Jazz Blossoms Art Deco Pattern

Tags

Adobe Illustrator, Ai, art deco, design, graphic, pattern, pattern motif, Photoshop, spoonflower, tulips

Using Adobe Illustrator, I created the motifs for this design. Then I assembled them into an initial pattern layout.

I exported the initial layout as a .png file and opened it in Photoshop. I applied the offset filter to wrap around 1/2 the vertical and 1/2 the horizontal distances. This moved the empty black areas to the center for editing.

I chose this method because the center of my design had the spacing just as I liked it but needed the outer edges revised. After applying the offset filter, my outer edges will now align perfectly with each other when I tile out the pattern in repeat.

Next I selected each quadrant, cut and Edit > Paste Special > Paste in Place, to get each on its own layer. I used layer masks to hide the excess black areas of the top 2 quadrants. Then I selected the top 2 quadrants and moved them together straight down to meet up and align with the bottom 2.

Then I cropped the tile to the new top edge.

I used a layer mask to hide the excess black area of the lower right quadrant. Then selected both right side quadrants and moved them to the left to overlap and align, closing up the extra black space.

I cropped to the new right edge. Now I had a repeatable tile with the excess black removed.

To test the revised design, I entered the pattern tile in Photoshop’s pattern library. Edit > Define Pattern and selected this new pattern tile. Then in a new larger document Edit > Fill > Contents: Pattern and Custom Pattern: select the new pattern. An alternate to test filling in a new document is to add a pattern fill layer to the same document and scale the pattern down.

Looking at the test repeat of the tile, I could see that the repeat was working, but there were a number of changes I wanted to make.

If you compare this test to the final design below, you’ll see that I removed one each of the duplicate vertical rows of medium size motifs, changed the centers of the largest diamond motifs, and rotated the tile 90 degrees for a more horizontal emphasis.

©2018 Alice Frenz all rights reserved.

My Jazz Blossoms Art Deco design is available for sale on Spoonflower and Roostery

 

Psychedelic Succulents Design

Tags

Adobe Illustrator, colorful, design, motifs, Op Art, Peter Max, psychedelic, succulents, textile design

For this textile pattern design, I was working towards a design inspired by Peter Max posters from the 1960s and 70s and also the current popularity of succulent plants. I decided that for at least this version, I wanted to go with the energy of bright colors and the rainbow/color spectrum feel of Peter Max’s work.  And I just kept thinking about Orlando and the rainbow colors of the Pride flag.

I think the plant and flower shapes that aren’t succulents, as well as the color, makes the succulent concept not come across and it simply feels floral. Perhaps I’ll try a more predominantly soft green palette for one of the colorways.

©2016 Alice Frenz all rights reserved

 

Here are 2 great exhibitions of Psychedelic Art to see this summer:

 

 

You can see the work of Peter Max
at the Tampa Museum of Art
through Sept 11, 2016

 

 

 

 

You can see the artwork of Jerry Garcia
at the Psylodelic Gallery
in southeast Ohio
through July 31st.

 

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Motifs for Boho Borders

Tags

active wear, Adobe Illustrator, Boho, floral, mood board, motifs, women's

I’m working on motifs for women’s active wear for a trend I found in the Vogue runway fashions for Fall 2016. I’m calling the trend Boho borders. I found designs that interested me in their pieced together look of multiple ornamental borders.

I’m trying to build the sense of zigzag stripes and diamond shapes composed of the small flower buds and leaf shapes I created. I will probably combine these motifs with curved or angled abstract stripes, and linear textures to increase the feeling of empowerment and energy for the active wear market.

I first drew the flower bud and leaf shapes in pen and ink. Then I manipulated scans of my drawings with Kaleidomatic by Stuffmatic to generate ideas for different arrangements and combinations of the smaller shapes.

Then I redrew the motifs I liked best in Adobe Illustrator as vector shapes. This allowed me to compose most of the motifs by reflecting and rotating copies of the vector shapes. I also composed the mood board in Adobe Illustrator.

I have some very different flower and leaf motifs for the other trends I found and hope to get them organized to post tomorrow.  It was such a great treat to take time out to spend with the flowers and leaves in my gardens working on my sketchbook.

©2016 Alice Frenz all rights reserved

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Santa at Plate

Tags

Adobe Illustrator, carousel horse, Christmas, New Albany, Plate, reindeer, Santa

I designed and illustrated this poster for Plate’s 2013 Santa events in Adobe Illustrator. I used Plate’s beautiful carousel horse and designed a coordinating reindeer with holly decorations to display the times and dates. My Santa illustration was inspired by the jolly old elf himself.

Santa will be at Plate Saturday Dec 14th from 10am to 12 noon, and Sunday Dec 15th from 4pm to 6pm. Plate is located at 29 S. High St. New Albany, OH 43054  Call 614-855-2929 to make reservations.