This weekend, I turned a log of wood into a series of
patterns that I might upload to Redbubble and two book covers – already loaded
onto Magic Owl Design. Why? Well, because I could, really. It was fun. That’s
what art has become to me lately – simply fun. I find myself racing from one
experiment to another, becoming happier and happier as I go along. Whether
others think they’re wonderful doesn’t really cross my mind, unless the art is
a commission, of course, in which case I slow down a bit and concentrate on
what they want. Otherwise, I’m simply
rolling with the flow of whatever happens and enjoying every second of it.
So how does a log of would become a piece of art? This way,
basically...
Start with a photo of an interesting log of wood.
Smooth the texture out so it looks painted.
Lay the result in various patterns – reverse the image, maybe overlay it here
and there and then mess around with the colours and blends. Photoshop is full
of surprises when you play around with it.
With these particular results, I saw possibilities for book covers. If you look closely you can see a man in the first picture. That's what inspired the first cover. The second, I cropped, stretched and added all sorts of filters and gradients to it.
Voila! Two more pre-made book covers for sale.
And sadly, I now have to stop and go and live real life. My family do need to eat after all.
Before I begin, I'd like to wish you all a very Happy New Year. I hope it turns out to be all that you wish for.
Anyone who is friends with me on Facebook or other forums
will already know that I handed in my resignation at work at the end of last year. I am no longer a library assistant. Instead I am a freelance writer and
illustrator, with some relief teaching thrown in to help the coffers. The
question remains, why?
The impetus came from two directions. Firstly there was what
a friend euphemistically called ‘stuff’ at work. Because of the ‘stuff’ I found
I no longer loved the job as much as I did a few years ago. Of course, every
workplace has ‘stuff’, and on its own it probably wouldn’t have been enough to
make me leave. I still loved the kids, and the teachers, and support staff were
wonderful people to work with, but ‘stuff’ was the grain of sand that overbalanced
the decision-making to the leaving side.
It really all started when I discovered the work of Sir Ken
Robinson. If you haven’t heard of him, look him up (or, at the very least, watch the video below). He’s an education expert,
gives inspiring talks, makes more sense than all of the other so-called experts
I’ve met put together. He believes in creativity, he believes we all have it
and he doesn’t think modern day education recognises that fact. As someone who
at school, was told by the Principal that I was being lazy choosing Arts
subjects for my final two years rather than the Sciences as my two older
sisters had, and by a science teacher, that I would never amount to anything
because I didn’t possess an ounce of logic (he was joking, but it stuck with
me), the idea that creativity could actually be a good thing resonates with me.
Creativity is not just the arts, though. That’s why I've always been a fan of
Einstein. He recognised that creativity was important, whatever walk of life
you were in.
Without creativity, nothing changes.
Back to Sir Ken. He wrote a book called ‘The Element’. I read
it at the end of last year and loved it. It’s about people who struggled in
life until they found (or someone showed them) the one thing that made them
really come alive. They weren’t necessarily ‘arty’ types. They were from a
whole range of professions, but their lives had changed with the decision to
leave what they were doing and start being who they really wanted to be.
What Sir Ken wrote wasn’t really new to me. I’ve done
courses: ‘discovering your true self’, ‘discovering your hidden talents’ sort
of things, but with the ‘stuff’ at work, it really got me thinking. This wasn’t
just about talent, it was about passion. In the library, I’d be looking at my watch
regularly, hanging out for the next bell, the next cup of coffee. At home,
working on a book or on illustrations or book covers, I can sit down at 9am
thinking ‘I’ll just do this for an hour’, and be surprised by my husband coming
in wanting to know what he should have for lunch. When I’m writing or
designing, I zone out and time vanishes. I’m in my element. Interruptions are often annoying. I’ve always known it. Until now though, I’ve pushed that fact aside
and done what I ‘needed’ to do – originally whatever I thought my parents
expected and later, whatever I needed to do to support my family.
My family still need supporting. Eldest is still at
University, Sausage has just discovered violin and apparently has potential and Dynamo is being a teenager with all the attendant costs that involves. We need money. The fact is, though, that I was not enjoying life
much. I’d come home grouchy from work, have three days of relative happiness
and then feel grouchy all weekend, knowing that I had to go back on Monday. It
wasn’t good for me or my family. Yes, it was a regular income, but at what
cost? In the end, I decided that a happy mother with less money was really more
beneficial than a stressed-out mother bringing in a small but regular
pay-cheque. Magic Owl Design is bringing in income, albeit smaller than I
earned in the library. I’m getting more work as an illustrator and my books are
trickling out of Amazon slowly but surely. I really think that I can make a
living and be happy. I’m going to give it a jolly good try anyway!
Another year. They seem to be passing with speed that’s on a
logarithmic scale. It feels like tomorrow I’ll be wishing everyone a happy
2015, but common sense tells me that time has not sped up, just my perception
of it. It’s scary.
Sorry my blogging has been so erratic. My whole life has
been erratic to tell the truth. I’d like to think that this year, things will
settle down, but it’s not looking promising so far.
On the good side, I did get that one book published in 2014
and the website I started in the hope of selling book covers has grown and is
getting a satisfying number of hits each day. I’ve been privileged to create
covers for some really great books. I’ve also done some maps and of course more
troll illustrations for the wonderful Smelly Troll books by Rosen Trevithick.
Photo manipulation
Those of you who are friends with me on Facebook will know
that I spent some of the money I’ve earned through book covers to buy myself an
Intuos Pro, a drawing tablet from Wacom. I already had a Bamboo tablet, but it
was tiny and I found it very restrictive. This is huge and I absolutely love
it. If I’d had lots of money, I would have bought a Cintiq which allows you to
draw straight onto your picture on the screen. But I didn’t have lots of money,
so the Intuos had to do – and it’s proving pretty good. I love being able to do
the whole illustration from sketch to finished product straight onto the
computer. No messing around with pencil and eraser, no trying to scan the
drawing to a satisfactory quality. Just straight onto the screen, multiple
layers and then all sorts of lovely effects you can get through Photoshop.
Original art plus photo
One thing that has become clear to me over the year and with
using the tablet is that my penchant really is for children’s book covers and
fantasy covers. Photo manipulation is fun, but I just love being able to create
the whole cover out of my head or turning photos into my own artwork. I don’t
suppose that surprises me. I’ve always loved creating fantasy/illustrations,
but I wonder if there’s a market out there for original artwork covers?
Something for me to find out this year: how many authors are actually willing
to pay for full rights to an original cover?
On the writing side, I have a work in progress – a novel
based on “Orlando’s Gift”, the short story I had out on Amazon for a while. It’s
very different from the short story because I’ve devised a whole other tale to
intertwine with it and that’s rather taken over, but from the reaction I’ve had
on Critique Circle to the chapters I’ve written so far, it’s going down all
right. I just need to knuckle down and keep writing. I already have the cover
done, just to keep me motivated! I'd love to show it to you, but that would spoil the effect later, wouldn't it? I still don’t have a title. I’m waiting for it
to hit me as I write.
Original art
To all of you who read this blog, a very belated Happy New
Year…unless you celebrate Chinese New Year, in which case, I’m a few weeks
early! Here’s to a year of getting done what you want to do, surrounded by
supportive friends and family.
