Apparel Design for American Crown- Spring 2013

I apologize for my long absence from the blog. I have been very busy over the past year and a half working as a designer at West Coast Novelty, where I have had the opportunity to do design and illustration work for WCN's American Crown destination apparel brand. 

Here are some styles that I created last year that have since been produced and sold to Walmart stores nationwide. Check your local Walmart- some of these styles may be available for purchase at a location near you!

(These are all original designs for West Coast Novelty Group and may not be copied or reproduced in any way.)

Men's Mardi Gras 2013 Tees:

 

Women's Mardi Gras 2013 Tees:

Girls' Mardi Gras 2013 Tee:

Toddler Mardi Gras 2013 Tee:

 Men's American Crown Spring 2013 Apparel:

 

 

 Women's American Crown Spring 2013 Apparel:

        

                    

                  

Pre-Christmas Caribou... and a Tip for Painting Snow

In my Wildlife Illustration class, the module on antlered ungulates provided a great opportunity for me to prepare for the holiday season by learning to draw reindeer. My research taught me that, in the wild, they are called caribou... only domesticated caribou are called reindeer.

A little character, Rosemary the Reindeer
(created in Adobe Illustrator):

 I think I will re-work Rosemary the Reindeer later on to dress her up for Christmas!

Anatomy studies of caribou:

A color study (painted in Photoshop):

Lesson Learned: Snow doesn't have to be white! When painting snow, think about all of the different colors that can be reflected in it. For my color caribou study, I added areas of orange and blue to the snow. These sunset colors reflected in the snow help to create a mood for the piece that is much more interesting than if the snow had been plain white.

Martina Koala... and a Lesson on Preliminary Sketches

For my first Children's Book Illustration 2 assignment this semester, I was assigned to interview a classmate and then come up with an illustration that somehow relates to 3 bits of information that I gained from the interview. I interviewed my lovely friend Martina, and from her responses I decided to illustrate these three points:

1. If she were an animal, she would be a koala.
2. Two words that describe her are: ridiculous and dramatic.
3. If she could go back in time, she would go back to when she was 5 years old, because she loved it.


So, here is my illustration of a ridiculous/dramatic koala in kindergarten:

Lesson Learned: Even after you have chosen the final narrative and composition for your illustration, sometimes the concept development can go even further. When I was refining my original sketch for this illustration, I placed a sheet of tracing paper over the original so that I could re-draw the koala's head in a different position and make the blocks look like they are starting to tumble. As I was drawing, I accidentally shifted the tracing paper a bit to the side. With the original drawing visible underneath, this created the illusion of animation- like the koala's head was moving and the blocks were falling. This sparked the idea to create this illustration as vector art, so that later I can go back and animate it in Flash! I plan on creating simple buttons (the blocks tumbling, Martina roaring, her classmate's head turning) that will transform this into a fun, interactive illustration! 


So next time you start working on refining your sketches and other technical aspects of preliminary work, don't put your brainstorming to rest. You never know when a new idea might come up if you stay in a creative mindset throughout the entire process.

Mt. Rushmore Gets a Makeover... and Tips for Brainstorming

My last decorative illustration assignment was to create a set of holiday-themed paper product coordinates : a paper placemat and coordinating paper napkin design.

I chose to do a design for the Fourth of July:

Lesson Learned: When brainstorming for a design idea, make a list! 

For this project, I started by writing down things that I associate with the 4th of July: fireworks, flags, stars, summertime, barbecues, America... then expanded on a few things from that list- summertime: hot, sunny, sunglasses; America: freedom, democracy, presidents, national landmarks... and I eventually ended up with the idea of illustrating the presidents on Mt. Rushmore wearing sunglasses like they were taking part in the sunny backyard BBQ. I never would gotten to this idea if I hadn't written everything out to help guide my thought process.

Dungenous Crab... and a Lesson on Color Temperature

For my last big assignment in Adobe Illustrator, I had to create a poster advertising a San Francisco Event. I chose to make a poster for the Fisherman's Wharf Crab Festival. Yum!

Lesson Learned: Color temperature is very important to make objects come forward or recede in an illustration. It took a lot of experimentation before I found the right temperature contrast to make the red checked tablecloth sit behind the red crabs on the table.

Coffee on the Beach... and a Lesson on Saving Your Work

Last week, we learned how to create simple animations using Adobe Illustrator.

I had almost finished a really cool animation of a girl doing yoga on the beach holding a coffee mug, but then I saved it to my flash drive from a school computer, and when I got home the file was gone! So, around 8pm on Wednesday night, I had to start my animation over again (it was due the next morning). I ended up simplifying it a lot so that I could get it re-done in time, and this was the result:



(CLICK HERE to see a full-screen version of the animation.)

Not nearly as cool as the yoga girl would have been, but it works...

Lesson Learned: When you save a file that you have worked on for hours, check and double-check to be sure that you saved it in the right location! My yoga girl animation probably ended up being saved onto the school computer and got deleted that night when the lab techs came around to clear the files from the computers. So sad.

Happy Birthday to me!

I created this this simple interactive flash illustration in class today. Just drag your cursor over the name tag on the box and click on it to see the animation.



This was my first attempt at using Adobe Flash- I'm excited to learn more!

If the image isn't loading in blogger,  CLICK HERE. This should open it in another window.

If you still can't see the image, try opening the page in a different browser (Google Chrome works) and make sure you have the free Adobe Flash Player installed on your computer.


Lesson Learned: Don't try to draw in Flash- the illustration tools are no good. Do the drawings in Illustrator and then import them into Flash to animate.

Fruit Ladies... and an Easy Tip for Perfect Symmetry

For my midterm assignment for Illustration 3, we were assigned to create 5 "icons" that fit together under a specific theme. These illustrations are called "icons" because they are meant to go together in a set, and each illustration is meant to fit inside of a 3x3 inch square.

For my theme, I decided to illustrate a set of fashionable ladies wearing cute clothes- and the clothes are all inspired by different types of fruit.

Here are my little fruit ladies (pear, strawberry, pineapple, watermelon, and banana):

Lesson Learned: If you want to make a symmetrical object in Adobe Illustrator, just draw ONE side of it really well, then copy, paste, and reflect it and voila! you have perfectly symmetrical object!

Monkeys with Maracas... and a Tip for Procrastinators

For my latest Decorative Illustration assignment, I had to create a general occasion greeting card. I decided to do a birthday card for kids.

Here are the designs for my little dancing birthday monkeys:

Lesson Learned: Digital illustrations are way faster than traditional for simple illustration styles like this. When I did my initial sketches and color comps for this assignment, I had not decided yet which medium I wanted to use for the final illustration. When it came time to do the final, I was running low on time, so I decided to do it using Adobe Illustrator. This made it so much faster because I could alter the colors and shapes quickly and easily as I went along, and it could be printed quickly without having wait for anything to dry or having to scan the artwork. 

My advice to all: For short deadlines, GO DIGITAL!

Satin Ribbons... and a Lesson on Printing

For my decorative illustration class, we were assigned to create an 8.5x11" stationery sheet with a matching envelope.

Here is the fun, girly design that I came up (inspired by my BFF Kelly's upcoming wedding):

Lesson Learned: Color laser printers do NOT do justice to projects like this (no matter how nice the paper you use is or many hours you spend trying to print it in different file formats from different programs). The quality of printer you use WILL determine the quality of your artwork with a project like this- if you want the colors to look rich and bright, you have to use the expensive inkjet printer or you will be disappointed with the result. 

Illustration 3: Monster Portrait

In my Illustration 3 class this semester, we are working with Adobe Illustrator. For our first assignment, we had to create a portrait from photo reference of a Hollywood monster of our choice. Of course, I found the cutest monster out there to use for my project- Grandpa Munster!

Here is the photo reference I found online:

And my final portrait done using the pen tool in Adobe Illustrator:

It took a lot of time, but I am really happy with the final result. I never thought that I would have the patience to do an illustration this detailed using Adobe Illustrator.

Lesson Learned: When working digitally, give yourself time to take breaks! 

I worked on this portrait for 8 hours straight one day, and that was a bad idea. The prolonged sitting took a serious toll on my back and shoulders, the constant mouse-clicking gave me cramps in my hand, and the intense focus on the computer screen resulted in infrequent blinking, which dried out my eyes. One of my contacts actually fell out of my eye without me even touching it because it got so dry! Even then, I was too focused to get up and just stuck the contact back in my eye without a mirror. Bad idea.

When working with traditional mediums, I have to take breaks to wash paintbrushes, sharpen pencils, get more supplies, or whatever else I need for the project I'm working on. But for digital work, there is no reason to leave the computer, so I just got sucked into this mode of serious concentration and I didn't get up from the computer at all the whole time. Now I know that I need to stop and get up and stretch every hour or so to give my body a break!