Illustrated Pride Flag

Tags

creative, decorative, flag, flowers, hand lettering, healing, ideas, illustration, ink, LGBTQ, life, nature, peace, pride, rainbow, spirit, sunlight

I spent Monday wrapped in thought and prayers for all touched by the Pulse Nightclub shooting last year. Remembering so many times members of the LGBTQ community and their supporters have touched my life, inspired creativity and shared pride in personal expression, I took to my sketchbook, trying to express emotion and meaning for each of the stripes in the Rainbow Pride Flag.

Uniball Signo 207 Bold ink pen on 11″ x 17″ Borden & Riley sketchbook

Below is a colored pencil study on a smaller size copy to show my concept for the colors. I hope to eventually create a larger version and add watercolor.

Color study in Prismacolor pencil on an 8.5″ x 11″ print.

Being out-of-town and away from my scanner, I used my favorite scanner app, Scanner Pro by Readdle Inc. to capture an image of my inked page so I could print a copy for making a color study.

I make it a regular habit to capture every sketchbook page with Scanner Pro as I finish working on it, no matter where I am. This way I always have a library of sketched ideas with me on my iPhone as a resource I can refer to in further development of my ideas.

Laser Cut Luminaries

Tags

cancer, childhood cancer awareness, creative, gold ribbons, graphic design, graphics, lantern, luminaries, luminary, Ohio

I wanted to learn more about designing for laser cutting. So I designed this paper lantern, or luminary that holds an LED candle using my artwork for Friends of Faith Pruden Foundation.

First I developed the 3D shaping I had in mind and constructed hand cut tests to refine the shaping. Then I drew the 3D pattern pieces in Adobe Illustrator as vector line art. Next I added vector artwork I had created for the Friends of Faith Pruden Foundation scholarships and childhood cancer awareness work and began cutting tests of my design in the Fab Lab at CCAD.

At first I thought I would be lining the insides with yellow vellum paper to create glowing silhouettes of Gold Ribbons; the symbol for childhood cancer awareness. But when I tested my design with the warm white battery operated LED candles I had ordered, their yellowish light worked perfectly with plain white vellum paper as the lining, giving off a soft golden glow.

After laser cutting several iterations to refine my design, I ended up creating a movable lid that slides up the handle to get the LED candle in and out, to turn it on and off. I then cut and constructed 8 lanterns from my final design to donate to Friends of Faith Pruden Foundation. And had fun taking pictures of them assembled all together before they left my house.

©2017 Alice Frenz  all rights reserved

Read more about my artwork for Friends of Faith Pruden Foundation in this post.

 

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Pattern Ideas using Kaleidos Pic

Tags

app, creative, design, ideas, iphone, motif, pattern

I’ve been playing with using apps on my iPhone and iPad to create ideas for pattern designs. In this example, I’m using a motif from my November sketchbook with the Kaleidos Pic app from Fluocode on my iPhone.

First I saved my sketch to my camera roll on the phone. Then I used the folder icon in the app to locate and open it.

Next I open the choice of shapes for my tile by touching the hexagon icon.  Use 1 finger to move the tile to the portion of the image you want to use. You can rotate the shape and change its size by using 2 fingers. It’s a little bit fussy, so just be patient and remember to switch back to 1 finger before trying to move the tile after scaling and rotating it.

Now you can adjust the size of the design tile by moving the blue slider button. Then touch the check mark to see the design tile in repeat.

You can touch the flip button to see how it changes the pattern. Use the back arrow to change the tile selection, shape, or size. When you have a pattern you like, touch the save icon.

 

 

Use the blue button slider to select the size you would like to save. The larger the size, the more repeats that occur within your saved image.

The app doesn’t display your saved image. You’ll have to go your camera roll to view it.

I like to use Photo Transfer App to send the images from my phone to my computer where I can then use them as reference for my designs.

image saved from KaleidosPic to my camera roll

 

©2014 Alice Frenz all rights reserved

 

Plum and Ivory

Tags

creative, design, ideas, ipad, ivory, kaleidoscope, mandala, pattern, photography, purple, repeat, spiral, surface design

Ideas for patterns in repeat created with the Kaleidoscope Camera app by Binary Noise Ltd on my iPad.

click to view larger images

©Alice Frenz 2014

All from an 8

Tags

black, creative, design, ideas, iphone, kaleidoscope, kooleido, pattern, pink, repeat, spiral, surface design, touch sketch

I created these ideas for pattern designs by playing with a sketched figure 8 shape and the Kooleido app on my iphone.

Click on an image to see a larger view.

 

my original Figure 8 sketch

First I sketched the Figure 8 on my iPhone using Touch Sketch, saved it to my camera roll, then opened and played with it using the Kooleido app in manual mode and varying the settings.

I experimented with cropping my sketch for variations with different amounts of black space. As I played with it and discovered patterns I liked, I saved them to my camera roll.

In the Kooleido app, the kaleidoscope effect wants to display in motion. To reduce this effect, I turn off Tilt. As I begin to see something I like, I slow down my finger movement and hold it still for a few seconds to stop the motion before trying to save.

This is a fun, spontaneous way to generate ideas for pattern designs, and also allowed me to practice my critical “eye” for seeing when interesting Gestalt effects begin to happen.

©Alice Frenz 2014

Make a Paper Top Hat

Tags

bristol board, card stock, creative, hat, how to, instructions, make, paper, punch, top hat

Click here for a pdf of pattern pieces and instructions.

Materials:

• 4 – 11” x 14” pieces of Bristol board or other light weight board such as poster board. One piece of the 4 is for making the templates. I used Strathmore 300 Series Bristol board for both my templates and hat pieces.
• 7.5 yards yarn or ribbon for lacing – I used worsted weight micro-fiber yarn
• blunt point yarn needle
• sharp 6H or 4H or 2H pencil
• scissors
• paper punch

I make templates of each pattern piece out of Bristol Board. I then use the templates to trace all pieces needed for the hat. I recommend sharpening your pencil frequently to have the most precise and easily removed lines to follow in cutting and punching. My thin pencil lines are removed when I cut out the pieces. For the greatest accuracy, I just barely cut off the pencil line; no more than that. The paper punch removes the traced punch guide circles.

Click here for a pdf of pattern pieces and instructions.

©2014 Alice Frenz All Rights Reserved

Read more about this hat in Sewing Card Top Hat.