Icon Designs

Back in May of 2020, a friend of mine who worked for a conveyor belt company asked if I’d be interested in designing custom icons for their tablet, the ALMEXPAD Senior 3.0.

I was a little nervous — I’d never done anything quite like that before but was up for the challenge. I had been slowly been building my skills so I told myself, “Yeah, I got this!”

My first attempts turned out a wee bit too cute for the intended target audience (see the images below) and likely better-suited to a children’s book but some of the rejected sketches did evolve into some of the icons that were approved.

Designing icons for this project was a great experience and I learned a lot from it.

I designed 35 icons in total. Below is a small selection and some of my process.

Initial ideas.

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2020 – 2021 Years in Review

Now that I have a little break in between projects, I figured I should take some time to update my blog and share what I’ve been up to the last couple of years.

I always thought it a challenge that I could not seem to keep a consistent style and didn’t really want to. I was always trying out one thing or another (cartoon, realistic, anatomy, etc.) However, I believe all that practice and posting was beneficial because, throughout 2020 and 2021, I started receiving offers of work from some cool and interesting companies where I was able to put those skills to use. Unfortunately, I can’t mention some names because of NDA’s.

Over the past two years, I’ve worked on a variety of projects outside my comfort zone. I worked on video game backgrounds, did some concept art for a small video game company, created painted icons for a tablet interface, developed tee designs for a company’s promotion, greyscale colours for a graphic novel, character designs for a comic, and public service illustrations. Unfortunately, my social media and storefronts suffered because I didn’t have time for personal work. Despite that, I somehow still had some sales, especially masks! My heartfelt thanks for the love and support!

We also adopted 2 Bengal-mix kittens from the same litter: Thor and Loki. By a freak accident our dear sweet Loki passed away. It was very tragic and, for the longest time, we couldn’t bring ourselves to write about it. Subsequently, we ended up adopting a Siamese-Bengal mix and named him Baldur. We’re very fortunate the two boys got along and have become almost inseparable.

bengal kittens — Baldur in front, Thor at back sunning themselves.

A small sample of some of the illustrations I’m allowed to share.

A small selection of icons I created for Almex Group.

beach scene van — One of the many tee designs I produced for Almex Group.

An early rough concept done for a video game company. While I and the client liked it, it didn’t make the cut. I later added a cat, just because.

Happy New Year and Best wishes for 2022!

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Chorizo the Game Background Art

Recently, I was asked to create some background art for an indie video game by an artist that I follow on Instagram. His project is still in production but he has kindly given me the go-ahead to share my contribution.

It was a happy coincidence that this opportunity came about; lately, I had been trying to incorporate more backgrounds into my personal work and posting them along with background studies to Instagram. He came across my “Goldhorn” painting and it aligned with the style he was going for. Because my background studies were more for learning, I wasn’t sure how they would work in terms of animation. Fortunately, this parallax animation didn’t require that I deviate too much from my normal workflow—keeping the foreground, mid-ground and backgrounds as separate layers. Of course there were some things I had to be more concerned with, such as painting-in hidden elements so the environment would appear more seamless when layers moved. It was a fun experience and I would welcome the chance to do work like this again.

The Backgrounds

I was sent the following sketches to use as guides. The last image—with the client's cute pig character for placement—is an earlier version I did of the hut scene. For the sunset scene, I was asked to change the monkeys to the “see/speak/hear no evil” iconic poses.

When there is more information available about the game it will be posted over at the official site.

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A Look Back at Some of My Successes and Setbacks of 2019

Some Setbacks:

Said goodbye to our fur babies

It was a stressful and emotionally-draining year for both the hubby and I. Our two cats became ill at the start of the year (one with stage-4 kidney disease and the other, rectal cancer). The one with kidney disease (left) lost his eyesight so we had to watch him more closely. He had fallen from a landing through a rail onto the stairs (luckily, not far). Needless to say, this scared us so the hubby built guards along the railings and to prevent future mishaps. Both cats ended up needing constant monitoring and care so it tied us to our home more than usual. Sadly, their battles ended later in the year, one shortly after the other's, and it was a truly heart-wrenching time for us. We know we were very lucky that they both reached the ripe age of 20 but it was still very hard to accept. They were our babies and had been with us since they were kittens. The house certainly feels emptier without them.

I also had some of my own health issues to deal with, one of which was the onset of severe back pain. I’m still trying to rule out the cause but it has slowed me down. I’m hopeful that I’ll figure it out and rectify it in the new year.

Although I did manage to create more art and post it, some goals that I had laid out for myself at the beginning of the year, both art and personal, weren’t reached.

I sum up the setbacks in this final image I drew for the year:

And some of my successes:

Gained new a client

An animator who follows me reached out to see if I was available to assist a project he was involved with. While working for this client, I learned some new techniques and had a lot of fun creating background illustrations and props for an instructional animation about ADHD. Once the project had completed and been made public, I was able to share it. It's an unusual but satisfying feeling seeing your work as part of an animation.

Worked with returning clients

It’s gratifying when clients come back to you for more work. It seems to validate that I did something right. At least I hope it does. Maybe it’s just good timing. Unfortunately, most of that work was either internal or not yet allowed to be shared.

Got my work published in a children’s art book

The Monster Project:

I was pleasantly surprised when I was approached to contribute artwork to The Monster Project: elementary students are asked to draw a monster of their own creation and artists from around the world are each matched up with a child and attempt to envision that child's creature rendered in their own style. The organizers had a big event late in the summer to present the new creations back to the kids so they could see where their imaginations and collaborations led. It made me happy to see the video of my chosen kid’s reaction to my artwork. I was delighted and humbled to also have my artwork included in the printed book. It turned out very nicely and if weren't for this project I never would have discovered so many other great artists. So thank you to the organizers!

Started to gain some more followers on my portfolio sites and more interest at my stores

This might be more common than I realize but, speaking for myself, an artist's ego is a fragile thing. It sure feels nice to be appreciated for what you do. As an artist that feeling perhaps goes a longer way. Could it be that the extra time & care spent posting and curating helped? I did spend more time working on the consistency of my art style; it's a constant struggle. I’m pretty sure being part of the Monster Project didn’t hurt.

Learned some new skills

I pushed myself to do more colour and light studies; I learned how to properly apply colour to a greyscale image, and learned some new techniques to speed up my workflow. I like to think that my design skills have also improved this past year.

In the preceding images I used reference from The Mandalorian TV show and what I had learned from my classes with Sam Neilson to paint them. I drew this little fellow (yes, I know it's Baby Yoda AKA The Child) by breaking him down into flats, shadows, occlusions, highlights and final touches. It was good practice to focus on technique and application instead of just trying to race to the end result.

I also delved some more into animal anatomy because I want to get better at drawing animals and creatures:

I hope I'm not just imagining it but I started to notice a style beginning to emerge (see my earlier comment about consistency) and more of a direction with my work. It’s something I wasn’t sure I’d ever accomplish with my penchant for being distracted by bright shiny things and techniques.

Despite the setbacks I think there were some real positive gains and I look forward to what 2020 brings. Here’s to a healthy and prosperous New Year!

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A Sad Good-Bye.

Sadly, my full attention has been elsewhere lately. We had to say good-bye to our sweet cat Max yesterday—a little too soon after saying good-bye to our other cat, Dax, earlier this summer. After fighting an open wound for months and cancer in her lymph nodes, Max lost her battle.

Max was my husband's cat first (he had her for 20 long years) and over time I grew to love and respect her. She had her own personality. Unlike Dax, she was a quiet cat that didn't beg for scraps but would sit quietly and wait her turn. She was also selective to whom she gave her affection—and when. It took a while but I was lucky to eventually be included in that short list. I had to constantly remind myself that her cute wide-eyed stare didn't always mean I could pet her. We are heart-broken that she is gone; that both our cats are now gone. The house feels far too empty without them.

Max:

Dax:

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Client Work—An ADHD Video for a Pharmaceutical Company

I just found out that one of the projects I worked on this year was just made public so I’m finally able to share the video and show some of the assets I worked on: http://www.adhdandyou.ca/Parent/ParentKidsProgram.aspx

Illustrators can sometimes work for weeks or months on a project that can’t be shared until it goes public, if at all; client jobs don’t always appear to the public.

An animator I admire (RichToons) reached out to me earlier this year. He had a tight deadline and thought my cute cartoon style would lend itself well for one of his projects. He needed help with additional characters, backgrounds and props. I was surprised and flattered that he contacted me.

Here are most of the finished images I created for the video. Although the deadline was tight, I really enjoyed the challenge of working in someone else’s world yet was able to contribute a little bit of my own style.

Family Tree

Brain

School Kids

George - Classroom Scene

Cashier Scene

Ice Cream Truck

Emma - Mall Scene & Bestie Design

Emma - Dishes and Props

Emma - Classroom Scene

Emma - Bedroom

James - Office Scene

James - Boardroom Scene

James - Hallway Scene

James - Home Office Scene

George - Bedroom

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The Monster Project 2019 / This Isn't Kansas

A community undertaking where elementary students draw monsters and artists from around the world recreate them in their own style. These new versions are presented back to the kids in the hope that it encourages them to see where their imaginations and collaborations can lead them. It's such a wonderful project and I'm honored to have been a part of it this year.

The big reveal of 134 monster images happened today, August 5, 2019. Check out all the amazing contributions at The Monster Project and please consider supporting it by purchasing a book.

Below is my contribution and progression along with my chosen student’s work that inspired it all.

I tried my best to be faithful to the original drawing and colours. When I saw the speech bubble, I felt it might work well looking like it belonged in a comic book. This young artist sure has a great imagination! I hope she continues to create and come up with fantastic stories.

Update: I've been told that my artwork has been selected to be included in the 2019 Monster Project Art Book. With the amount of submissions, there were no guarantees so this was a nice surprise. I’m very much looking forward to receiving my copy.

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Recent Studies, Recent Art

Sorry for the lack of blog updates these past months! I decided early this year to focus my efforts on learning and creating more artwork to add to my portfolio, stores and Instagram pages. I’ve also been helping out an animator with an informational video on a tight deadline. I’ll talk more about that in an upcoming post.

In order to produce more personal work, I began to set some time limits for myself for each piece and, as a result, I became much more efficient and produced more work in a few months than I did in an entire year. I realized a lot of what slowed me down in the past was overthinking things. Don’t get me wrong, I occasionally still do but I’ve been trying my best to push past it. I totally get that ubiquitous t-shirt phrase, Don’t Overthink It.

Letting go to draw whatever came to mind and trying out whatever style was also very freeing—I was coming up with ideas far more often. Too often, sometimes, but that’s a good thing, right? My main struggle these days is I have trouble trying to stick to a single subject matter and style because I love to explore. It would be nice to be recognized for my style. I’m not sure if I have one yet. Maybe one day.

Because I’m constantly trying to increase my knowledge of technique, I followed some tips I picked up from my Schoolism classes and I started to do more light studies, studies of animals, action poses and backgrounds. I began to notice improvement to my finished pieces which I’ll save for another post. I felt like I was able to produce them a little more easily than I had in the past. Although I was pleased at how some of them turned out I know there will always be room for growth. I did start to think: Wow, did I really do that? There was a time when I would make numerous studies and still feel like I wasn’t advancing. I was embarrassed to share them so often I didn’t. To me they weren’t good enough—I made the mistake of comparing myself to others. We are often hardest on ourselves, right? I’ve since changed my perspective and instead try to learn from those artists I admire. Below are some of the studies I’ve been doing this year.