christmas card design

I spent yesterday and today working on this design for a holiday greeting card. I was originally going to put some text in the center, but I liked it better without. Here's the line work before I colored it:

And the painted version is now finished and can be seen here!

it's autumn already?

I'm definitely appreciating the cooler weather, but it feels like summer absolutely flew by. I have a very summery illustration series of girls of bathing suits I'm still finishing up. At the moment, I'm in the middle of redesigning my site, but I'll get that up that up very soon.

Here's a mixed media (pen, watercolor, markers and colored pencil) piece I did yesterday while staying dry inside. I used an Aquash-style brush for the watercolor, which worked much nicer than I'd been expecting.

Illustration Friday: Swell

'Swell' as in 'Hunky Dory' as in, 'Let's dress up and pretend it's the '40s.'

Let's just go with it. Ballpoint, watercolor, colored pencil and gouache.

...and a finished project!

I finished this graphic on Friday for a Wise Guys game. I was given only very basic guidelines for the faces, so there was a lot of creative flexibility. And it wound up being a lot of fun!

a belated personal update

I've keep asking myself where the last two months went then I remember, oh yeah, I've been planning my wedding! James and I are getting married on July 23rd, which is...well, excitingly close!

Melissa Tomeoni is our wedding photographer—and we already had a lot of fun with her in June during our 'engagement shoot.' Her photography is beautiful. Check out her blog!

(James is pretty great too).

charity auction piece

In March, I participated in an online charity auction to raise money for disaster relief in Japan. According to the last tally post, the first round of auctions netted $45,743.10. And that update was from April 7th. Wow, right??

I auctioned off an original digital commission and was pleased to work with the winner, whose story I have read and enjoyed. Here's the picture I did of her two main characters. Looking sassy:

Publishing a story!

I have a short story titled "Susannah Don't You Cry" appearing in the upcoming issue #3 of Line Zero, an indie arts and writing journal.

Anyone interested can check out the journal at their website!

Issue #3 comes out May 15th, but is available for pre-order. I've seen the proofs, and there looks like a bunch of great material in that issue. Maybe next time I can get around to submitting some art too!