I’ve finally scanned and posted the last of my flower trading cards. I’ve already started working on the full-size versions, and have the first few scanned. I’m in the process of cleaning them up and coloring them right now. Some of the final artwork will be a bit different from these small ones, but that was part of the point of making them: to see what worked and what didn’t work. In fact, I’m still not 100% decided on which flower to use for two of my letters, so I did both:

  
Gerber Daisy     or        Gladiolus?

   
Snapdragon       or        Sunflower?

Decisions, decisions… there are just too many flowers that begin with “S!” Any opinions out there?

To see the whole series, check them out here and here and here and here and here…. or just check out the whole set in my Flickr account.

With the intense heat wave the Atlantic coast has been having, it’s hard to think of something as fresh as spring flowers! Even the summer-blooming flowers in my garden have been wilting in the sun, despite my efforts to keep them watered. And I’m feeling a bit squirrely from hiding indoors so much… I miss the outside! We had a respite this week with some much needed rain, but now the hot is socked in again, with extra humidity on top. Even knowing we’re not having the worst of it is poor consolation. Thank goodness for air conditioning!

I’m getting to the last of the trading-card-sized sketches from this series. The last few remaining letters are the ones that have been giving me trouble… either in deciding what flower to use, or in how I want to draw them. If you haven’t seen the rest of the series, you can check them out here and here and here and here….

I’ve been doing an unusual amount of traveling in June, so in July I’m very much looking forward to some time to sit down and draw the final versions for this whole series. Stay tuned!

A few more from the Flower Alphabet series. It’s been fun to do these quick little sketches! I’m starting in on the full-size drawings now. Some of them won’t be exactly the same as the sketch/trading card size have been, and I’m narrowing down some of the layout details that I want to standardize across them all.

In the meantime, right NOW, through midnight on Tuesday, June 22, Zazzle.com is having a sale! $10 off any purchase of at least $10 when you use this code at checkout: BLFXRTENHRZERPAJPVFW — it’s a great time to head over to my Critterwings shop if there was something you’ve had your eye on!

I’ve finally had a moment to scan in the next batch of artist-trading-cards/sketches for my flower alphabet. What I haven’t had a chance to do yet is start in on the final versions. This spring has been relatively insane, both at work and at home. I’m really missing my drawing table lately, but at this rate I’ll only be able to make brief visits until July.  *sniff* I’m keeping my sketchbook close to console me…

The first set from this series was posted in part 1 and part 2. They’re all the standard 2.5 x 3.5 size for artist trading cards, but they’re still basically first drafts for a series I’m making for my store. This batch isn’t colored yet, but I haven’t decided yet what I’m going to do with them. Perhaps it’s time to start using that dusty and neglected Etsy account, hmm?

Still, a plane ride is a long time sitting still with few distractions, so I whipped out my sketchbook and was faced with the usual performance anxiety when faced with “draw something!” and no other parameters.

The result, a rather imperious cat and some happy little griffins. You can take a look at them in my RedBubble gallery, where there are some much nicer and far more finished works from other participants on display. What do you think? Do they deserve the full treatment and real finished drawing?

Later this week: something that’s not just a pencil sketch, I promise!

Denver kicked my butt last week. And all I can say is “thank you.”

I had an awesome time attending the InHowse Designer Conference in Denver, and it has left me visually and conceptually recharged. Overcharged, in some ways, since I’m still mulling over things I saw and heard. I attended some excellent speakers on various topics about design process and developed a minor hand cramp from taking notes. I’ll be typing up my notes soon so I’ll be able to comprehend them later. While there, I was able to meet up with some old friends and make some new friends, and had a wonderful time hanging out with all of you at InHowse and across the street at the How Conference. The photo above is me being slightly menaced by the giant blue bear outside the convention center, but it turned out he was just the curious type.

Outside of the conference, I walked. A lot. Denver was a great town to explore, and I’d like to visit again, even if it doesn’t include the massive HOWie pub crawl next time. The day I arrived I was able to swing by the Chalk Art Festival and People’s Fair, which were a nice surprise. Later I stopped by the Denver Art Museum and spent a few hours over at Red Rocks Park before my flight left on Thursday. And I took a ton of photos with my dinky little point-and-shoot camera, most of which are still dumped into a big heap on my hard drive. But here’s a taste of Red Rocks:

I’m back home brimming with ideas and inspirations, and more than a little worn out. This week I’ll be trying to assemble all the little bits and pieces floating around in my head and form them into concrete plans for the future. Meanwhile… time for a nap!

Look what arrived this week, just in time for me to bring with me to the InHowse/HOW Design conference in Denver! These are the new die-cut vinyl stickers from Redbubble, and they live up to my expectations. If you’re there, find me and I might have one to give you!
I’ll have a very limited number of these with me at the conference, but you can always order your own — without the website on them, I made these up special for myself :)  Any of the T-shirts in my RedBubble site can be ordered as a sticker instead of a shirt, just click on the “buy/preview” button and choose the Sticker option at the top of the screen. For reference, the dragon is about four inches tall.

I’ve also finished a super-quick but much-needed remodeling job on my main website. (This blog is next in line for a makeover, but it may take a while before I get to it.)

Between preparations at work and at home for this trip, there hasn’t been much time for new drawings. Hopefully, I’ll be able to make up for in some part in between waiting at airports, spending 5 hours on a plane, and doing some sightseeing in Denver tomorrow. After all, June 5 is Drawing Day! I won’t have my scanner, but I’ll have my camera and my laptop, and will try to post *something* over the weekend on my RedBubble site. See you there!

Last weekend I went to see Toad the Wet Sprocket at a very nice venue in Annapolis, MD, Ram’s Head Live. We had a table right in front of the stage. Between the good view, the nice convenient table, relatively good lighting, and the readily-available paper (namely, the daily specials menus) I just couldn’t help myself.

I’ve been trying to do more sketching from life instead of photos, but it’s hard with subjects out “in the wild” and moving around. I’m a bit rusty at that, I confess, most of my life drawing practice has been from still, posed models but it’s hard to capture gesture that way. The band was relatively easy since they’re moving but pretty much staying in the same place.  Even so, it was hard to get faces down; the dim lighting and the Strongbow probably didn’t help much either, although there was only minor damage done to my paper, lol. I drew some random pedestrians from a trip to DC last week that came out pretty well too, I’ll post them when I find them. Practice, practice, practice!

I DO have more flower trading cards to post, they’ve been sitting on my drawing board waiting to be scanned for at least two weeks. I’ll try to get some of them posted this week, but odds are slim: I’m heading out to Denver on Saturday for the InHowse Designers Conference, a part of the How Design Conference that’s targeted for in-house design groups like the one I work for. I’ve been trying to get things done at work AND put together a few things of my own to share while I’m there. (Oh, and try to bring a little bit of order to the house, so my husband doesn’t have to spend the better part of a week alone in a pig sty…) I have a feeling my to-do list is longer than my actual available time… isn’t that always the way?

30% off all aprons, 20% off postage stamps, 50% off posters, and 40% off business cards with sale code MEMORIALSALE, valid through June 1, 2010

There are also a few ongoing sales that are running through the end of June:

15OFFINVITES — 15% off all invitations

TSHIRTS10OFF — 10% off all T-shirts

MUGS15SAVER1 — 15% off three or more mugs

BIZCARDSAVE1 — 15% off business cards

POSTERS1DEAL — 10% off posters

1STICKERDEAL — 10% off all stickers

And remember, Zazzle always offers bulk discounts on almost all of their products if you need a lot of anything.

It’s a little out-of-season at the moment, but new art has been posted in my RedBubble portfolio! I’ve been working on The Dragon of Winter for a while, a companion piece to The Dragon of Autumn. It took me a while to sort out exactly what I wanted to do with all those snowflakes after I’d drawn them. It was created with the same process: ink drawings, layered together with Photoshop coloring and a few watercolor textures.

(Also available as one of those cool new stickers RedBubble offers…)

I’ve been working on several new pieces… watch this space!