My Dad

Earlier this week we got some devastating news that our beloved Dad has passed away.  Nothing in the world prepares your for this, and I am not prepared.  I now have to prepare myself  for a flight to Africa - which I am not looking forward to because flying frightens me to death!    And in general I do not like funerals so this is more than a double whammy for me.  I am trying had hard not to think to much about any of it.  

I'm also planning an order of service for my dad which I want to take with so I don't have to try and find a printer there.   Now just trying to go through the motions of Christmas.   

Creating headers

With typography fixed firmly in the back of my head, I decided to create my own typed headers.  I've learned so much about these letters and the history behind them.  Its easy to bang some letters together, its much much harder to fiddle around with the spacing, and I'm not talking about the spacing that our computers automatically use.  I'm taking about using InDesign and making sure that you pull some letters closer together and push some further out, the weight of the letter is also important.  Anyway enough of the lesson .

Summer

This is Summer  and another mixed media image I have created,  she is really nice and brightly coloured.  I've been thinking that I would l love to be able to offer a mixed media workshops teaching this wonderful relaxing art.   Not sure if anyone would actually like to do this though.  She has been created using acrylics, pastel pencils, and collage bits.

Faces

I am having this urge at the moment to paint, paint, paint, when I was at college I was urged to persue my collage work, but really struggled with this  for a long time.  Maybe it was burnout, I don't really know, but I just could not get into it.    So now I am armed with a small A5 sketch book which is so much easier to have around than a big canvas and of course the piece is done in minutes.  This is  my master piece, I am so proud of this one.  It dawned on me the other day just how connected to art I actually am.  I'm doing a two year HND Graphic Designer course and I am hoping that I am going to  be able to put my newly learnt skills to good use and market myself a little better than I have been.  In the mean time I am carrying on with my passion which is creating collaged faces.  Kelly Rae Roberts has truly inspired me.

It's not about faces today

I decided today was all about scrapbooking and making pages.  I nicked one of sister-in-law's photo's of my adorable  little niece and take her out of the photo completely and put her somewhere else.  This image was really great because she appeared to be focusing down.

I have loads of embellishments and backing papers ( all digital) gleaned from many different sources so I decided to create my own little fantasy place for a gorgeous little princesses.

So here is my gorgeous niece looking into a mysterious pond filled with fairy lights!

Err ummmm

I am trying really hard to get the blending looking a little more cheerful and bright(as in colour)  I am also thinking of offering  some painting face workshops in our area where people can come and have some fun, hopefully not just learning how to draw and paint faces, but how to create other things like scrapbooks, journals  etc.  Hopefully someone out there likes what I do.  In the meantime I am going to see if I can get a video uploaded.

 

 This is a big improvement on some of  faces I made right at the start of my journey

Circus RollerMan

I decided to step away from my faces and do a lightly different illustration, I've called this one Circus Roller man, and of course he is purely fantasy and a bit whimsical.

More faces

I don't think I can stop painting faces, its taken ages for the penny to drop, but at last I can see some progress.   This was done using acrylics and finally the skin is starting to look more blended.      The background is a pre-printed, I am preparing a collage back ground for my next one.

Digital art

Some digital art

Drawing Faces

Firstly I sketched the face making sure that the eyes lined up using a ruler to make sure.  I used pastel pencils  and a paper with a slight grain to it.

 

I then started added the dark shadings using dark brown and black.  Using flesh, subtle yellow and white to  blend the dark shades in, once I had carried on blending until I was satisfied that I had got the skin colour reasonable , I then added the hair working from the dark colours to  the top lighter ones.  In the end she did not look to bad.

I'm making faces

I am making faces and thanks to Suzi Blu's the penny has finally dropped!  Here I used Suzi's face principals and combined these with All Norah's Art technicolour faces.  I coloured these in using pastel pencils and was amazed at how easy it was to blend them, they work so well.

Journals

My art journals, and some of the pages I have already decorated., sorry I am a woman of few words.  I am going to try and make my ramblings longer, to be honest visually things say a lot more.  The journals were pretty pricey, but  going to a flea market, picking up a lovely hard back between A4 -A5 size should do the trick, don't worry about whats in it this can easily be painted over, interesting words or images left in to add more depth to your page, there is only one limit and that's your imagination  Scrapbooking  is a wonderful way of not only off your beautiful memories, but a very relaxing and rewarding way of  having that all important me time.    If you can stick it you can use it, step out your comfort zone and discover your hidden talent. 

Faces

I am mad about faces, and love it even more when I have sketched my face and start adding paint.  The final result is un-predictable and exciting.

These two are my technicolor faces and I just love them!

My Scrapbook journal pages

I love how the effects you get when you combine paper, newspaper, wallpaper, fabrics with paints glues, stamps and inks.  On these pages I have used many of the above to create a sort of shabby chic look to  my pages which are all one offs.  Happy accidents can often to out to be the your best pieces.  This is this the front cover to my painted  scrapbook journal.

This is the side view with all my hand painted tags for my different headings.

These are just some of the pages from my scrapbook.

Wings - Challenge with ACT's

Here is my contribution

Some of my favourite things

If you had to ask me what was my most favourite thing in my artist tool box I would have to say that its my Viva paints.  I just love them, I love the colours and the textures and they work so well with  my work.  I will be showcasing more stuff I have made using this fantastic product.  I included the photo of the felt pens because I just love the colours.

When we went to the beach

When we went to wales I  sat  on the sand near  a pebbled sea barrier, and I was armed, yes I had my camera and oodles of time.  The skeleton of crab.

I piled  as many pebbles as I could and took these  photos before they toppled over,  I used the macro(flower) setting on the camera, I was really pleased with how they came out considering they were tiny little stones.

I wouldn't consider my feet attractive at all but honest I couldn' t find anything thing else in close proximity to me lol

  But my best surprise was ...............................

the beautiful sunset I managed to capture.