aprylstottdesign.com Blog

My friend Julie emailed me a few days ago & reminded me how much I miss working with other illustrators in a studio. It was SO GREAT to have people to bounce ideas off of, or ask what needs “fixing”. (When you work on something too long, you loose all objectivity.) So, my friends, I am enlisting your help. Can you please tell me what you think of this? I’m looking for some good studio-space feedback. Tell me the cat is too purple. Tell me the pink is too strong. Tell me what you think!

Thank you!

I finished the last batch of the line work job I’ve been working on. Here’s a few favorites…

Maggie, my super-agent, said that things might be slow till the election. That means a month of Personal Projects! (And a few less trips to Target. Why can’t I get out of that store for less than $40? Even if I go in for baby food. I still come out with a bag full of can’t-live-without-so-cute-and-look-it’s-on-sale stuff.) I’ve been thinking about a new book idea for a few months, want to experiment with some new techniques & have some projects I want to try (like this).

We’ve finally gotten around to writing our Thank You!’s for Ella’s birthday party. We made a project out of the cards (I don’t know about you, but we’re always looking for something to paint, embellish and stick google eyes on…) My favorite is this one, where we made a hand print.

We used acrylic craft paint (the kind that comes in the little bottles & costs about $.75. A staple in our house). We also practiced our recycling skillz and cut up some cereal boxes. You can tell she was getting a little burned out at this point because of the lackluster paint application.

My absolute favorite part is writing the card inside. I ask her a bunch of questions & we fill it out using her words. This is her thank you for her new BFF (their relationships has its ups & downs, but they love each other fiercely…)

(Oh yeah, we keep a stack of “crafting photos” around so that she can personalize her notes with her sweet little mug. Everything is more fun when it has your face on it. At least when you’re 4…)

I made up a Halloween Party invite for my friend Carrie. Then my super awesome sister-in-law decided to have a party too. Then I thought, maybe someone ELSE is having a Halloween party. Are you? You can use the invite too! I left lots of black space so you can include all the info on your shindig. Click on the image to see the FULL SIZE FILE. You should be able to place your text onto the image in any layout program. I usually have 4×6″ photo prints made & double-stick-tape them to 5×7″ cardstock (which leaves a lovely 1/2″ border AND is a fairly standard envelope size, if you’re in to that sort of thing…)

Let me know if you use it, I want to hear how your party went!

Enjoy!

This is what we did yesterday:

Why yes, those are purple rain-boots she picked out to go with her Cinderella dress! To the pumpkin patch…

And Greta got so tired out…

…that she took a 2.5 hour nap this afternoon. (Unheard of!!!) I was able to finish this, plus another 23 illustrations. (Well, I mostly just had to scan them in & upload the finals, but still…)

I just finished a coloring page & thought I’d show you how I go through the process start to finish. It’s not very complicated. I start with a loose sketch in photoshop using my beloved Wacom tablet. (I’ve had the same tablet as long as I’ve had my husband. It’s still true love.) I’ve found it’s easier to work out the details this way, before I commit to pencil & paper. I tighten it up quite a bit, but don’t finalize everything till the next step…

I print this sketch out & refine the shapes a little more. This is the sketch I email to the art director for approval:

Then, once I’ve gotten approval, I print this sketch out. I use my table as a light box to ink in the final drawing (it’s very technical. It involves a bare bulb lamp, frosted glass table from Ikea, and occasionally burned toes on the 100 watt bulb…)

Then I scan it in, take out any dust, bump up the contrast & brightness, and email or upload the final. Yay!

And while I was busy doing that, Ella made her own “project” (as she calls it):