Recreating an old sketch to use on my Cricut!

I've kept sketchbooks off and on for years... simple, inexpensive notebooks I'd pick up either on sale or at the dollar store. While looking through some of my older sketches, I found several I'd like to make into stickers. I started with this strange little critter that seems somewhat frog-like.

My original drawing was fairly messy, but still fun.

He needed a LOT of work! The original photo of my sketch wasn't all that great, and he very much needed to be cleaned up and sharpened up. Because of this I brought the image into Photoshop and basically redrew the entire image.

Once I was finished, I saved him as a basic PNG image, then brought him into Illustrator to save him as an SVG. Then I had an idea...

I love the rough quality of the lines, almost like the tool marks from a chisel!

I recently saw a post on Reddit that linked to a really fun website called CuteCutter that helps you create simple SVGs of your images so that you can print them and/or cut them out on your cutting machine. I've done several images and I love how they come out... I'll be sharing more of those in the coming days, believe me. :D

I have to say I loved the way my original drawing came out using CuteCutter! It has an interesting, organic feel to it... almost like a linoleum print! It will definitely make an interesting sticker!

Also, once I finished cleaning up my drawing I decided to share an animated gif to show the difference between the two images. It's always good to start with the highest quality image you can, so that you can wind up with better end products.

Hopefully I'll be showing you some lovely stickers soon, including this chunky boy. I also have several other things to share coming up, so keep an eye on this space!

Til next time!

Last Sketchbook Update of 2013!

The year is winding down, and I'm sharing a last few sketches of the year. There's not much here, mainly because I've been fascinated by intricate patterns lately.

For those of you who don't know, I find drawing to be a wonderful thing. It helps distract me when I'm worried about something or having a bad fibro night. Because of this I tend to carry art supplies with me wherever I go. Nothing too fancy, just a notebook and some pens.

Ok, that's not quite accurate. I generally carry 4 black gel pens in different weights (from extra fine point to extra heavy), a few pencils and erasers, and something like 30 or 40 gel pens. And maybe a ruler or two, and maybe a couple of stencils for drawing circles or other shapes. Oh, and then there are the sharpies...

Let's just say I love color, lots and lots of color. I carry more art supplies than anything, because they're important to me. If you ever see me in public, I'll probably be doodling! But enough of that... on to the sketches!!

I doodled this onto a napkin after Thanksgiving dinner.

Flowers. I absolutely LOVE flowers. When we went to my dad's house for Thanksgiving, I wound up doodling on my napkin after we ate. I get really caught up in my head sometimes, so when I'm having a conversation, doodling something simple helps me focus on the conversation.

It sounds silly, but there are even studies to show that doodling can help people focus in meetings! Having a simple, mindless task certainly helps me turn off the internal chatter that seems to run through my head. That way I can actually pay attention to what's happening around me!

 
These three are related, although it's hard to tell. The left image is a copy of a drawing by Lorri-Marie Jenkins I'd found while browsing Stuffed magazine. I copied it, then colored it and added the white patterns. A few days later, I tried to draw some sketches in a similar style, but I don't feel like I captured it. Maybe it's my own style, but I don't really know. Then I did the strangest one... it started out being a woman, and then ... I don't know. It turned into some sort of woman/Dalek/duck combination. Don't ask, I don't have any answers.

But hey... this is how creativity works. Sometimes you get the Sistine Chapel, other times you get a woman with duck legs, a plunger, and... umm... whatever that silver thing is. They can't all be winners, right?

It's 6:40am, and I haven't been to sleep yet. Let's just show the rest of the sketches without much commentary, shall we?

This is the sort of intricate pattern I've been experimenting with. These take a long time to complete, but they're so much fun to do. I really, really love doing these!!

 

I hope your holidays are going wonderfully, and that you're having a joyous time. I'll see you soon!

Drawing supplies are cheaper than therapy. :D

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Fibromyalgia Sucks. New Meds Suck. Being Sick Sucks.

Ink, with pencil shading. The monkey
was already on the page.

Have you ever had one of those days where almost everything you can think of goes wrong? They're no fun, and you run out of curse words to use and you don't want to throw anything because it's just more crap you'll have to clean up later, right?

My last 3 months or so have been like that. I was sick, then I had a fibro flare, then I had a fibro flare while I was sick. I spent about a month mostly unable to eat or drink much and ended up in the emergency room for IV fluids and quite a few antibiotics. Once that was ok, I ended up with new fibro medicine that's kept me sleeping anywhere from 16-22 hours a day.

No, I didn't mistype and you didn't misread. I've actually spent several days asleep for 22 hours. It's not cool, and I don't recommend it.

So, with all of the medical drama, I've sort of run out of nails to write about. Who'd have thought, right? I've got the jitters from meds and I'm just plain not feeling creative when it comes to cosmetics. However, I do have lots of sketchbook goodness to share with you, so hopefully that'll inspire you some. In fact, I bet some of these sketches would make for good nail art! So, enjoy the sketches (hopefully, at least!) and the fun nail mockups!

Some days it's not worth chewing through the straps....

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Some sketchbook pages and an update

I worked on this page for quite a while over a span
of weeks. I think I'm happy with it? Maybe...

Whew, this last week or so has been a rough one. I'm not sure why, totally, but I think I may be fighting with a cold. When I get sick, the fibro pain tends to intensify, and I end up not good for much. I haven't even been journaling much, and my nails have been bare for two weeks or more. So sad.

So, in the interest of forcing myself out of my shell and writing a bit, I wanted to share a couple of images from my sketchbooks. This first one is in my tiny notebook, only 4" x 5.5".

I'd started out with the profile in the corner. I've been trying to learn how to draw pretty female faces, as I've written about before. This was an exercise in patience, as it took a lot of tweaking, erasing and redoing to come up with the finished sketch. Overall, though, I think she's a pretty one, and I actually really like the band in her hair. Small victories, yes?

Then there was this. I'm very interested in hand-lettering things, interesting ways to create letters. I found some interesting fonts (are they still fonts when they're hand-lettered?) in a book, so I sat down and played with them. It was fun.

Sorry it's been so quiet here. I'm hoping that when the weather cools off, I'll feel more like myself again. This summer has been a tough one, as usual.

I look forward to fall.

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More Sketchbook Goodness

My first two coptic stitched books!

I have yet another new addiction. I've admired handmade books for years, knowing that eventually I would get into it. Apparently, it's finally time and I have been overwhelmed with the need to make books!

I started with a simple book bound with duct tape, then made a larger art journal and a smaller one bound only by glue and paper. I wanted to move on to larger, more complex and beautiful bindings. I did some googling, spent a few hours on YouTube, and finally came up with a plan.

I called it Another Test because I wanted
to see how it holds up to every day use.

I started out with rather common supplies- white printer paper, glue sticks and cereal boxes. I used heavy thread to bind it, then realized I didn't like that and ripped it out to start over. Eventually I used rich brown embroidery thread to bind it, and liked the results (finally, after 3 tries!). I colored the covers with sharpie markers and called it done.

I'm really happy with this one. It opens flat so I can get all the way to the edges of the paper, which makes me very happy! I glued two sheets of cereal box together for each cover, then wrapped those in regular printer paper. They're nice and strong, and make fantastic drawing surfaces.

Overall, this is a fantastic travel journal! It's 4.25" x 5.5" and fits perfectly into my purse. It opens well, stays closed when I want it to, and is wonderful for jotting down things I need to buy, or ideas I want to try, or quick sketches. I'll definitely be making more of these!

So far I've used it lots for sketching. I've been trying to learn how to draw better hair. I want to be able to draw more varieties of hair, rather than just straight or wavy blowing-in-the-breeze. To help with this, I've found several artists that inspire me and have been copying their style. Once I'm comfortable with it, I'll work on incorporating it into my own drawings!

This book will be filled with things that make me happy!

This next book was a total spur-of-the-moment thing, although I absolutely love it! We were walking through the Dollar Tree (yes, the same trip where I bought the nail goodies!) when I found a pack of brightly-colored index cards! I've been seriously obsessed with bright colors for ages now, so when I saw those I knew they needed to become a tiny book!

This book is seriously small: it's 2.5" x 3". I've been adding lots of media to the pages- some have been painted, some have colored pencils as a base. Some have napkin scrapbook paper covering the whole page! So, I'm doodling my way through this one.

I did do a quick sketch in this one, experimenting with drawing curly hair my way. It's... somewhat less than successful, but I won't complain too much. :D

Overall, I'm having a wonderful time exploring this new hobby! But don't worry, I've got a new set of nail art experiments to share with you as soon as I can get them photographed!

Til next time!

There's something zen-like about stitching a book binding.

See my disclosure statement for more information.