2 Corinthians 10:17-18

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But, “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.” For it is not the one who commends himself who is approved, but the one whom the Lord commends.

I decided to do things a little differently today.... 

First I started with this: a drawing I did waiting for a day I would need, or want to use it.... What I usually do is draw something in pencil then scan that to color it, so I always have the uncolored original (I explained that in a past post)  I would normally print this out and go from here....

 But today I decided to take an existing True Type Font, CK Paris and paste the text inside the opening like this:

But, you'll notice that everything is very straight and not at all "hand drawn" looking, at least not like anything I would do, which usually isn't straight at all... soooooo, I changed it to this: ..

I broke all the text apart and worked one letter at time, stretching, pulling and moving nodes..sometimes one at a time....now a lot of the same letters are different, not all, no point in totally reinventing the wheel!

When I finished all that work I finally printed it out as shown above and began work coloring it in. The first thing I did was go over every letter with a sharpie, filling in the white spaces and thickening the lines so that it looked even more natural ....I added some pattern to some of the squiggles, then colored everything.

I then re-scanned it and added the black and white boarder.

To be honest with you I think I would have been just as content with  the black and white version, because you know, I am partial to black and white!  

And the good news is, because I did it the way I did, I can have it either way!  

It was a fun experiment but I could have actually hand drawn each letter MUCH quicker!  I don't expect I'll be doing it again.  I will say though, the advantage to it is that I was able to space everything out so that there was room at the end!  I did one last night (a different scripture, not colored yet) 100% by hand and I ran out of room for the last word!!!  I had to erase the whole bottom line and re-do it!!  And yes, I quick sketched it but I never follow those lines ... and this time I paid the price!

Psalms 119:93

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“I will never forget your precepts, for by them you have preserved my life.” Psalm 119:93 NIV

Why this picture today?

Last night I got the idea to challenge myself, and anyone wanting to play, to do something artistic with the "Verse A Day" that Biblegateway sends out everyday. If you look at the top of this screen you will see the Verse-A-Day button...click there and see the details.  The challenge doesn't start until August 1st but I wanted to start today to have some examples and just to see if it was even do-able!


What does it mean?
Again the scripture is:
“I will never forget your precepts, for by them you have preserved my life.”Psalm 119:93 NIV
I wanted to show

• the "fork in the road" where we all have to choose, life or death, belief or unbelief...
• the Bible on the sign is the precepts with the "Life" to the left arrow and "Death" to the right...it is there for us to keep us from certain death.
• the "road" to the left is the road less traveled, the narrow road ... and I drew it close to the edge of the page because I wanted to show that we really can't see what is next...we have to depend on God for our every step. I didn't do a very good job showing it but the road is rough (gravel maybe) with stones on either side showing that it is a direction that isn't attractive to "the world".
• the road to the right is wider and the scenery is more beautiful with flowers and trees (ok, so use your imagination!)...but what the traveler can't see is the cliff he will drive off of going that direction...in the direction where he/she is their own god...they don't "need or want" ANYONE telling them what to do, "if it feels good, do it" is their motto.
• the text below is the definition of "precepts" (I had to look it up...I knew what it was, because everyone knows about Kay Arthur's Precept Training...  but it isn't a word you hear every day and I wanted to be certain and to put the definition on my page)

That's it!  YAY! I was able to do something!

LOVE IS....

This ended up having to be a hybrid  ... not on purpose, its because I misspelled a "angered"!  Thankfully I noticed it before it was colored.  I scanned the b/w version, took it into PSE and erased the misspelled word, then printed it again.  Watercolor painted the background of the heart the used markers for the words.  Scanned that so I have that version... but I cut out the original colored copy, glue it down into my journal and did this:

I just couldn't stop there!

I always feel like I have to fill the whole page!  ... and this was the big tablet again so it took a while!

Love is ...

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Love is .... an ACTION verb!

I did this May the 6th..but at first I had it saying "Love is a Verb"... true that, but I just didn't feel like it was enough... it had to say "action"... so it has been just sitting here, untouched.  But, I don't have anything to load today because I was busy with recycling bottle ideas.  

I decided that I would take the easy way out and add my new PW Doodle font.  I blocked out what was there and typed what I wanted it to say....making it a hybrid. Unfortunately, I saved the original scan at 72 pixels, not nearly enough to modify, and I don't know where the original is...somewhere, under something else... you can see the difference...shoot!

Lessons Learned:
- save all scans at 300 in case I need to print them... then save again at 72 to upload.

Thought I'd Give PollyWolly Doodle TTF a POP!

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That was my plan anyway, but I got a bit carried away and had to dig myself out of the hole I got in!

First I printed a black "A" onto white card stock. Cut it, and folded it into a regular size card.  

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I haven't done anything with the top "A" yet... I used the bottom "A".  Please note the gray behind the black.  That is my new favorite thing to do with my new font...I can add the shadow on the PC so now I don't have to guess where the silly thing goes anymore!  It is right there!... It is fairly light so it disappears if I'm using a dark color, but I know where it is...If I'm using a light color it is good enough to just color over it and a darker version of the color shows up...cool.

THEN I sat down to color...and the more I colored the less you could see the "A"  ... It got kinda busy.  But, I've decided that if I'm not gonna do my favorite ... black and white ... I'm gonna use color, and lots of it!  

See what I had to do?  I had to use a white pen to outline the "A" just so you could see it!  BUT, look what that does!  It almost has a "velum" look to it... ALMOST like it was printed on velum then cut and stuck down.   Hummmmm.... there is some potential there.


Lessons learned:
- don't try to color directly onto the folded card because the ink went through and I had to cut it and stick it onto another card (see the black and b/w border? that is card stock, not part of the original drawing)


- don't go crazy with color, design really, behind, or near, the letter


- you can't trust a white pen to be opaque, the best you will get is a muted version of the color below, but, that can work for you if you need a translucent look.

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You Have To Be Different

I just finished this last night... started it week before last... 

Lessons Learned:


- I don't like 9"x12" paper!  There is TOO MUCH space to fill!  
- A regular black sharpie works best to outline when everything is this large.

Two Hearts

Nothing much to say...I wish it had better depth... I LOVE the red!  That's the color I spent lots of $ to finally get!  Unfortunately it took almost every red I have to finally make it the color I wanted.

Lessons Learned:

I knew when I started that I wanted the lines intertwined and 3Dish... I should have made them all consistantly smaller on one end and larger on the other so it looks like they are going away from me... they don't even look "under" and "over" to me... hummm

Never Too Old To Color

It is all I can do not to tweek everything I do with Photoshop.  It could look so much better but since this is as far as it gets there really isn't any point!  It is what it is... 

The good news is, I see what does and doesn't work with every attempt.  Looking forward to the "Just Right" place.


I started with no end in mind.. just that I wanted to use turquoise, red and yellow


- Started w/ border...
- Added flower then leaves so that brought green into the mix
- decided to try paisleys because I've never drawn one...and clearly I had no clue what to put inside of one!  (I need to find some pictures!)  I'm happy with the two large ones because they have a 3-D feel... the other two, ugh.
- then I had to figure out what the heck to do with the rest... ho-hum...gotta get better...that's the hard part for me...filling the "white" space
- last minute decision to add the text...it needed to say something!


I drew it on a homemade spiral bound half sheet of regular printer paper then when I finished it I decided it would look better on black so I tore it out and mounted it on black card stock.

Spiral

Went to Dick Blick yesterday and came home with more markers...head hanging in shame...


Now, on the subject of markers, I have managed to get at least a few of several brands and I now have favorites.... sit down for this.... but the Copic is my LEAST favorite one!  I am so confused by people's obsession with the TOO EXPENSIVE markers!  They bleed through the paper (HATE THAT) and did I mention they are TOO EXPENSIVE!!!


Anyway, let me get off my bandwagon and tell you the ones I do love and why.




1. ZIG Brushables... LOVE because they have two GREAT brushes with a lighter/darker version of the color!  LOVE THAT, because I can shade using the same pen... the only problem is they only offer 24 colors (or 48 if you count the double colors)  They are really hard to find,  (in other words, you can't use your 40% off coupons for these)  I got mine from MarkerSupply.com for $2.54 each... I'll admit, I don't love paying even that much for a marker, but, like I said it is my favorite.


2. Stampn'Up! because everything matches everything else...and they have a good brush end, and you can refill them (major plus!) I haven't bought any in AGES but I'm sure they are as good as ever.


3.Tombow Dual Brush Pens ... Great, vibrant colors and good brush tip... easiest found at Dick Blick $2.13 online, $2.59 in the store.... that's right, WAY cheaper to order online!


I did this today using mostly Tombows:

I guess I need to add another part to MY definition of doodling...and that would be, its not perfect (probably one of the hardest things for me to follow!  But the goal for anything I'm doing these days to be FAST and that messes up the need for perfection. And, well heck, its a DOODLE!

Names

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A couple of weeks ago I did a mailing and used these drawings for the address on the envelopes.  The address was tucked in under the last part of the name.  Some have "flowers", some don't ... I used those where it made some sense to me because of the white space and how far I had already gotten with the name.  If your name is here you are welcome to save it if you want.

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Sure you could do this yourself...but it will take a while, buy the font and just type it!

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Broken Heart

Yesterday I wanted to see if I could draw something that looked 3D so I covered the left page with the red and purple...there wasn't a big heart.  Today when I was looking at it I thought it could look like a broken heart so I started erasing the right parts to form a shape (gotta love pan pastels!) Unfortunately the scan/save process magnified the pink...try to ignore.  I couldn't get it all off but I got my shape... it needed words so I added these.  Don't you just hate when someone breaks your heart but you can't stop loving them!

Today's Doodling

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OK, I'm having too much fun "doodling" now, here's today's....

Now that its "finished" I hate that the colors don't look good together!  Every bit of it was testing the color more than the design....all the beads are new markers I have and I wanted to see what they looked like in the book.  And the "JUNE" is colored with PrismaColor Nupastels...I got those because I learned this week that you can add water and blend colors!  And it worked!  Loving that!  Now that I look at it though, I covered the blended colors with the black...hummmm...oh well, I saw that it worked.  

Actually here was the original test:

 great coverage and good blending!  YAY!!!

OH!  Did you notice what I am doing with one of my $1 books... WAY cheaper than other paper to practice/test/doodle on!!

Need I Say More

Taking Advantage of Technology

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Hi All!  I have been off line all week actually DOing!  I have mentioned wanting to draw in several posts lately and this week I did just that.  Unfortunately, nothing is at that "I'm DONE! Finished" place... everything is a piece of something or "I just want to do one more thing to it" stage.  And as I was trying to go to sleep I realized that if I don't post something it could be months before I "finish" something!  Not good.


That, and I really do want to document the process...so tonight I start the documenting of the process.


Here are some of the things I did this week:


This is the scan of the original pencil drawing I did with a regular pencil on cardstock

I liked her, but I needed to add color, and I wanted to do several versions of her to see what I like best, then I'll redraw an original drawing of the one (or more) that I like best ....  SO, I scanned her, whited out the eyes (because the scan was TERRIBLE and the eyes were just black dots ...look at it again...UGH!  So, I white out the eyes and print 4 of her on a piece of cardstock.

And here ya go... her done three different ways:

I'm still not done, I think I like the green one with the word "Why" ... doesn't it look like that's what she thinking?  And there could be many reasons she is asking "Why?" ... "Why did I get cancer?"  "Why did he leave me?"  Whatever... it is just a sad "Why?"

but I moved on to other drawings...I'll get back to her....

Again, here ya go...a TERRIBLE scan (gotta learn what I'm doing wrong!):

modified for printing:

and with some color added:

I will add more color later...She's not there yet... I do like her like this but I want to see what she will look like in full color.

I did these two with a plan to add words ... once I get happy with them.  They are my two little "Bee" attitudes.  I actually did them separately then used PSE to overlap them (that's how I was able to do the transparent wings on the front one).  I practiced with both having black faces and both with yellow... I'm liking the mix of the two.

And then Thursday I got my Pan Pastels!!!  OH MY GOSH!!!  I AM IN LOVE!!!  I also got a little 3.5 x 5 watercolor pad so I decided to just jump right in and not worry about messing up, just go for it!  


Here is what I have done so far:

quick watercolor flower...the border is the PPastels!  AMAZING STUFF... you put it on with a makeup sponge (or the thing that looks like a makeup sponge)  swish/ swish and you are done!!!

 And here I was messing with color combinations and possible future borders ... and, I wondered if I could draw AFTER I put the Pan Pastels down...yes... I colored the stripe first then did the flowers on the right side of the page:

And just another watercolor with the borders done with PP

I did the two watercolors after I saw a class being offered by Martha Lever .  I wanted to see if I could do them without the class.  It costs $30 so I am still debating.... tools or class??? or GAS for that matter!  OH MY GOSH!  When will it stop going up?!

Anyway, THAT's where I have been this week!  I have been coloring :-)  I did do some other stuff but it is downstairs in another book... I'll show you that later.

OH!  And welcome to my new followers!  I got a few this week.  I OWE you your "gift"... I know.... I actually did one this afternoon and my computer CRASHED just as I was exporting the file and I lost every bit of work....so, I did what comes naturally and said.... SHOOOOOT!  I'm going to get something to eat! ..... and I did.

WordArt

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I went to Dick Blick Wednesday and bought myself all kinds of colors!  Lots of watercolor pencils (LOVE) and several Copics (OUCH!!!)  I have resisted them this long and finally gave in and got some.  I have to admit I do love the "paintbrush" tip... but OUCH!!!

Since then, I have been playing.... here are a few things that I did from scratch...my very own self.  

How to Create Your Own Word Art ... the easy way.

I actually had a method to my madness today.  Welll....sorta.  Last week I discovered Stephanie Ackerman's art and I LOOOOOVE IT!  

But before I show you some of her stuff let me show you where we are going, because I have learned that the first picture shown is what will show up on Blog Links.

Now, examples of Stephanie's work:

I just LOVE the messy, easiness of it!  I love it so much that I bought both of her classes to learn how to doodle!!!  How sad is that?!  I have to be taught to just relax and do it!  Even though I am a VERY MESSY person, I am also a perfectionist so just "letting go" is HARD for me.  But her stuff is SO SIMPLE it should be SO SIMPLE to do, right?!  My brain struggles...but I CAN DO THIS!!! PRACTICE! PRACTICE! PRACTICE!!!

But, in the meantime... there are a couple artists, Rani and Jilustration, at Lettering Delights that have the same "feel" and I have now bought almost everything they have available!  They have the same double black outline, primitive like drawing.  CUTE! CUTE stuff!  They can easily be printed out and modified with the shadowing and markings that Stephanie has.  FUN!

Example... The first is a font and a graphic directly from Lettering Delights.  I printed a copy of this then colored and added lines  to the one below

 Same thing, but with my added coloring and drawings...see, kinda has the same feel as Stephanie's.

Neato Alphabet for the words

Noteworthy Friends Graphic Set for the lamb

Other options:

A font that has no color at all like: LDJ Happy Trails Font (then you can use any color you want)

OR, if you take Stephanie's class you get her empty font!!!!