by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Cool Apps, Work in Progress |
Oh my sweetums, something has come over me. Once upon a time, like last week, I was totally disorganized. Disorganized as in scattered, running around like the proverbial chicken sans head.
Like these folks.
Sigh of relief. You didn’t think I’d show a dead chicken video, did you?
The point is, I was running around flapping my wings and squawking (yes, squawking) about doing S.T.U.F.F when in reality very little stuff was getting done. Except the squawking. I’m good at that.
And then Alyson Stanfield, the Art Biz Coach and author of I’d Rather Be in the Studio, began having her way with my bad habits via her ecourse Organize Your Art Biz.
BTW, it’s a great book and no one’s paying me to say that. Buy it.
Back to being somewhat organized…I now have a office separate from my studio. And a clean inbox. And files, both electronic and paper that are shaping up and starting to make sense. Best of all I have discovered the elephant in the room…Evernote. And I am in luvvvvvvvv.
I will not go into all the details of Evernote here. Let’s just say it involves NOTEBOOKS! OMG, do you know how much I love notebooks? And those legal pads? I bet there are at least four on the kitchen table right now. But my EN notebooks are free from coffee rings and kitty puke because they only exist in cyberland. You can have as many as you want, give them each their own names, group them in related stacks and fill them with things you clip from the internet. Or notes you write. Grocery lists. Everything syncs between desktop, cloud and mobile. So if you’re out and about and want to save someone’s business card but don’t want to clutter up your wallet, take a photo with your phone and file it instantly in the right notebook in Evernote. And you can have Evernote send you reminders when something is due. So far my art ‘stack’ has notebooks for expenses, inspiration, artists to follow, ideas for classes, reference photos and submission deadlines. The notes within these notebooks had previously been all over my desktop and archived in email. Which means they were all but inaccessible. Forgotten.
Especially submission deadlines. I can’t tell you how many shows I’ve missed because the call to artists disappeared somewhere in the belly of the beastly laptop.
But not any more!
One of my newfound notes was a call to artists for large scale figurative paintings. Bingo! Some of those Women in Red that I did back in January on the iPad have been begging to live large on canvas. Well, now they will.
Which brings us to today’s work-in-progress. Ta-da… It’s a big puppy, 4×4 feet. This is early days, just blocking out the shapes.
I started with a canvas that already had some preliminary layers. I sketched out the figures with charcoal.
Then added the first of the color. Acrylic. Got a long ways to go but it’s a start.
Love to hear your thoughts on this. Have any great apps or productivity tips you want to share? Let’s get a discussion going in the comments below.
Meanwhile, remember this:
It’s turning into my new signoff, like Roy and Dale’s Happy Trails.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Cool Apps, Digital Art, Gardening, Photography |
Oh my sweetums, today I wandered in the garden. It was beautiful! Gorgeous! Came pretty close to being spectacular! The plants are poppin’. The temperature was perfect. And there were bunnies EVERYWHERE. Easter Jackrabbits en masse, reminding me again why it’s not a good idea to plant a vegetable garden.
Ever the multi-tasker, I had the phone with me and chatted with the kids while I was outside. Remember the days when phones were tethered to the wall, when you ALWAYS knew where it was? And when it wasn’t a camera?
Well, since I had my phone-which-is-a-camera with me, I not only noticed how the sun did magic things in the garden, I was able to snap a few shots.
And since I’m a painter I decided to throw them into a painting app and art them up a bit. Here they are:
Nothing says SPRING to me like a Dogwood in bloom. Nothing.
Except maybe Lilacs. I loves me my Lilacs.
This is my exhale spot, one of my favorite places in the garden.
Technical Info: All photos were taken on an iPhone 5C and digitally altered with Aquarella.
What’s your favorite photo app? I’m always open to playing with something new. Tell us about it in the comments below.
by Susan Lobb Porter | Cool Apps, Digital Art |
Oh my sweetums, today I’m going to share a SECRET with you. A bit o’arty advice. Pssst…come closer. I don’t want ADOBE to hear this but…unless you’re a fancy pants designer or uber photographer, you DON’T need Photoshop. Or even the elements version. Seriously, want some cool effects? A photo collage, some text? A file big enough to print or small enough for the web? Well, grab some bananas and head on over to Picmonkey. It’s free unless you decide to upgrade a few choices and go pro. Then it’s a whopping three bucks a month. I’ve been using it a lot lately, redesigning the websites. The header you see up above? Picmonkey. The sidebar dodahs–Picmonkey. Well, not the mailchimp button, that’s something else. Which reminds me, I’ve finally got Arty Life set up for email delivery to your inbox every week. Don’t leave here without signing up.
I’ll know if you do, I’m a mother, I have magic all seeing powers.
But back to Picmonkey. Let’s play with something, okay. And by the way, this is an unsolicited review. I’m not an affiliate and get nothing but good mojo from sharing this with you.
This little gem took all of 5 minutes to create. Yeah, yeah, I know it looks like it but I wasn’t going for art here, just wanted to show the ease of creating a little graphic using the program. And I didn’t have any idea what I wanted to do. My indecision took up at least half of those five minutes. You can import your own photos but I just played around with one of the stock backgrounds. They have a lot of them. I’ve never even seen this one before. And they’ve got special effects too. And tons of fonts. You can make photo collages, facebook headers, posters and anything else your heart desires.
Let’s play with it some more.
Is that cool or what–a FRAME!
Picmonkey, to sum it up:
- It’s free unless you upgrade. The upgrade is cheap but you can do fine without it.
- Large or small files, you decide
- No download to clog up your hard drive. It’s a web based photo editing thingie.
If you haven’t tried it yet run on over and check it out. Be sure to tell us about it in the comments below. And if you have another favorite photo editing program tell us about that one too.
As always–
by Susan Lobb Porter | Art, Cool Apps, Digital Art |
Confession: I collect arty apps like other people collect, ummm…other things. Imagine that! I’ve played with them a bit from time to time but have never been happy with the results. Everything always came out looking too digital. Like that one over there (arrow pointing right).
Go figure.
Well this weekend I had this AHA! moment, this flash of inspiration that said maybe it’s not the apps’ fault. Repeat, please…maybe it’s not the app’s fault!
Maybe I needed to treat them as any other art TOOL and not a toy.
Maybe I should learn how to use them.
Sometimes I astound myself with maybes.
So I decided to explore Procreate. This is a digital illustration app complete with layers, more layers and a full selection of mark making tools. But I ran into the same issues I’ve had with apps in the past…the end results looked contrived. Looked like cartoons. Nothing against ‘toons but that’s not the look I was going for.
And then one of the many voices in my head, one of the nice ones, said something I needed to hear. She said stick to your own style!
MY. STYLE. You know, the way I normally paint… scribbles and layers and textures and whatever else I throw into the pot. Approach it like one of my paintings sans air guitar and Da Boss. Instead of the studio I was on the sofa. My feet were up on the coffee table and the dogs were snuggled on either side of me.
AND THERE WAS NOTHING TO CLEAN UP!!!
Ohhhhh… I might like this digital stuff.
I have yet to watch a Procreate tutorial (of which there are many). I just dived in layer by layer. Because Procreate allows you to work in layers. Large, like 4K, the industry standard for high def resolution. And export in layered PSD files.
There’s even a free manual you can download. Can you believe that…an app with a manual!
Are you in love yet?
I had several false starts as I was getting a feel for the way it works. I’m still working on that, actually. This is the first image I was satisfied with.
Red Earth
© 2013 Susan Lobb Porter
Digital Art
Yes, you’ve seen this image before. Or it’s canvas cousin Red Bob. Red seems to be an ongoing theme of mine. But by starting with a familiar design, I was free to explore the tools. And after I was comfortable with them–
Glow
© 2013 Susan Lobb Porter
Digital Painting
–this happened!
Ahhhhhhhhhh…
Stay tuned, there WILL be more.
As always, I LOVE hearing from you in the comments below. Heart emoticon here. Lots of ’em.
xoxo
by Susan Lobb Porter | Cool Apps, Photography |
There are MANY photos in this post. Really, LOTS. It’s all about COOL APPS. YAY!!! But like all good things, you have to be patient because I have a story to tell you first. Okay? Good, then let’s get to it.
We’ve got an old sofa. It’s the most COMFORTABLE sofa on the planet. In the entire universe. In the entire spread-your-arms-this-big realm of existence.
Really, I am NOT exaggerating. Except it’s not really a sofa, it’s a sectional. Which means there’s this long part you can lie down on, an adult can sleep on and not wake up with a back that’s all catty-wumpus. Which makes it even better.
God made this sofa. I would not lie about that.
But after 14 years, 2 kids, many, many, many sleepovers, 4 dogs and 2 cats…well, it’s looking a wee bit worn around the edges. Which isn’t too big a problem because the sofa itself is sound. Solid. And slipcovered. That’s the way it was made and over the years all I’ve had to do when someone peed, puked or spilled wine was unzip and throw it in the wash.
It’s not only comfortable and attractive, it’s practical.
It’s also time for a new slipcover.
Problem is, the store we bought it from is no longer around. The nearest store that had the manufacturer’s swatches was up in Lake Tahoe. Well, not in the lake but right there on the edge. So Mr. Spouse and I ran up there yesterday. Not quite as dramatic as it sounds, we’re only an hour away. Although considering the way Mr. Spouse takes those mountain curves, umm…well, it was dramatic enough from my point of view.
After picking the fabric we had an hour to kill before dinner. An hour with scenery–gorgeous gorgeous UNBELIEVABLE scenery and a camera. Ahhhh, for an artist who likes to take pictures it doesn’t get much better than that.
Except for some reason, some unfathomable reason, most all the photos came out crappy. Especially the ones that featured my index finger–of which there were many.
Must’ve been the altitude.
So today’s post is about taking a crappy photo and making it better. Or at least interesting. Making lemonade out of a lemon.
It involves apps. And Photoshop. And MAGIC!
This is the original photo. See what I mean? Meh. Shrug. Boring! Really, like for this I went to art school?
Here it is with a little help from the JixiPix app Simply HDR. It punches up the color, evens out the shadows. I consider this the base for further play.
At this point I shift over to Photoshop. JixiPix apps also come as Photoshop plugins so I can continue what I began with the iPhone.
A painterly look with Artista Oil.
Now vintage. But not just any vintage. This is a combination of JixiPix Vintage and a whole bunch of effects from onOne software. From here on that’s what I’ll be doing, combining apps and effects from different companies. A bit of this, a bit of that. I’m sorry I can’t tell you the exact recipes because I just start playing.
I cook the same way.
Ummm… I think this is from JixiPix Romantic Photo. Something brooding about this one, like an English novel.
This one is straight Moku Hanga, again from JixiPix. It’s supposed to give the effect of a Japanese woodblock.
And this one is starts with JixiPix Grunge and ends up a few more layers in onOne. It’s one of my favorites.
But not all of the photos needed editing.
Like this one. This thing was monster huge and heavy on the Macadamia nuts, hot fudge and whipped cream. Yes, we shared. And even left a little on the plate.
So, excluding the obvious draw of the fancy-ass hot fudge Sundae, which of the altered photos is your favorite? You can tell me in the comments below.
And I’d love to hear about any favorite apps or Photoshop plugins you may have.
As always, my best beloveds…xoxo
by Susan Lobb Porter | Cool Apps, Photography, Ponies in the Morning |
A lazy afternoon. Da Boy was hangin’ out in the barn-which-is-a-shed, hiding from the bugs and the sun. He was dozing but I woke him up. Said, hey, let’s take some pictures.
He was all droopy eyed and sleepy. Between that and the lighting (dim interior contrasted with bright outdoors) I figured we were in for an arty good time. Arty meaning out of focus, blurry, light leaking PERFECT for day dreamy shots.
Sigh…these all make me very happy. There’s a time and a place for focus…and this was not one of them.
Technical info: These were taken with an iPhone 4. They were arted-up and edited in Aquarella and Photoshop. They look even better if you leave a comment down below. Really, they do. Has something to do with light bending quantum physics blogging. I read all about that on the interwebs so you know it has to be true.
