40 days of lettering...day 26

New year and another quote for Creative interviews, this time with Mat Zucker, Global Executive Creative Director Razorfish. The interview can be read in its entirety here.  I can certainly agree with this sentiment and can also easily see myself falling into this trap! I have never been an overly decisive person. Take for instance this design. Under a tight timeframe for me (one evening to complete), I initially thought I would keep it simple and stick to black and white. The style of lettering kind of lent itself to this and it seemed like a clean answer. Ultimately though, I couldn't stop myself from throwing in a bit of color to see how I liked it. Although I kind of liked it, in the end, I decided that it was better off with less going on, as well as the thought that the profile didn't read as well in multiple colors. When I started out, I just worked the lettering in the rounded shape, playing off the waviness of "wishy washy." It wasn't until I was nearly done, that it occurred to me that it might be a bit more interesting to add the nose and eye to make it into a profile. Anyone prefer the more colorful version? Ahhhh... the indecisiveness continues ;)

Time for a new year, resolutions and day 25 of the lettering project!

Happy New Year! As I embark on 2014, I have resolved to finish this project...this year! Umm ok, maybe I can do better than that ;) After all, finishing a 40 day project that I started about 3 months ago would be the lamest of all New Years resolutions. Actually, I have never been one for resolutions in the first place. People always seem to make them after Christmas overindulgence, and they tend to pass long before spring. But this year, I have given it some thought, art-wise, and actually have a few things I hopefully am resolved about enough to actually accomplish.

1. Try my hand at using some traditional media. Yup. Back in the day, I actually was fairly capable at picking up a brush. I'd like to try gouache for illustration (which I have never used) as well as good old fashioned ink for lettering. I'm sure I will never abandon my mouse, but to coin the phrase of Lilla Rogers, I think it might "inform" my work, hopefully for the better and give it a more organic feel. Take for example, this piece. I used the pencil tool for a rougher look. It was hard for me not to smooth out those Bézier curves, but I held off. I still look at it and wonder what it might have looked like being done with an actual brush.

2. Now this is a tough one to define....make my work more commercially viable. I suppose every artist tries to do this, but I feel like I need to take a step back and look at my "style" objectively. I feel that I tend to go for pure over the top cuteness, that just isn't as sellable as it could be. Not sure what all this means, but I hope it ultimately translates into making art that actually sells.

3. Make an official website. I had/have one but since it is flash-driven, and super hard to work with, it hasn't been updated in ages. I do have a portfolio site over at carbonmade, but it doesn't give you the bells and whistles that a personalized website does.

4. Work on more collections. This is related to number 2.

That should be enough to keep me busy! What are your resolutions, art or otherwise? I would love to hear! Thanks for following along and all the best for a happy and healthy 2014!

Jill

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

In the spirit of Linus, enjoy your holidays and may all your December snowflakes taste ripe! Happy 2014 as well!!

40 days of lettering...day 24

Quite an number of 40 days have passed since I started this project, but I have not given up! Here is day 24, another piece that I did for Creative Interviews. The quote is by Oscar Stern, Creative Director Art/Broadcast Producer for the Hachette Book Group. Interview can be read here. I had very little time to work on this one. Aside from a quickie thumbnail, a week earlier, I didn't start this until 10:00pm last night! Proud to say, I powered through it without a drop of coffee, but I nearly went to fire up my Verissmo, a few times! The text itself, was pretty visual, which always helps get the ball rolling. Not that you have to have anything other than straight lettering in a piece like this, but I always think it adds a nice touch, if you can. Considering my time constraints, I wanted to keep it simple color-wise, so I decided to throw it on a black background that I could quickly "grunge up" at the last minute (which ended up being around 2:00am).  I could have spent more time working on the leaves and making them more interesting, but at that hour, I was going for speed and simplicity, which for me, meant using the brush tool as opposed to the pen tool in illustrator. Always a relief to use that as opposed to the point making, handle pulling tedium of using illustrator's pen, but hey... it's what I'm used to. All things considered, I was happy with the way it turned out.

society6 sale!

Hi there! Just a quickie to say that you can use the special promo link below and get *FREE Shipping plus $5 OFF each of my products when you order from my Society6 Store! The promotion expires December 8, 2013 at Midnight Pacific Time. There are lots of prints, pillows, totes, T's, cards and onesies to choose from. *Free shipping offer excludes Framed Art Prints, Stretched Canvases and Throw Pillows with insert.promo link

Lilla Rogers, Make Art That Sells, hometown map assignment!

I realized that I never officially posted week 4 editorial assignment from Lilla Rogers MATS class. This was a particularly challenging assignment to do in less than a week. We were to do a map of our hometown. Now I presently live in a typical New England small town, just 30 some miles west of Boston. I actually considered stretching the truth and just doing Boston, but ultimately I decided that doing a map of a city would be more overwhelming, especially since it has been done so many times already. I seriously doubt that little ol' Westborough has been the subject of an editorial map. 

The disadvantage of doing a small town is the seemingly lack of interesting subject matter, so I dove into the history books to get some material! Although he left here as a small child and his family's home is long gone, Eli Whitney, the inventor of the cotton gin, was born here! Also, in the 19th century, Westborough was known for sleigh manufacturing. Outside of that, I decided to focus on the hellish traffic circle (the rotary) in the center of downtown, with no less than 7 streets converging into it. To make traffic worse, nearby there is a low railroad bridge that despite multiple warnings, tractor trailers get stuck underneath it on a weekly basis. Fun! Since it is in New England, the epicenter of the Dunkin Donut chain store magnate, there is an odd, unhealthy abundance of donut/coffee shops. I counted 9 in a town of 18,000. Seems like a pretty high ratio, but maybe the sugary caffeine rush is necessary to navigate through the downtown traffic ;)

I have always wanted to tackle a map and despite the challenge, I was thrilled that this was the assignment. My class submission is the smaller version pictured below. I wanted to submit this to the wonderful site, They Draw and Travel, so I had to expand and reformat to meet their horizontal specs. There was a lot that I did not have time to do for the class assignment, so I took the opportunity to add more buildings, people and of course, the infamous railroad bridge. There are always more details I would like to have added, but this kind of work is really an exercise in editing it down to a manageable amount of info that gives the viewer a feel for the locale, without showing every last detail. I hope I achieved that!

happy thanksgiving!

Just a quickie for day 23 of my lettering project, but more importantly, I'd like to thank anyone who takes the time to visit my little corner of the cybersphere! Thanks for your interest and support and have a great and happy thanksgiving day!