Surface pattern designing





Well hello again peeps.. 

Sorry for not blogging for a week or so, but I have been genuinely busy busy busy...

Firstly I've been racing through my Surface pattern course - its fab..
Each morning you receive a new 'lesson' on the virtual classroom, sometimes with links, comments, things to look at later. Interviews, tips, and workshop pdf files. Then I've got to be creative amongst all that work and come up with something I like .. not an easy feat when your putting your work out there for all to see... A bit like showing everyone your pants, you just don't know how its going to go... 

Last week was all about drawing and mark making.. so having a go at finding new ways to make marks on things. 

Confused? 

Well, it could be using paint and your finger and drawing random stuff, or different pens or paints and just blobbing away or rolling a rag with ink on or even using the sewing machine to sew patterns or shapes, never heard of it before?, well neither had I but its actually quite liberating just throwing yourself into things and seeing what comes out the other end... 

Anyway a few examples are my leaves below which I gathered and just painted onto and stuck down and drew round, land splurged over and stuff.. The idea being that I can use this later for a background to a design or even a card, picture etc..





Hopefully that gives you some idea where I'm coming from...

Amongst all of this we were drawing things we might want to use... so here are my Poppies from pictures in the garden
(sorry its on its side, but I am still learning)










Well if I wasn't too distracted watching kids and doing crappy jobs like housework,  that  keeps me on my toes, this week has been all about colour. It has taught me loads about what I'm drawn to in colour. I like red, and not because its always 'on sale' but it shows urgency and perhaps that fact that I have no patience at all... 
(note to self, slow down, take some time over what I'm trying to achieve and think about it.)

Anyway we've been searching and taking photos of things and coming up with the colour charts for them... I took mine from a website I love called Flowerona which I love. It's about all things flowery and girly and colourful.. Here is mine..
I used a website called Kuler which then allows you to make a file which you can upload right away into Illustrator... cool or what? It shows the colours off the picture which might spark an idea or inspire me later..



Below of a couple of the efforts of this weeks work. I like them, but they are just not quite right somehow... I defiantly need to introduce more colour, more background, and perhaps move away from flowers for a bit to get a bit of variety and see where I'm coming from.
The course is also about finding your own style, why that's your style and how your going to keep going with that or move over time... I really can feel myself changing my tastes along the way.. 
Below is part of the result of the Poppies drawing above... 


This is Clematis I drew from outside the backdoor... 




 More poppies

Colour combinations

(note to self, have far too much pink stuff in this house, perhaps 3 girls against 2 boys doesn't help..)




On another note, had a lovely day out in Bath the other day.. I love Bath, (I'm going to live there one day) and took the oportunity to take some pics of patterns and colours there... I mean I took flippen loads, but here is a few for you.. 







So right now I'm struggling a bit with Illustrator - I mean there are loads of free tutorials on the internet, but really they do assume quite a lot and its bloody annoying going through them all to see which is relevant etc.. so today I joined an on-line site called Linda.com. It's a monthly payment which gives you access to all the tutorials you will ever need.. problem is some of them are 50 hours long...


On that note I'll leave you with a few pics of whats happening in my very neglected garden right now and hopefully be back soon... not within 50 hours of course.




Bye. Bye.
x









2 comments:

  1. You have a great skill of telling things in a way that makes it easy to understand each and every process...it seems I'm in my class now !!!

    great going with your patterns...I'm not started to do designing on illustrator ! I'm thinking of learning it... thanks for the link !!!
    here's mine:
    http://nanditark-lifeiscrafty.blogspot.in/

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Nandia,
      Thank you for you kind words, its so nice to know you are not alone in this big pattern world. I'm sorry I haven't updated my blog lately at all as I'm thinking of a new name and getting a web site sorted so I thought I'd save all my rambelings until then.
      Anyway glad to here you are on the course also, it brilliant, I am in Mod3 now about licencing and she is really putting loads and loads into it.
      I'm looked at your blog and you have a very nice style so keep it up - !
      Don't worry about Illustrator - it will come but you need to practice.
      There is a very nice lady who is a master of illustrator - here is her link, and also have a look as Smart Creative Women - very good also.
      Best of luck with the course and stay in touch.

      Trina

      http://www.trueup.net/2010/fabrics-2009/q-a-california-dreamin-by-jenean-morrison/

      Delete