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Mi történik, ha az ember felvág egy körtét? Lássunk két felhasználást!
What does happen if you cut a pear? Let's see two different ways!

I/1. A körtét lefotózom. Nyitok egy új file-t Illustratorban, és place in paranccsal behívom a fotót. A layert lelakatoltam.
I/1. I take a photo of the pear. Open a file in Adobe Illustrator, and place the picture in, close the layer.

I/2. Egy új layeren a toll (pen) segítségével körberajzolom a magház formáját.
I/2. On a new layer I draw over the figure of the core using the pen tool.

I/3. Az alsó layer-t lekapcsolva megigazgatom még a kis forma íveit.
I/3. Turn off the lower layer, and put right the curves of the object.

I/4. A külső íveket kék színnel kitöltöm, és a pathfinder panel-en expand paranccsal egy objektumot csinálok belőle, majd kijelölve egy-egy belső formával együtt a pathfinder panelen a divide paranccsal a belső formákat kivágom a külsőből.
I/4. Fill the outer objects with a light blue color. On the pathfinder panel expand into only one object. On the same panel with the divide command cut the inner objects from the outer one.

I/5. Egy világos kék háttérre teszem egy sötétebb kék színt adva a formának.
I/5. Put the object on a lighter background.

I/6. A formát megtöbbszörözve, forgatva elrendezgetem egy négyzetes háttéren.
I/6. Multiply the object, size the new ones and arrange on the background.

I/7. Kijelölve az egész objektumot az edit menüt legördítve rákattintok a make pattern parancsra. A swatches panelen megjelenik a frissen készült pattern.
I/7. Select the object and use the make pattern command. The new pattern is appears on the swatches panel.

I/8 Egy nagyobb felületen kipróbálom, hogy hogy mutat a minta, és kísérletezgetek a formák rendezgetésével, méretezésével addig, amíg nem leszek elégedett a végeredménnyel.
Minden egyes változtatás után újra mintává kell alakítani a kis ábrát a 7-es pontban leírt módon.
I/8 Use the new pattern on a larger object. Try different arrangements with changing the sizes and places of the small flowers on the background. Always use the "make pattern" command to create a new pattern.


II. A másik felhasználási módja a felvágott körtének, hogy fotózás után kisebb darabokra vágom, és beleteszem egy süteménybe, aminek a receptjét már tölthetem is fel a remek receptes blogra. :)
II. The other way to use the pear. Make smaller pieces, put into a lovely cookie and enjoy it. :)

There are at least eight excellent reasons that I think you should take the nine minutes it will take to watch this video of Sarah Vowell, who is the voice for the superhero Violet from The Incredibles.

1. Sarah Vowell is a big introvert.

2. Sarah Vowell is so cool you won't hardly be able to stand it.

3. Sarah Vowell is extremely funny.

4. Sarah Vowell says things like "... I'm better with dead people."

5. Like Nancy Pearl, she has her own Action Figure-- two actually, and one of them is INVISIBLE.

6. Sarah Vowell makes Abraham Lincoln seem kinda, well, you know, hot.

7. As part of my book launch plan I'm starting some school visits and the first one is tomorrow and I'm speaking to two Assemblies with 160 kids each and I'm in dire need of some serious superhero mojo. (And I seem to have misplaced my punctuation she says gasping!)

8. Could there be a better name for a superhero than Violet?

What do you think, friends? Does she make the cut our Shrinking Violet Hall of Fame?

Click here for Sarah's video!

Wish me luck tomorrow--
Mary Hershey

Okay... It's not quite Spring! But here in Texas, it sure feels like spring comparing to all the northern states that have been bombarded with snow all winter long. I love birds and was just playing around with the textures and colors... Just having fun for a change.

Valentine's day is coming up...I know, I know. I'm not a fan of the unnecessary pressure that the holidays' arrival tends to bring out in some either... But, I AM a big fan of creating ornamental and decorative art, and... I AM a huge fan of symbols of all kinds, and, well...I DO love pink... soooo, I guess you can sort of understand my *aesthetic* appreciation of Valentine's Day. It is a FUN holiday to do artwork for!! :) Yay for hearts, swirlies, and X's and O's!! (...and, besides all of that, I really don't mind a holiday centered around chocolate.)

For those that may have a slight tendency to break out in hives or a cold sweat, and possibly feel a primal urge to quickly locate an underground bunker and hole up til the storm passes, here's a newsflash-- you got 13 days until V-Day. If the all-media marketing push hasn't hit you *yet*, it's only a matter of time, so hurry to the store for some canned goods, candles, batteries and bottled water... ;)

Jo has been really interested in the pattern sketching I've been doing lately. Any time she sees me with my sketchbook open she adds a few sketches of her own. The other day she drew this. . .She said I should use it to make a pattern. I thought it was a jar of rocks or pebbles (we HAVE been shoveling gravel) and I nattered on and on about how great it would look with some leaves or maybe other things that you find outside. Jo got excited and suggested acorns, which I thought was a great idea. Then she tells me, "Actually it's not rocks. It's a jar of eyeballs." Well. No idea where that came from, but I was happy to run with it and we brainstormed some other fun Halloween ideas. Here's what I've translated to Illustrator so far. The original jar of eyeballs inspired this eyeball polka-dot.Gund made a great Sesame Street cube a few years ago that I've had sitting in the back of my head for a while now. I decided to do some faces in squares.The Frankenstein is my favorite. So I decided to use him to make this cool checkerboard pattern.I showed Jo the square guys and she said we really needed a witch - so here she is.Finally, Jo said that we needed something with spiders. Together we came up with this Mommy and Daddy spider with lots and lots of baby spiders crawling in every direction. Jo suggested black spiders on the purple background. We tried orange and green polka-dots scattered in among the spiders. Jo preferred the green and I agreed - so here it is.

I finished one more pattern in the black & white & pink collection (here and here) - and I think this one might be my favorite. It's the diamond pattern in the group of all four shown below. I tried to post it on its own, but every time I uploaded the image, it showed up with white diamonds instead of the black with white lines. No idea why.Next up is a Halloween collection. Jo's been really interested in the pattern designing I've been doing and she came up with several Halloween-themed ideas, beginning with a jar of eyeballs she drew in my sketchbook. Should be fun!

Here's one more pattern to go with the other two. It's a really small-scale check, so definitely click on it to see it at more of an actual size.Ooh la la! I think of these as very French for some reason. I'm not sure if it's the colors or the sharp geometrics, and what do I know about French patterns anyway? I'm planning one more in this color combination - this one a larger-scale pattern, probably a diamond grid. I've been having trouble getting one part of it done in Illustrator - a simple line! Why are the simplest things so hard in this program?! Anyway, my task for tomorrow night is to figure that out - or figure out a way around it.

I lost sunlight today before I got to my Project Barbie challenge so that's going to be a fun after-school project for Jo and me tomorrow. Instead I decided to work on getting some patterns out of my sketchbook and onto the computer in documents I can use. I'm bound and determined to learn how to use Adobe Illustrator - the most non-intuitive program in the world. I gave this a shot earlier this year and ended up with this and this. Then life intervened and I stopped working through the tutorials. Mastering this program is one of my goals for 2008 and I decided to get an early start this week while the computer is mine. . .all mine.
So here's what I got down today. I'm starting with pretty simple geometrics and basic fabric-style patterns - polka dots and stripes. I started with the polka-dots and I was really happy with it. You can click on the images to see them bigger.Then I tried a coordinating stripe but I thought the horizontal bands were kind of fighting with the vertical pink stripes.
So I tried this instead and I liked it much better.Wouldn't the polka-dot make a great little A-line dress with the stripes used for a ruffle on the bottom and maybe some pockets?

8 x 8 inches

This is what I'm working on right now. I thought it might be fun to post a work in progress, so you can see how these things develop.

I know its light and a little difficult to see, I apologize. But this is exactly how it looks on my board (well, except for the bad scan splice down the middle).

This is going to be a red and white Scandinavian snowflake design (yes, I'm thinking Christmas already). I essentially knit the design with my pencil, drawing it out, stitch by stitch.

Then I used a colored pencil (in this case a Polychromo red) to lightly indicate the red pattern stitches. I came back in with a light grey to go over the rest of the stitches (which will be off-white).

I then lightly erase the graphite pencil lines underneath. The colored pencil holds up better to erasing, and holds the pattern just enough, while the graphite goes away.

Notice I keep saying "lightly". That's the key. Too much color too early will ruin it, and too heavy erasing will take it all off. I need to be able to see the pattern, but not have it be outlined like a coloring book.

Here's a detail. This is about the size the stitches are in real life.


So now I get to start painting! I decided to do this in watercolor. I'll probably do some colored pencil on it as well, but I will at least establish the color pattern and maybe shadows with paint first. Stay tuned.




I guess I need to find some Christmas music to listen to. The other night I watched "The Wall" (Pink Floyd) which I hadn't seen since it first came out (although I've listened to the album many many times). Its still stuck in my head, and doesn't really go with happy Christmas knitting designs.

I'm teaching myself how to use Illustrator and I thought a great way to set myself some "assignments" would be to join in on Illustration Friday. I'm really focusing on pattern design rather than illustration, but it seems like a friendly bunch over there so I hope it's ok.
The theme for this week is "Geeky." I guess it's a cliche to do big round glasses for geekiness, but I loved the graphic possibilities of the image so I went with it. So here it is - my very first Illustrator creation and my first Illustration Friday submission.