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.

Sketchbook: Adding Color

Tags

colored pencil, floral, illustration, ink, motifs, pattern, Prang, QSDS, sketchbook, Susan Shie, watercolor

This week I’ve been trying out some of the new art supplies I purchased for the QSDS (Quilt and Surface Design Symposium) class I’m taking this weekend. The class is Lucky Drawing: Freehand Sketchbook 2 Day, with the wonderful, amazing artist and teacher Susan Shie.

I started at the top of my page with a set of Loew Cornell watercolor cakes that I already had. Then switched to my new Prang semi-moist 16 watercolor oval pan set recommended by Susan for the middle and bottom rows of flowers, leaves, and insects.

The Loew Cornell colors were very chalky and too opaque, covering up my ink line work. They also flaked off the paper when I tried adding colored pencil on top. The Prang colors were much more transparent; letting the ink line work show through. Colored pencils layered over the Prang watercolor paint very nicely. I definitely preferred the results with the Prang set.

You can find out more about classes taught by Susan Shie on her Turtle Moon Studio website.

A New Website for Plate

Tags

food photography, graphics, illustration, New Albany, Ohio, responsive web design, restaurant, website database

desktop screen

After many weeks of work, Plate’s new website is live ~ www.platenewalbany.com

Studies show that 85% or more of all Restaurant website visits in today’s mobile world are via mobile devices. So an important aspect of this design was that it be responsive, giving the visitor a quality experience and impression of Plate on both smart phones, tablets, and full-size screens.

iPhone 4 screen

iPhone 4 screen

I planned and coded the arrangment, size, and placement of elements to accommodate changes in viewport (screen size), always keeping in mind that visitors often have different purposes to their visit when using different sized devices.

2 months ago, I didn’t know my way around a digital SLR camera. Thanks to guidance from Hélène Dujardin’s book Plate to Pixel, I’ve learned to take food photos for Plate’s website and social media promotions, using natural light from the windows in Plate’s Granville Banquet Room with white foam core boards propped up to bounce the light to all sides of the dish. More than half of the photos on the new site are mine, as well as the illustrated graphics.

This is a CMS website, Content Management System, which means it’s designed for ease in making regular updates to content. This is important for many businesses, including restaurants, who have special events to announce, menu changes, etc.

The menus are database driven, which means that changes to a menu item, such as price or ingredients, only need to be made once. The changes will then automatically carry through to every place where that item appears on the site.

Friends of Faith Pruden Project

Tags

awareness, cancer, childhood, faith pruden, gold, graphic design, illustration, logo design, ribbons, web design

This monarch emerged from its chrysalis August 27, 2010

Faith Pruden was a first grader, with a wonderful zest for life when she was diagnosed with terminal brain cancer in February 2010 and very little time left. She got her wings on August 7th 2010, 6 months later. She touched many hearts with her love and courage, and is missed by all.