Illustration Friday: Hierarchy

My husband and I recently brought home chicks for Easter. And of course it's been interesting watching them establish their pecking order.

For those interested in chickens, the orangy-yellow ones are Buff Orpingtons and the Black ones are Barred Rocks.

The idea behind the composition was to make it look like collage.

Illustration Friday: Talisman

I really finished the majority of this last weekend and to be honest I've kinda forgotten how my train of thought pulled in at this particular station.

I guess it went something like talisman=shiney dangley thing=cat toy.

I tried using reference shots from my big gray tomcat who is a much "witchier" looking cat and I thought it would fit the bill, but he was quite uncooperative so I went with my much cuter, more whimsical and slightly cross-eyed Siamese.

I classify it as Traditional since the main focus of the piece was done in watercolor and watercolor pencil, but the background was finished in Photoshop CS4.

I <3 paisley.

Illustration Friday: Poise

The first thing that came to mind for me was ballet. Because of course ballerinas (what do they call the male ballet dancers, ballarinos?) always seem to possess an ample amount of poise. But where's the danger, wheres the intrigue. Apparently it's in tight-rope walking.

From there it was really all about pattern, and how many ways I could use (or abuse) it.