Diary of a "Make Art That Sells" Student: Weeks 3, 4 and 5 of Part B

Sorry I've been absent these past few weeks.  MATS Part B became very challenging for me and I also got sick so that didn't help.  Here are my projects for weeks' 3 through 5.

Week 3 was Scrapbooking week and I thought I was going to have an easy time with this one.  Nope. I found it quite difficult.  I think it was the subject matter, cameras and typewriters.  I don't normally draw objects.  I like characters better so I couldn't envision anything.  I also prefer the papers section of the Scrapbooking department and the focus was more on icons for stickers and embellishments for pages.  I don't go into that section.

I came up with these icons and used Illustrator to make the line drawings look cleaner.

Then I randomly chose 5 colored pencils to come up with a color scheme and played with layers in photoshop.

I think they look kind of cool but I'm not head over heals in love with this design  Below is the final presentation.  I tried to create "patterned paper" like you would find in a packet of paper.  I will likely revisit this and see if I can come up with something more interesting in the future.  

Week 4 was editorial and our mini was about lettering our town's name.  I had a sinking feeling the main assignment was going to be a map and I was right.  I had no clue how to do a map so, I decided to show the places you can take your kids in our area.  Morrisville has several parks and other interesting places to take your kids that you may not normally think of going.  Since the theme was "kid" oriented I took inspiration from Eric Carle and made a collage from painted paper.

My Icons

 My Final

I think its pretty good for a first try.  I love my boat, plane and firetruck.  I may need to use those for something else.

Our last week was Party Paper and the mini was all about Ukrainian or Bavarian Folk art.  Years ago I used to do craft painting and a lot of it was "folk art" style with swirls and flowers.  I was never a huge fan of that style but I went for it anyway.  I liked the Ukrainian better than the Bavarian.  I pulled out the paints and chose my favorite colors.  I even pulled out my special paint brushes that are often used just for "folk art painting".  They help the artist make flowers quickly.

These are my icons.

And this is my final presentation.

I really like how this came out.  It's bright and colorful and fun.  I think these icons can be used on lots of other things too.  I felt really good while I was creating this project (despite the fact that I was also sick with a horrid cough).  

Now the class is over and it's time to get motivated and get to work.  I know I am getting a better grasp of this licensing thing.  It's all about icons, icons, icons.  More importantly though it's about doing what you love.  I love to draw, paint, use bright colors and use characters in my work.  I think if I keep these things in mind when creating I will come up with a good collection.  I also have a really decent grasp of Photoshop.  I spent two days painting icons for my last project and two days on the computer assembling everything.  Who knew photoshop could be so helpful with art!  Stay tuned to see what happens next in my career!  Now, off to work!

Thanks for stopping by!

P.S.  More things will be added to my Etsy shop as well.  If you haven't visited yet, please stop by and check things out.