Photoshop Lesson Update on Art Ed Blog

I just added one of my Photoshop lessons on my Art Ed. blog at http://kellynixonarted.blogspot.com/. 

Bear-Frog Animal Hybrid: Demo Model

This lesson was to make an animal hybrid by using photo-manipulation. It was aimed at Art I students, check it out for more details. 

You may recognize the Bear-Frog image featured for the lesson from my art portfolio pages. I had originally made him as a demo model for this lesson and liked him so much I kept him as an art portfolio piece : ). 

Enjoy!

More artwork and lessons coming soon!

Art Updates

Finally its time for some art updates!!!

Discovery of a Werewolf

This is a small comic piece done in pencil. A man walks in on a werewolf attack in progress. The question is what will he do next?

Futuristic House Design

 This is a small gouache painting. For those of you unfamiliar with it, gouache is like a thick opaque watercolor and it is great for giving vivid colors. This house was designed to fit in the void between two canyons and has a greenhouse area on the top for growing food, vents on the front of the base to capture wind energy for power and heat/cool the home, piping to gather ground water, and entrances on both canyon sides. Its kind of like a live in bridge.

Future Robot Design: Litter Collector

 This is another gouache painting. I was experimenting to get a few painterly effects, mainly in the background and on the animals. The story here was how robots might be used in the future. Here I interpreted them as caretakers of nature. They keep the forests clean and protect them. This robot is collecting trash.

The Fox Painter

 This was an illustration spread for a little comic I made. In the story, a boy gains the power to make his paintings come to life, after helping a magical fox get free of some rubble in a cavern.

Fox Painter Spot Illustration

 Here is a spot illustration for my Fox Painter comic. After spending the night cowering in a closet to get away from bad creatures, the boy emerges to find one of his paintings has changed positions and has marks of fighting on it. The painting had come to life and protected him from the creatures.

Bear/Frog Hybrid

 Here is a little Photoshop exercise I did during student teaching to demonstrate how to combine different animal photographs digitally. The real focus was to match colors and blend the images seamlessly. In this piece, I combined a bear, frog, turtle and some moss and rock textures to create this twisted little animal. I'm trying to think of what sound this guy would make.

Dream of Falling

 My interpretation of falling in a dream. Made in Photoshop by using blurred Christmas lights for the background and merging it with the photo of the figure.

Flashlight Blur

 Flashlight fun! Made by attaching colored gels to flashlights and moving them around. The camera has to be set to take a long exposure. The longer it takes the more trails you can make.

Flashlight Blur 2

That is all I have for now. I will be adding more art from jewelry, ceramics, and some logo designs I have been doing over the next few days. Check back for more updates soon!

Illustrator Tutorial, Fall TV Premieres

Here is a little insight into how I work with Adobe Illustrator. This is a tutorial I made for converting a photo into an illustrator drawing. This is generally how I work in illustrator for the realistic pieces. I take my own reference photos and work from them. With other illustrations, like the previously posted Aesop illustrations, I make a line drawing traditionally, scan it in, adjust levels in photoshop, do a live trace in illustrator to vectorize the image, and then I proceed in the same manner described in the tutorial. Later, I add in textures in photoshop. Enjoy.

On a side note I just finished watching the premiere of Grey's Anatomy. It was a total tear jerker. If you haven't watched it and consider yourself sensitive, grab your tissues. It did have some humorous parts including Callie walking nonchalantly past Mark's girlfriend into the bathroom, while he was taking a shower, to ask him a question and when Izzie had her usual inappropriate reaction to sad issues- She left the funeral service to go bust out laughing and the others joined in as well. Just like the narration says, everyone has their own way of passing through the stages of grieving. RIP George, we'll miss you!!!

Flashforward was pretty good too, but I'll reserve judgement until the plot has progressed some more. The one man who was conscious while the rest of the world blacked out is really interesting, so is the depiction of what would happen if people blacked out- cars, planes, and helicopters crashing, surfers drowning, the surgeons passing out. A lot of these I wouldn't have thought about. Some of the characters said the blackout was a blessing, but I kept thinking: not for the people who died during the blackout. I also got the impression that TV is showing more graphic images than it used to, whether that is good or bad I haven't decided yet.

-Heroes was pure awesomeness! The speedster with the knives and the tattoo manipulator were my favorite new additions. I'm glad Danko is gone, I never really cared for him to begin with. As always Hiro, Ando, and Sylar were fun to watch. I busted out laughing at the point when Hiro and Ando were called to save a cat and Hiro froze his own time. Ando rolling him around on a dolly was priceless. The compass thing and the burial of an unknown character were a little odd, but its too soon for those explanations. I intend to enjoy the ride for now. I also thought it was funny that two characters from Days of our Lives were on there and they both didn't last long either, they were the water delivery man Matt sent away and Claire's 1st roommate that died.

River Photomerges

My family has had a place at the Rappahannock River for over 30 years, but last year the campground we went to was closed for good. I thought I should capture our view of the river to remember it by. Both images are photomerges which make up an 180 degree view of the river. The sunset version was taken from a bluff that overlooks the water and the day version was taken from water level on the beach. Enjoy! (If you click on these, be warned they are very big, width wise.)

This was made up of about 4-5 different photos. I really like it because it shows all the boats that belong to my relatives and the boat the furthest on the left (My brother's) had to be photoshoped in later because he was taking his boat on the last ride of the summer- you can see him in there covering his boat too, my family got a kick out of that!

This one was made up of about 12 different photos. I love how it shows how long the river is and the beach of the campground is visible there, as well. I would have liked to have everyone's boat in there too, but they had all gone to spend the day at the sandbar. I was disappointed to find out after I had finished that this one is pretty impossible to print, given its size. I figured it up and to print it at a height of 3 inches it would have a width of several feet, ahhhh very disappointing :(. Oh well, it will live forever digitally!!!

-On a side note, I am able to print the sunset version :)

LOOOONG Overdue Update

This update has been long in coming. I'm adding pretty much all the finished illustrations I did during this past Spring that I already had digital files for. All of them are a mix of traditional, photoshop, and illustrator techniques. Anything I forget or have to photograph will be added later.

Also I will be trying to post updates daily now, but they all won't strictly be art updates. With out further adieu here is my art dump, enjoy!! :)

Editorial Illustration from February about how Obama has to deal with a lot of national security changes that Cheney made, while in office, and whether or not he should get rid of them, or keep them as is.

Ed. Illustration also from Feb. that draws comparisons between the inaugurations of President

Obama and President Roosevelt (FDR not Teddy).

-I know I need to work on the likeness in these illustrations, but they were my first attempt

at drawing a celebrity, oh well live and learn. :)

Ed. Illustration about Chinese search engine, Baidu, which is the largest search engine in China (their logo is the dog paw print by the way). Baidu has been basically killing the traffic to sites that refuse to buy ads from them, which effectively kills those businesses in the process.

Ed. illustration that discusses human evolution and its roots in Africa.

Illustration of Aesop's The Old Lion. In the fable, the lion is too old to hunt so he feigns illness to trick passing animals to come into the cave to help him. When they come in, he eats them. One day, a fox passes by and calls out to the lion. The lion asks why the fox won't come closer and the fox says that he has noticed that all of the animal tracks lead into the cave, but none come back out.

-I've always wondered how the next scene would play out, would there be an awkward silence or a sudden chase?

Illustration of Aesop's The Wolf and the Crane. As the story goes, the wolf gets a bone caught in his throat and promises the crane a reward, if he will use his long beak to get it out. The crane does so and the wolf starts to leave. The crane asks for his reward and the wolf tells him that being able to stick his head in a wolf's mouth and live to tell the tale is reward enough.

-I've come to realize Aesop's fables are all kind of violent. I didn't really remember them being that way when I was little, go figure.

That's all for now, check back tomorrow for more!

Ist POST!!!

Hey everyone,

The new blog is up and running!! Here are some samples of my work. I'll add more later after I've gone through my files some more. 

~Kelly

Coke ad - Illustrator 

Seven Samurai movie poster- Photoshop

Cat cards design- Illustrator

Conceptual self-portrait, I just had to do a sheltie :) - Photoshop

Self-portrait - Illustrator