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Clare Owen is a freelance illustrator based in Bristol who combines traditional media such as pen and ink with digital media to create charming illustrations. Her work has a feminine, pretty feel with added quirky touches. Clare Owen is inspired by films, flowers and food.
If you would like to view more of Clare Owen’s work please visit her portfolio.

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This is Florence- a commission I did for a lovely couple. Yay for pugs!

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Most people point their cameras up when there taking photos. Lately I’ve been pointing mine down. I find the best textures live on or near the ground. I’m sure my neighbors think I’ve lost it when they see me taking pictures of my driveway but I don’t care because I know it’s going to make an excellent texture for my next piece of art.

There are lots of different ways to add visual interest to a digital file.  I’ve been inspired by the some of the unique art I’ve been seeing on Instagram lately. Lots of textures and lots of originality. It seems as though the pendulum has begun to swing in the direction of a more organic look these days. Adding texture is a great way to great way to add visual interest and create a unique signature.  The trick is figuring out how some of it is done and that’s the focus right now.

I’ve worked with adding simple textures in the past but I feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface when I look at some of the artists I’ve been following. This month I plan to dig in a little deeper and see if I can come up with some solutions of my own. At the same time I’ll be attempting to solve some of the problems I ran into earlier with my textures. I noticed some of the blending modes I used earlier made my art skew a little darker than I would have liked. I’d also like to see if I can find a way to add more vibrant colors to my textures at the same time.

My early attempts focused mainly on Photoshop but now I’m looking into Illustrator. The technique is slightly more complicated with Illustrator because, as you know, Photoshop offers the ease of using clipping masks where Illustrator does not. The art shown here involves two different textures placed on top of the original art using different blending mode for each. I’m pretty happy with whats going on in this illustration but for my next attempt I’d like to try and push the envelope a little further. Stay tuned for more updates.

 

 

If you’d like to see a demo of the Photoshop techniques I use just check out this video:

 

 

The post Working with Textures in Adobe Illustrator appeared first on Bob Ostrom Studio - 919-809-6178.

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Rupert is acting very naughty at home and at school...
but one day someone new comes to class who is 
even NAUGHTIER... has Rupert met his match? 

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Henri!, Character design concept.

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By Chloe

Lizzy Stewart is an illustrator and artist currently based in London. She is inspired by writers such as Tove Janson and Doris Lessing, as well as museums and galleries. Her work is highly narrative and full of character. This is aided by her use of traditional media which gives Lizzy Stewart’s work a unique, quirky quality. If you’d like to find out more about Lizzy and her work please visit her portfolio here.

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 As I may have already mentioned, I've been cleaning up my house recently. It fell into disrepair due to neglect (by me) and now I'm giving it some much needed attention. I've put a deadline on getting it done too; August. I have decided to do an Open House then, to show off all my hard work - decorating and drawing - and you're all invited. I need to, not only paint the whole place, but, get my work together to frame and hang. I came across this radio drawing whilst sorting through stuff. I made it, about six years ago, whilst in Italy. It was on that trip that I met lapin for the first time too. I also drew his hat. But that hangs in his home.
 Anyway, I decided I'd like this drawing to be at my Open House exhibition, so last night I played around with it a little. I upcycled this old radio, if you like. There were practical reasons for doing it; the brown pens I used back then (my beloved Pilot G-tec) are just not light fast, and so, as I wanted this radio hanging on my wall, in August, it too needed a little attention. I went over it all in brown light fast fine liners and added a little colour pencil. An improvement on the original? I don't know. That's all subjective.
Now, I haven't got time for all this. I've got walls to paint. AUGUST?! The whole house by August

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But, this isn't fitting in with my quest for minimalist living. So there's going to be a cull. Things are getting serious. But how can I get rid of these corks? They are thing of beauty. I've drawn them before (above and below) and I may want to draw them again. They all have their own characters and personalities. They're all slightly different. You can make rubber stamps out of them. They have sentimental.....

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Here's another of my passions folks. Zines. I am a fully fledged zine maker. A zinester, to use the technical term. What is it about making zines I love? Well, it is the whole process. But the main main thing is that it is DIY publishing which means you only answer to yourself. You write, draw, play, create whatever it is that you want to. Totally and utterly authentic. Nobody else has any say, influence or sway over what you want to produce. What can be better than that? Well, making money out of it would be nice. But, that's never the starting point. You'd be sorely disappointed if it was. They are a labour of love. No, the starting point is 'I'm going to make this because I want/need to'. 

It does, however, mean that sometimes we have to flog our creations. So, here's a bundle of my five current zines. Each has a run of 1000. No more no less. And, I've put a SALE on. Normally $50 but I've knocked 20% off so until the end of the week they're just $40.

This is the perfect inspiration kit for anyone who loves drawing or just loves to look at drawings.

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Check out the Chun-Li Artist Series Card I made for Fangamer: Also, don’t forget to take a peek at the other cards, they all turned out awesome!  goo.gl/0aUSNm

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By Chloe

Sticky Monster Lab is a multidisciplinary creative studio based in Korea. They cover various mediums from illustration to motion graphics, graphic design to product design. This wide spectrum helps make their work so unique and dynamic. Sticky Monster Lab have great wit and attention to detail which has allowed them to collaborate with Nike, Nissan and MTV.
If you’d like to see more work from Sticky Monster Lab, please visit their portfolio.

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Amongst all the other illustration work I do, I also co-run Dr Sketchy Sheffield and, so, being the sketching half of the team (my co-running partner is from the performance arts), I create the poster artwork. It's one of my favourite things to illustrate. Because it makes me feel closer to the poster artists, from days gone by, who's work I adore. I wish there were more call for poster artists. These days it's all done digitally so I like to buck that trend with purely illustrated posters (and I wouldn't have a clue how to do it digitally).

Now once we've set our theme for our Dr Sketchy event the idea for the poster image pretty much comes to me straight away. Sometimes without even having to think about it. Really, it's just there. I see it - the whole poster - fully formed. I then just need to put it onto paper.

Our next event (next Saturday, at the Greystones, Sheffield!) will be a celebration of dance. We have performers from different genres of dance modelling and, erm, dancing for us. We have a belly dancer, a breakdancer, a bhangra dancer amongst others. So, already I knew I had to get that info into the drawing. The first and original thought was of the kind of drawing in the image above. I think it's important to go with that initial idea if it has presented itself to you. I love those 'consequences' drawings. I've heard them called other things and somebody once told me that they were known as 'exquisite cadaver' drawings. I think that's such a great name, which conjures up all sorts of weird and wonderful images, so I'll be sticking with that.

I made a few exquisite cadaver sketches, like the one above, to try it out. To see if it worked. I'll be honest with you, I think the trial run above is still my favourite. I guess that's because it was the most spontaneous. Then when I'd got one that I felt would work as a poster image I sketched it out onto a 'proper' bit of paper. I always add the image first, leaving room for the text. Sometimes I will play around with where I want to place the image. I did with this one - I tried her on both sides of the page and central before settling on this composition.

For the text I always quickly research (Google) posters or fonts until I find something that fits. For example, I'll Google 'Bollywood poster fonts' or some such thing. This one was a combination of various fonts because of the variety of dance genres. When I find a font I like I loosely copy it. I don't measure out the letters, nothing technical happens, I just copy it by eye (is that even a saying? It looks odd now it's typed out). I don't want it to look exactly like the fonts I find. I want it to be my own version of them.

Anyway, that's a little (ish) explanation of how I create my posters. Now anyone want a poster illustration? I'm for hire. I'm always for hire.

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The Jaguar E-type has recently been voted Britain's favourite classic cars in this poll. I was commissioned to produce a drawing of it. It's not surprising that it is in the number one spot as it really is a thing of beauty.

I used pencil (a soft thick 4B) and marker pens, to make this drawing, both of  which are drawing materials that I've recently started using. I've never been much of a pencil girl. It doesn't really do it for me, but I kinda like these soft pencils now and again. The marker pen has been a revelation and I can't get enough of them these days. I did all the darker tones and areas with the markers, and it struck me that at one point I would have filled all that in with tiny cross hatched fine lines. Just the thought of doing that, now, brings me to tears.

You can see the rest of the list of Britain's favourite cars, and if you vote you can actually win this drawing HERE.

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Stephanie Graegin spent her childhood drawing and collecting fauna. These days, she lives in Brooklyn, is still drawing, and has managed to keep her animal collection down to one orange cat.

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By Chloe

Dean Gorissen’s illustrations are packed with character. His warm colour palettes and subtle textures add depth to his work and give a slight retro feel. Dean Gorissen has worked for a large variety of editorial clients and has also illustrated several picture books.

You can see more of Dean Gorrisen’s work here.

 

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