International Colour Day: Fibonacci Spiral Dream Art

International Colour Day: Fibonacci Spiral Dream Art

by | Mar 21, 2023 | Watercolor Pencils

Today….I bring you a piece of art at the intersection of math, dreams, and creativity! It’s perfect for today’s holiday: International Colour Day!

I stumbled onto something about the Fibonacci sequence online, and that led me to The Golden Ratio: The Divine Beauty of Mathematics (there are many others) – it doesn’t focus JUST on the Fibonacci sequence but does put it into context with other numerical theories. It’s quite amazing, even if a seriously difficult read!

I’m taking it a page or two at a time, and re-reading sections; it’s taking me back to what I remember as the good old days of calculus – yes I was THAT kid in high school who loved it! I enjoyed seeing how math could apply to real life!

I even found out at a job I once had that math could make me very valuable: I worked a photostat camera and had to enlarge slide photography to a large size while converting it into a halftone….and the increase was so great it had to be done in two steps. To get the halftone size dots correct, I wrote up a little calculus equation – and my coworkers and boss thought I was magic. 🙂

If you know someone who loves math, art, architecture…..this might make a lovely gift for them. They’ll know you think theyre very smart.

Tutorial: International Colour Day: Fibonacci Spiral Dream Art

A little bonus today: the pups got some cameos in the video!

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

Supracolor pencils

These Caran d’Ache watercolor pencils are quite yummy….rich, vibrant color that waters out nicely with a wet brush. This piece had a lot of layers building it up as I kept changing colors to create the transitions between each section. The only thing that could make this more like my dream would be if it moved and all the pieces danced in the air!

International Colour Day 

This holiday was adopted in 2008 – by the International Colour Association.

The Association Internationale de la Couleur (AIC) aims are to encourage research in all aspects of colour, to disseminate the knowledge gained from this research, and to promote its application to the solution of problems in the fields of science, art, design and industry on an international basis. 

I’d recommend going to your workspace today and creating something in honor of this day, and post it wherever you post things to share! Let’s celebrate color of all kinds…not just rainbows but a favorite color, a set of moody colors….whatever you’re in the mood for today!

Supplies

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

  1. Supracolor Watercolor pencils 
  2. Arches Cold Press Pad
  3. Brushes:
    1. Da Vinci Maestro Kolinsky Sable Round 4 
    2. Winsor Newton Kolinsky Sable Series 7 Round #8 
  4. The Golden Ration by Gary Meisner 

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Olo Markers + Colored pencils on colored cardstock

Olo Markers + Colored pencils on colored cardstock

by | Mar 16, 2023 | Copic/Alcohol Marker Intermediate

Hello and welcome to my stop on the Colorado Craft release partayyyy! I’m super happy to welcome you here for this little garden party today – be sure to read to the end to check out ALL the giveaways! 

My project is complex but simple….I used Olo Markers along with Prismacolors to make a 7-stamp-set-one-layer-card!

 

 

  1. Complete Bundle 10% Off
  2. Stamps Only Bundle 5% Off
  3. Summer Garden 
  4. Carrot On 
  5. Rooting for You
  6. Garden Therapy
  7. Veg Out 
  8. Peas forgive me
  9. Veggie Stack 
  10. Greener Grass 
  11. Thinking About Mini 

Tutorial: Olo Marker + Prismacolor on Colored Paper 

If you haven’t tried Olo yet, they’re a marker that I’ve reviewed — and made a hex chart for! While they’re missing some colors I’d loe to see, combining them with pencils really does solve that issue pretty well. 

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

A few tips

To set up a layout, just stamp everything in a light ink on desert storm cardstock – let them layer over each other! Pencil and marker will cover most if not all of the excess lines. 

Color from front to back; don’t get distracted by the cacophony of stamped lines, just tackle one bit at a time.

Try just one or two images in this technique before this many. It was a bit…overboard. LOL!

Bleed-through

Neenah does allow some color to bleed through; but I did only a limited amount of blending so that was minimal. It was easy to add a layer of desert storm behind the card front, which also gave it a little more heft as a card to survive better in the mail.

One of my Patrons will be getting this card! In the next few weeks I need to get a new batch out. If you’d considered joining our little Patreon band now’s a great time to maybe get in for a card!

Join Artventure

My little Mighty Networks community called Artventure isn’t so little anymore! I’m SO excited about how it’s taking off. Lots of people are sharing their work, encouraging each other, getting answers to questions, and inspiring each other. Best thing? No ads, no algorithm, no viral dancing…just ART! 🙂 Join us – it’s free!

The new little gouache class will be there in the near future; I’ve got the class videos ready and the classroom built but now I’m awaiting Apple’s approval. (Any time you sell anything through an app they get to weigh in, lol!) The class won’t be expensive – but you’ll need a few things so see the post over there with a peek and a supply list if you’d like to be ready ahead of time. 

THREE Giveaways!

Giveaway 1:
I’ll be giving away the Veg Out  set from this release to a lucky winner that CCC will draw from all the comments left on my social media hangouts like this blog, YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook – the more sites you visit, the more you increase your changes!. Leave a comment, follow or like and be sure to join my email list too.

Giveaway 2:
CCC will be giving away a complete bundle of this release to one randomly chosen winner that has placed an order using my link!

Giveaway 3:
CCC will be giving away 3 sets to 3 randomly chosen winners on their Instagram. 

Bloghop!

It’s a hop of course so check out the others who’ve made beautiful creations with these stamps. Hope you get inspired!

Supplies

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

  1. Complete Bundle 10% Off
  2. Stamps Only Bundle 5% Off
  3. Summer Garden 
  4. Carrot On 
  5. Rooting for You
  6. Garden Therapy
  7. Veg Out 
  8. Peas forgive me
  9. Veggie Stack 
  10. Greener Grass 
  11. Thinking About Mini 
  12. Olo Markers 
  13. Olo Hex Chart 
  14. Neenah Desert Storm 25pk
  15. Eclipse Tape, Judikins
  16. Prismacolor pencils 
  17. Prismacolor Hex Chart

 

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When Pigs Fly: A drawing, class news, and a story!

When Pigs Fly: A drawing, class news, and a story!

by | Mar 14, 2023 | Featured

Ever feel like you’ve been running an artistic marathon? That’s me today, running through the tape – and finally bringing you the news about the new classes, another drawing, and a story that you might find entertaining about a childrens illustrator, my dad, and my coach!

Children’s Illustrator Series returns!

A few years ago I was creating art inspired by some favorite illustrators…and today I bring you Ian Falconer!

Unfortunately this comes as a tribute after his passing at all to early an age – 63. So sad! What a talent.

Falconer was an illustrator for some New Yorker covers you may well recognize; then in 2000 he started writing and illustrating the Olivia books – she’s a rather independent little piglet with a bit of a dark side!

Olivia and the Fairy Princess inspired today’s sketch; Olivia wanted to be a princess – but boy she did not want to be the pink tutu kind that everyone else wants to be! It’s a lovely story about just being yourself – and not worrying about what everyone else is doing.

I can recommend picking up some of the books to read to your littles to encourage them in their uniqueness!

Video: When Pigs Fly: A drawing, class news, and a story!

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

My piglet

I decided to try drawing a little spotted piglet – not attempting to replicate Falconer’s style, but a tribute to his sweet little girl pig! “When pigs fly” was a dad-ism I heard a lot while growing up – so making her a unicorn pig, in all her uniqueness, seemed to be a good option for this fun little sketch.

Drawing on Nature classes!!!!!

Annnnnnd now it’s here! The Drawing on Nature series starts with the baby animals….all the information you need is on the page so tap on the image below to pop over there or click right here!

Whatcha think?

If Level 4 classes are too much for you, stay tuned – I’ve got something planned as a little birthday thing on Artventure, you’ll get a peek at it in my next post – on Thursday! It’ll make my cardmaking friends really happy!

Supplies

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

  1. Copic Markers 
  2. Copic Hex Chart 
  3. Stonehenge sketchbook
  4. Prismacolor pencils 
  5. Prismacolor Hex Chart

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Drawing of Emmanuel Todd Lopez!

Drawing of Emmanuel Todd Lopez!

by | Mar 11, 2023 | Copic/Alcohol Markers Advanced

Whether or not you know yet about Emmanuel the emu….this might be a fun little thing to watch! He’s a social media star – and I included a little clip of one time when he was being good and not knocking over the camera. LOL

Tutorial: Emmanuel Todd Lopez

Emmanuel is getting over a bout of bird flu that took out all the rest of his bird friends on the farm! He’d been unable to walk for a while, but he’s back to tearing around the farmyard again, fortunately.

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

Update

I was hoping the new Drawing on Nature classes ready today but….alas, the week got ahead of me. Finding 7 hours to do voiceovers (and more hours because I often do them 2-3 times) just didn’t happen with jury duty and the rest of life. I’m hoping this weekend is going to be SUPER productive though. I’m determined to get this movin’!

Are you following Knucklebump Farms?

Go check them out on Instagram! 

Supplies

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

  1. Copic Markers 
  2. Copic Hex Chart 
  3. Stonehenge sketchbook
  4. Prismacolor pencils 
  5. Prismacolor Hex Chart

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Alternate paper for Copics? (Bear cub drawing)

Alternate paper for Copics? (Bear cub drawing)

by | Mar 7, 2023 | Copic/Alcohol Markers Advanced

I made a little discovery of an alternate paper for Copics than the Neenah and marker papers that I’ve used for decades….and it’s a paper that really shouldn’t, by all rights, be for alcohol markers! It’s my favorite pencil drawing paper, and I was surprised that my little idea worked!

I’ve wanted to use pencils on top of alcohol marker, but hadn’t done so in ages because, well, marker papers and neenah don’t ‘feel’ as nice as Stonehenge drawing paper. So I had the idea to see if I could bring the markers to the pencil paper rather than the pencils to the marker paper.

Caveat:

I do realise that some artists won’t like the more pencil-ly look; totally fine! I’ve always resisted the tendency toward an almost digitally-perfect blend. I love to see the hand of the artist shown in their work. With the advent of that “perfection” in AI, I relish it all the more.

Tutorial: Alternate paper for Copics? Bear cub drawing

This won’t be a solution for everything, by any means; and switching to this paper for ALL your alcohol marker work might get cost prohibitive. But for fur? For fur it’s pretty amazing!

Watch the video below and scroll to the end to leave comments or questions — or click HERE to watch it on YouTube and leave comments over there. I read both dutifully!

A few more tips

A few things I learned along the way:

  • if your markers are dry, they’ll feel a little dryer on this paper. The soft surface has a little drag naturally, and a dry marker responds. But it’s nothing that more layers can’t fix.
  • Colors are not as cartoony-bright as on some other papers like marker paper or Neenah. But since I love making things look realistic, the slight dulling down is perfect for me. IF you like brighter, just step up the saturation in your color choices.
  • Alcohol can serve as a light blending solution – so how about a Copic? BINGO. You do have to clean off marker nibs on scratch paper, and it can stain them but it won’t have a permanent effect other than nib discoloring.
  • The technique I use with a lot of textures is washing over the area with a glaze of color to soften it and pull it together–and it works even BETTER on Stonehenge than Neenah! 

Perfect for fur

I enjoyed a couple drawings SO much so that I started immediately prepping a class series that a lot of students have asked me for, because this paper, marker, and pencil combo are perrrrrfect for it: ANIMALS! This lil bear will be a lesson in the “big” class (read on.)

Drawing on Nature

I’m calling it the “Drawing on Nature” series of classes; don’t worry, I’m not headed exclusively in this direction, but I’ve been needing to find a way to create more advanced courses without pricing myself compeltely out of the market! I’m so used to making 5-10 lessons out of a topic that I couldn’t figure out what to do when each lesson triples in length from what I normally do!

So instead, classes will be for invididual drawings, not a huge set. Choose your adventure!

I’m hoping to have everything ready in maybe a week or so – join the art-classes email list if you haven’t already, I’ll be shouting from the rooftops as soon as it’s all ready to roll! 

There will be discounts if you sign up for a few of the single classes at a time, so be sure to read to get the coupon code you’ll need; I can’t figure out how to automate it, since the plugin I bought for bulk purchase discounts won’t work on classes, so coupon code it is.

There’ll also be a get-em-all class with each of the 10 drawings in it PLUS the narrated bear drawing. The bear’s the only one with much of a scene – that log was way too much fun to play with! And he won’t be a separate class, he’ll be in the big class only.

On jury duty

I’m starting jury duty today – and I’m one of those weirdos who relishes the chance to perform civic duty! I’d be altogether too happy to serve my community if they choose me. I was on a case a few decades ago and it was a fascinating process – and gave me so much confidence in our judicial system. Crossing my fingers I get selected. 🙂

I may or may not have some creativity for you the rest of the week depending on that –  but as Arnold says…. I’ll be back!

Supplies

Some product may be provided by manufacturers for review and use. Compensated affiliate links are here at no cost to you. I appreciate your support of my work with your purchases! Full affiliate and product disclosure | My trusted partners in art

  1. Copic Markers 
  2. Copic Hex Chart 
  3. Neenah Cardstock, Solar White 250pk
  4. Stonehenge sketchbook
  5. Prismacolor pencils 
  6. Prismacolor Hex Chart

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