Cupcake Bouquet Art Process

 My Cupcake Bouquet greeting card design was inspired by a greeting card design challenge, #dhgartspark, on Instagram, Design House Greetings - Cue The Confetti. Which led to a lot of doodles in various notebooks and finally a full size pencil sketch and then  an even tighter one. My next step is to take it to the light box to transfer the sketch to watercolor paper.  I use Canson Montval Watercolor 140 lb paper.

Step 2: Is the inking. Black India ink with a brush and then wash with shadows.

Step 3: I paint my illustration traditionally. Using Higgins Waterproof/Water Resistant Colored Inks as if they're watercolors and then scan it all in.

Final Step: Bring it into Photoshop, clean up paint splotches, specs and dust  and add details like sprinkles. Tah Dah - here's the finished art!

 I hope to do a few more greeting card designs for this challenge before March1 happens. BUT who knows if I actually will. Anyhow hope you enjoyed reading about my art process.

Web: dianadelosh.com

Instagram: @dtdelosh

Post: @dtdelosh

Check out my shops:

Greeting Cards: greetingcarduniverse.com/dianascards

Gifts: zazzle.com/deloshdesigns*

Art Prints: wingedrabbit.imagekind.com

Art Process Experiments 1 - 3

Recently, I've been trying new ways to work for a variety of reasons including keeping my work Fresh. My usual process is to sketch, ink, paint, scan, Photoshop. Elements are created separately and then put together and further digitally messed with until I'm satisfied. Here's a link to a recent process post.

Experiment No. 1 - Old English Sheepdog:  Reversed my process and No sketch.
Results: It felt daring working backwards. However, I can't imagine doing a whole piece this way. It does open up more possibilities.  I like the less outlined look. I also like that I used less black lines and feel the gray lines give it a softer look.

Painted basic shapes with watercolors. Scan

Added more shadows  and lines with my Wacom tablet and Photoshop. 

Experiment No. 2 - Owl flying in a Pine Forest:  The OWL only - Digital. NO sketch.

Results: Fun and a bit challenging to just draw paint with the Wacom. It has a certain appeal. A sketch would have helped.

The owl is drawn and painted using only the Wacom tablet and added to the Forest. A few Pine trees were hand inked*, scanned than digitally colored and put together for the forest. *I had originally created the pine trees for a different project and before I had the Tablet.  

Experiment No. 3 - Squirrel:  Oil Pastels. NO sketch.

Results: Felt like I was drawing with trees... Doubt if a sketch would've helped. I'd have to do this MUCH BIGGER. Never mind years of practicing. Similar to my Wacom experience but without being able to undo and all the other advantages of digital.

I haven't used oil pastels since high school! Rediscovered why I stopped using them.

Sharing more art process experiments soon.

Web: dianadelosh.com

Illustration blog: dtdelosh.blogspot.com

Product Blog: arthareswares.blogspot.com

Group Blog: drawntopicturebooks.blogspot.com

twitter: @dtdelosh

Check out my shops:

Greeting Cards: greetingcarduniverse.com/dianascards

Gifts: zazzle.com/deloshdesigns*

Art Prints: wingedrabbit.imagekind.com

Gifts: society6.com/dianadelosh

Check out my ThumbNailer

INKTOBER2016: Inks 20 - 31

Whew -I survived INKTOBER2016!!! Yes! I  did 31 illustrations with various inky implements within the 31 days of October. What I learned from this challenge other than I enjoyed it immensely? Found that even though I do a lot of inking, that a lot of days I need to work on pencils or just Paint all day. Needless to say I did Inktober in clusters. The hardest part was posting/tweeting & blogging about it. Hence this blog post wrap up is a few days into November.

20 - Owl Sings © Diana Ting Delosh
Biro, ball point pen preliminary doodles for a project.

21 - Owl Character © Diana Ting Delosh
Biro, Character doodles for a project.

It's just as easy to do preliminary sketches and doodles with a biro as it is to do them with a pencil.

22 - Owl Sings © Diana Ting Delosh
Brush pen warm up.

23 - Leaves © Diana Ting Delosh
Brush pen warm up

24 - Hedgehog Bride © Diana Ting Delosh
Brush pen doodle

It's fun to do quick doodles with a fat brush pen and no underlying pencil sketch.

25 - Peep Sings © Diana Ting Delosh
Brush pen -Line art 

26 - Village in the woods © Diana Ting Delosh
Radiograph double zero point and some pencil left in for texture.

27 - Lady on the Train © Diana Ting Delosh
Biro - quick sketch on train.

28 - Man on the Train © Diana Ting Delosh
Biro - quick sketch on train.

The problem with sketching people on the train is that sooner or later they have to move or get off. It's also really hard to sketch on crowded trains.

29 - Another Owl Sings © Diana Ting Delosh
Brush pen -Line art

It's not deja vous numbers 20, 21, 22, and 29 are all related to the same project.

30 - Fall Squirrel © Diana Ting Delosh
Brush pen -just for fun

31 - Pumpkin Cat © Diana Ting Delosh
Brush pen - just for fun

And that's a wrap for INKTOBER2016! 

If you're interested in seeing the rest of my Inks click on: INKTOBER2016: Inks 1 - 9 and INKTOBER2016: Inks 10 - 19

In case you missed it:

My post on Drawn To Picture Books: The Eleventh Month by Diana Ting Delosh: It's that time to rally one last huge effort before times up. Tick... tick... tick...BOOM! It's November, the eleventh month and a f...

AND

I was also recently interviewed by Dana Carey on the SUB IT CLUB. Take a peek and read   The Postcard Post: Diana Ting Delosh.

Web/Portfolio: dianadelosh.com

Twitter: @dtdelosh

Product Blog: arthareswares.blogspot.com

Group Blog: D2PB

ThumbNailer a book of boxes for your creative process

2015 Black & White Illustration Promo Page

2015 B & W Promo Page - Panda / Wildflower
All Art © Diana Ting Delosh

I belong to a local illustrators group and one of my favorite CBIG Projects are the Illustrators Directories: Color and the Black & White. Here's my Black & White Promo page for the upcoming 2015 directory. And of course, I make a PDF version for my own usage. Handy for handouts or as a digital tear sheet.

For my Black & White promo page I wanted to show my grayscale art and my line art. I also wanted to show that I do people and with all the fuss with adult coloring books, my line art. But I didn't want to show too many things. And of course they had to look good in a vertical format. Here's my solution. 

Book Buddies illustration : ink with ink wash on Canson 120 LB  watercolor paper. greyscale art.

Wild flowers illustration: ink on vellum paper. Line art. 

Here's to hoping it's enough of a taste to get the powers that be to click on dianadelosh.com to see more.  And Golly Gee Whiz  - land me an illustration commission.

GTS 2014: Mini-Terrarium Wall Art

TAh Dah -drum roll please... here's my take on mini-terrariums... FLOURISH

Flourish © Diana Ting Delosh 2014
Ink, Watercolor and Photoshop

The brief for round 1 of Lilla Rogers' Global Talent Search was to create Mini- Terrarium themed wall art and type was a requisite.  My process begins with doodling. To come up with a phrase or word, I jotted phrases that came to mind in my sketchbook, my journal on the edges of job scraps, napkins, etc. I began with a large terrarium image focus and phrases like: Small World. As the doodles progressed I found the foliage kept growing out of my container and sayings like Grow Where You're Planted or Get Out of Your Comfort Zone or Grow Wild came forth. Could I distill that essence into 1 word?? 

Flourish Sketch © Diana Ting Delosh 2014
The sketch only hints at whats to come.

Finally came up with FLOURISH, a word with a lot of meanings. It could mean thrive or to brandish something like a sword or  to embellish. My concept was of a delicate plant growing inside the mason jar, bursting out of the confines of the safe jar to be this wild, slightly chaotic plant with big showy blooms.

Mini Terrarium Plant - Ink  © Diana Ting Delosh 2014
Note after I painted the lines I decided the composition was too tame . The plant needed to be growing off the page.

The actual art was created as 3 separate pieces: the mini-terrarium, the Flourish hand lettering and watercolor background wash.  Put together all in Photoshop. Couldn't decide if the type should be bigger or smaller and in the end went with the smaller type version. Only to hit submit and decide a second later that I preferred the bigger type layout as in the original sketch  - oh well.

Incidentally, the GTS 2014 Gallery is Live -Click here to see ALL 999 Entries. My Entry is on page 13, mid-way down the 1st row smack in the middle of amazing gorgeousness. And in case you were wondering -Nah, I'm not 1 of the 50 semi-finalists.

365 Drawings 2014 #14 Crab Sandwich #Twoodle

Drawing #14 & Twoodle - CRAB SANDWICH 

with words  brought to you by:

Crab - @aliciapadron

Sandwich - @Readitdadday

Feels good to twoodle again -haven't done this in a loooong time!

Crab Sandwich © Diana Ting Delosh
Ink & colored pencil twoodle
1/15/14

A twoodle is a doodle game on twitter. Use #twoodle to find out more.

W-I-P: Mr & Mrs. P. Pumpkin Eater

It's been awhile since I last posted on this blog. I've been busy with commissioned illustrations this spring (YAY!) but of course that means I can't blog about it - yet (Sigh). However I can share the Work-in-Progress of some personal work. I'm working on a series of Mother Goose images for an upcoming CBIG Group show.

Sketch for the 1st illo - for the Mother Goose nursery rhyme: Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater. 

Here's the ink for Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater.

Yup - I'm depicting Peter and wife as mice. What else eats pumpkins and can live very well in one? I know: chipmunks, snails, perhaps a small bird or even a toad, etc. but this is my illo so I'm doing Mice.  Next question - to dress or not dress the mice? Well if they can get married and set-up house in a  pumpkin shell they can wear clothes. 

 ... And the finished watercolored version will be coming soon.