Wednesday, March 28, 2012

an album cover

My super talented musician friend Brian asked my husband and I if we would make a cover for his album, and of course we said yes, and even though it took me a while to get around to it it's finally (mostly) done (except we haven't figured out the text quite yet).  

So it's really a collaboration between the three of us: it's Brian's concept -- that it should feel like his old apartment where he wrote most of the songs, Sean's layout/grayscale pass, and my color and painting.  

This is how it turned out!


I still really don't understand light, or lighting, or how to make something look all pretty and luminous with colors.  It seems that whenever I ask someone to explain it to me, they're all "Oh it's just a bunch of photoshop filters!  You just screw around with it until it looks right!"  WHAT.  
Since I have no idea what to make of that advice, I just googled a bunch of images with nice afternoon-ish lighting and then made little color keys based on those.  

The last one, which is the warmest, and really feels like Brian's old place to me, is the one we went with.  

Here's husband's drawing!  Sean doesn't get himself out there on the internet much (I know because I googled him and there's really barely anything of his out there besides some Adventure Time stuff: he story boarded Tree Trunks!), so I thought I'd post this.  He's the Background Supervisor on Gravity Falls now, so expect to hear a lot about that when it comes out in a few months!




He kind of slap-dashed the organ together because he couldn't remember what it looked like.  It is based on a real instrument though. Look!



Aren't those colorful keys enticing?  It looks like a big toy.  

Friday, March 23, 2012

dum dum girls


The Dum Dum Girls are al all-girl band.  They wear lots of black and fancy tights and red lipstick and they sound real good!  I've seen them play a couple of times before and they are one of those bands that really sounds best live, I think.  

I love how they all dress in black.  Why don't bands art direct their costumes more often??  It's so effective at making them feel like they go together. 

Look at them go in this video!

 

I think the text on this is a little wonky but hey, I'm no graphic designer.  

In other news, I'm pretty not-busy right now.  It's nice to have time to do things like fan art for bands I like, but I'm starting to get stir crazy.   I like having a BIG project to work on!  Also I like to be paid for it!  So I can buy clothes and then write about them on my other blog!  But that's how the freelance life goes, ebbs and flows, and lots of blog updates.  

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

dresses which are not dresses + website

I forgot to mention this before, but I finally have a place you can find me in the internets with a name which is very easy to remember!  


That's where my tumblr-based portfolio lives.  If you have a tumblr you can follow me and tumbl away! It feels very official and neat.  The only bummer is that you still have to remember to spell my name right (no D, two E's, two T's, yes I know it's a funny spelling, but I didn't choose it).

And here are some discarded ideas from a thing I'm working on, er, trying to be working on.  

I'm not going to explain too much because there isn't much to say.

Here's a birdcage dress lady!  Her hat is also a birdcage.  





I imagine that the weather girl is prone to mood swings.  



Pomegranates.


Yes I know they're very silly.  

Friday, March 09, 2012

stereo girl

I did this for my friend's zine!  I remember wanting to make zines when I was in high school and college, and then never doing it.   Sometimes I would even do a bunch of drawings and be like, "This is for the the ZINE!" And then the drawings would sit there forever and ever the end.

I'm not sure where this girl came from.  I did a super rough sketch of her a few years ago and I just liked the idea that her clothes (and maybe also her body?) are like a stereo, but a cool analog stereo, that plays how she feels.


























In these drawings she's in a joyful dance-y kind of mood!

What's she dancing to?  Maybe THIS?  That song always makes me feel joyfully dance-y, even though it's not necessarily super dance-able.

Or THIS?  I mean, you can't really argue with that.

In other news, I've been around old CalArts a lot this week looking at student portfolios!  I have a workshop-stype situation going on.  SO MANY PORTFOLIOS!  It's great though.  I get to meet the students and hang around in the faculty lounge.  I'll be there next week too!   Busy busy!