Burlesque Paper Cuts

Oh yeah. What happened with those? We haven't seen you since Thought Bubble and that was November.

Totally made more.

Totally had fun sketching the lovely ladies too. 

I'm working on new piece all the time so if you want to see my current range you should pop to the Make & Mend market on the 1st Saturday of each month and see me there. 

Or you can come along to the special event happening in Whitley Bay Library on the 24th May. It's going to be awesome. 

So. There you go.

BALTIC Artist's Book Fair 14th & 15th June 2013

I'll be at this book fair. I've been working on a bit of a (not so) secret project for the book fair. I'm going to reveal some images of my prototype. Please ignore the binding, at this stage it's not meant to look pretty.

The final book will have a few scenes like this, all based on burlesque acts that I have seen perform, or want to see perform very soon. Giving a bit of life and reality to the silhouettes. I have learned from this prototype that I need thicker borders to achieve the solid results I want. That's what prototypes are for.

I'll also have a handful of mini comics with me. This will all be for sale. The paper-cut burlesque artbook will be a limited edition.

See you all there folks.

Wedding Invitations

I enjoy doing markets, I get to meet new people and talk to them face to face. I was absolutely delighted when at a recent market I was asked by Joy and Marc if I would do their wedding invitations.

A few sit downs over coffee and discussions about wording later and we were ready to start making our plans a reality. So, with many sheets of paper, over 1000 Swarovski crystals and a corner rounder I set to work producing the custom designed wedding invitations. Each of the 210 invitations included an invite card, an RSVP card and a poem. The poem card can be seen in the photo below.

There was a lot of work involved, I wanted them to be perfect. After all, they were for a wedding and you don't get to do that very often. Joy and Marc were very pleased with the invitations and had them in the post to their guests the same day.

I hope I get the chance to do wedding invitations again. I've suddenly got so many ideas for something that little bit unique.

Choosing Colours

The other day I had an interesting conversation with Paul about design, specifically about how I start a new design. It was interesting because it was something I'd never put real thought into before, just something that I do.

When I start a design the first thing I do is think about what colours it should be and how those colours will work together to convey the feelings of the design. Only then do I think about the shapes and actual layout of a piece. I can't even see a composition properly until there's colour in it, everything just seems flat and the same.

Working in layers of card limits the amount of colours you can introduce to a piece, making it important that all the colours work together for the overall design. If a colour is there just for one tiny dot, then is it required for the design? Can that dot be the same colour as another layer? Does it then help bring depth to the piece?

I've learned a lot in the last year, about colours, composition, cutting and sticking. There's still a lot to learn. Maybe starting with colours isn't the most sensible working order but it's what works for me. Without them life is boring and everything becomes harder to distinguish. Maybe that's why I've always written with colourful pens, much to the annoyance of my teachers. My maths teacher probably had the hardest job, maths was orange.

Some useful colour resources:

http://www.colourlovers.com/ - make a palette for each of your projects, search through existing palettes, great for inspiration gathering.

http://www.informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/colours-in-cultures/ - everything on Information is Beautiful is worth your time and attention. This is a wonderful diagram of what different colours mean within different cultures, notice how much it differs? It's always worth checking this out, specially if you're doing work for use in a culture you're not familiar with. Check out meanings for your own culture, it might surprise you.

Thought Bubble

This time next week I will be at Thought Bubble. In preparation I have been busy putting together cards and the like.

These lovely designs will be appearing on my speech bubble cards, which I hope you will all like. I am also putting together a couple sets of blank speech bubbles so that you can make your own live photo comic. These sets will come with a link to a flickr group where you can share your comic and see others. It should be good fun. As long as I get them finished.

I will have copies of my 24 hour comic done in 2010, Not Mushroom for Thought  and a little collection of mini comics. Unfortunately my current comic project is still at the script stage and will not be ready for this years con. I do aim to have it done by Hi-Ex, this will be my first Hi-Ex, good thing I'll have Paul to show me the ropes.

On that note my table buddies for Thought Bubble are Paul Thompson and Cuttlefish. Many of the other Paper Jam Comics Collective regulars will be present. If last year is anything to go by you will probably find most of the Newcastle comics scene on the one row, throwing paper planes and challenging passing artists to 24 minute comics.

It should be good fun. Hope to see you there.

Making a Mess...

I may be paraphrasing but to make anything you must first make a mess.

Sometimes it's hard even to do that. Other times a design just falls into place. Making cards is a whole barrel of fun and testing out new ideas can be really rewarding.

I love that I can mix collage, illustration and recycling all together into one thing like this.

Especially when the results are so pleasing to others too.

I didn't learn this from formal education, that's for sure. What I did learn was that it's important to believe in what you're doing. It's very difficult to do good work if you don't believe in it or yourself. I know there are people graduating out there at the moment. I must say well done to you all. Don't stop believing in what you want to do.

This one is for you...

Punctual Paper Gifts

With Valentines day just around the corner I've been busy making some lovely love themed bits and bobs. Some will head to Made in Newcastle and some will find their way on to my Etsy shop. I am rather excited about the whole thing.

The two lovely cards in the picture are going to be available very soon. Keep your eyes peeled. The umbrella couple is my favourite right now.

Though it can make a bit of a mess.

And then some text.