Click OK.

You will now see a representation of your new brush in the Brushes Panel and can start experimenting. Select your pen tool and draw a swooping curve. Make sure you have no fill, and then select the triangle brush from your palette.

Except, I think my triangles are a little too large. Double click on your brush in the Brushes palette, and reduce the size some. I went down to 70%. Click OK, and then Apply to Strokes. 

Ta da!  It's that easy to make a garland of flags. If you'd like to make them different colors, select your path, go to the Object menu at the top of the screen, then under Path, select Outline Stroke. You can then select each individual triangle with the Direct Selection tool and recolor it. I've done an ombré look below.

For another way to use your custom brush, select your Brush tool, rather than the Pen. Make sure your triangle brush is selected. If you drag a long curvy stroke out with the Brush tool, your flags will have more dimension and character to them. I picture them blowing in the wind.

Also reminds me of the scales on a dragon's back...

...but I digress.

If you use the Brush tool and make short, choppy strokes, you will have a sort of confetti-like effect, drawing out one, beautifully imperfect triangle at a time.

This brush can lend itself to so many applications. What can you come up with? Please share!

P.S. For the garland image at the very top, I copied and pasted the flags into Photoshop as a Smart Object. I then added Drop Shadow, Bevel/Emboss, and a Texture Overlay.

One Cute Crab Invitation

For my adorable son's first birthday party, I wanted to create an equally adorable invitation. How cute is this guy? 

We read books each day and the little one always has a big smile for a story with sea creatures in it. Add in the fact that it's a summer birthday, and he already had a crab outfit, and our party theme was a no-brainer!

For the illustration, I wanted to keep the shapes simple and flat and let their uneven edges give the lil' guy plenty of character. The bright lobster (or in this case, crab) red has such a nice punch combined with the nautical blues. A classic serif font ties together well with the illustration's elementary style.

Supporting my theme for the party were some cute crabby balloons, the outfit I mentioned above, and a very crabby cake made by yours truly. A professional cake decorator I am not, but I did have a lot of fun doing it :)

Beach Crab mylar balloons

Carter's boy's romper

Our cute little crab also made an appearance on the thank you notes, which I paired with bright blue envelopes.

I am so pleased with how the bright, happy illustrations set the scene for a very bright, happy birthday. If you'd like this design customized for your party, please drop me a line!

Beautiful Beach Umbrellas

I always love visiting the beach. However, as a member of the 100⁺ SPF club, I can usually be found hanging out under an umbrella. Instead of taking in the rays, I take in the scene before me, and often spend time painting and sketching. While the water is awe-inspiring and the sky can be breath-taking, my eye is always attracted to the fun array of umbrellas dotting the beach. They shout SUMMER! in a way nothing else can.

I painted these umbrellas while on vacation in Ocean City, MD last year. They make a nice reminder of a great vacation. Of all the beach artwork I've done, this was the first time I took the beach out of the scene and just focused on the umbrellas. I like how it brings out their individual "personalities".

I'm not the only one using the beach umbrella as a muse. Below is a colorful collection of artwork showcasing beautiful beach umbrellas. Don't they just make you feel happy? Enjoy, and stay cool in the shade. It's hot out there!

Beach Umbrellas by Eileen Seitz

Beach Umbrellas by Jan Matson

Color Beach, a reworked photograph of a 1940's postcard by VintageBeach

Seaside Umbrellas by Kathleen Deni

Sand Dunes by Heidi Malott