100 Days of Animals

On Instagram I joined The 100 Day Project a few month ago. I chose the subject: Animal Characters. and today I published my 100th Animal! I made it!!

It was a fun journey. In the beginning I was in doubt if there would be enough 'drawable' animals for me. Now I know there are. No problem ;-)

Sometimes I drew the same animal twice, as the lion and the elephant, but a different character. I all gave them names with an alliteration. (I also gave them Dutch names)

Some animals were easy, others took more time. Annie Alligator  wasn't that difficult and she still is one of my favorites ;-)

I never drew a mole before for example....here's a shy one ;-)

The funny thing of such a project is, it not only motivates to create something new each day, but also in the end you have a whole collection.

Remember my face a day project? A project I did for a whole year, 365 days. So 100 days was much more easy to achieve.

This project doesn't stop here. I have lots of material to continue. I want to 'deepen' some characters. Place them in other environments and play with emotions and letters It's a rich source. I'm happy with it!

And maybe, maybe, maybe they will appear in a book.Who knows...?
I'm working on it :-) This project certainly will be continued...

You can find all the animals on Instagram.

Another Milestone...

Some time ago I wrote about a new Animal Characters illustration project. I make an animal character a day for 100 days. Today I placed Ronnie Rat, character 070. 'Only 30 to go.... I love it!

I'm not the only one who loves it :-)
Today I reached already 3500 Followers, another  milestone!

If you like, you can follow me too on Instagram
You are welcome!

Animal characters 002 - 004

My new illustration project is four days old now...

On Instagram I post a new animal character each day for 100 days. I love to draw animals and this is a good stimulans to broaden my portfolio for the children book market. I would love to make a picture book once. And you have to start somewhere, isn't it ;-)

Character 004: Boris Boxer

I'm not the only one who is doing the 100 days challenge. When I posted the first character: 'Christopher Cat' on my blog, I got a reaction of one of my favorite illustrators Manon Gauthier. She wants to join me and will post her characters on her blog. They are SO adorable. She will start today. I'm honored she wants to join and looking forward to see her new animal characters!

Character 003: Polly Pig

Character 002: Mike Monkey

Besides broaden my portfolio another  reason I joined this challenge, was because another favorite illustrator of me Claudi Kessels was joining the 100 days project. She makes her own 100 days of naturals. You can check it out on Instagram: clauditekent Very delicate and original!

Animal characters illustration project

Today I started a new illustration project: I join the 100 days challenge. I'm not sure where the idea started, but I saw it on Facebook and I decided to challenge myself to draw one animal character a day for the coming 100 days. Here's the first:

You can followmy challenge on Instagram if you wish.
I'm curious which characters will appear... :-))

Have a nice weekend!

Three Little Kittens

I join this weeks Spoonflower competition. Theme: kittenns in mittens.
I made this pattern after the nursery rhyme of Mother the Goose: three little kittens.
If you like it, you can support me and vote for it here
Thanks in advance!

I didn't know this rhyme, but I love it!

Three little kittens

The three little kittens, they lost their mittens,
And they began to cry,
"Oh, mother dear, we sadly fear,
That we have lost our mittens."
"What!   Lost your mittens, you naughty kittens!
Then you shall have no pie."
"Meow, meow, meow."
"Then you shall have no pie."

The three little kittens, they found their mittens,
And they began to cry,
"Oh, mother dear, see here, see here,
For we have found our mittens."
"Put on your mittens, you silly kittens,
And you shall have some pie."
"Purr, purr, purr,
Oh, let us have some pie."

The three little kittens put on their mittens,
And soon ate up the pie,
"Oh, mother dear, we greatly fear,
That we have soiled our mittens."
"What, soiled your mittens, you naughty kittens!"
Then they began to sigh,
"Meow, meow, meow,"
Then they began to sigh.

The three little kittens, they washed their mittens,
And hung them out to dry,
"Oh, mother dear, do you not hear,
That we have washed our mittens?"
"What, washed your mittens, then you're good kittens,
But I smell a rat close by."
"Meow, meow, meow,
We smell a rat close by."

Cowbear Party - week 2 - Make Art That Sells

This was the second week in part B of the Make Art That Sells course. It was all about the baby apparel market.Theme: Cowboys and Cowgirls, yeeha!

We were asked to develop a pattern with this theme appropriate for the baby apparel market. It's a totally new market for me, but I love to make patterns and I love to draw for kids. So it was a fun week for me!

I first did some research on the theme and gathered a lot of cowboy and their attributes and environments pictures. I had fun drawing them. It's such a good way to come into the mood of the assignment:

Ofcourse I also drew some cowboy faces with cowboy hats:

And lots of horses, here are a few:

I decided not to take cowgirls or cowboys for the assignment, but cowbears instead.
The whole week I had the Susanna song in my head, only the first sentence:

when I came from Alabama,
with a banjo on my knee...

That's what inspired me to make this Banjo Bear:

We were also asked to make lots of icons and variations in your presentation. I think this was the most challenging part for me. Also to make some patterns, called coordinates that fit with the main pattern. So it can be used in combination with each other to make clothes for kids.

Beneath you see the final result. If you wanna see it in a bigger size, click here

Next week we gonna look at the scrapbooking market. Also new to me.
I wonder what that will bring :-) Will be continued...

Make Art That Sells - Happy Holidays

Remember I joined the Make Art That Sells course with Lilla Rogers last spring? I'm now taking part B. Another five weeks cover five different markets: paper goods, baby apparel, scrapbooking, editorial and party paper

I just had my first week: paper goods. Here's the result.of the first assignment: a winter holidays postcard featuring penguins:

First we got the mini assignment to loosen up, trying different techniques and get to know the subject. So I was diving into the world of the penguins. I love these animals, their clumsiness is funny. I never saw a baby penguin before, they are  so cute. I would love to see them in real.

Baby penguins where not the only ones I drew. I also made these red cheeks variations:

Below more experiments, now I added some more color:

I also discovered this new technique. I drew lines with a sharpie, scanned them in, reversed the black lines into white ones and added the colors with some monoprint brushes I created. I like the effect, I think I'm gonna try this technique more often:

After all these penguin drawings we had to create a winter holiday postcard. The assignment was open. Only thing given was the subject and the size. It needed to be a portrait format. Funny I had several ideas which would fit better in a landscape format...

My challenge was to add a lot of 'icons'. To make a kind of winter holidays collection and still try to keep it organized. Would you buy a card like this?

Next week we gonna take a look at the baby apparel market. I'm already curious!
Will be continued!

platypus

And here's prompt #11 for the 30 days spoonflower drawing challenge:

This week it's animal time. I had to google this animal: platypus, a fascinating animal
as if he is made from parts of several animals to one animal. I like him a lot :-)

More spoonchallenge doodles under #spoonchallenge

Thank you!

Thank you all very much for your votes on my dancing rhinos design!

Unfortunately I didn't win, but I hope you will support me the next time again :-)
 If you are curious who did win: here are the winning designs. Happy weekend!

One of my facebook friends was so kind to tell me they published the voting results on the Spoonflower blog. My dancing rhinos are on the 22th place 0f 251 designs.
Not bad for a first time :)

Children book page: the fox and the crow

This was my most favorite week so far in the e-course Make Art That Sells
I thought it would be, and I was right: The children book market!

Our assignment was to make a cover or a double page for a children's book,
based upon Aesop's fable: 'The Fox And The Crow'

 

On Monday our inspiring teacher Lilla Rogers gave us the new subject: foxes.
My first reaction was: YES! I like to draw animals and I like foxes!

I looked on the internet for source material. Lots of beautiful foxes there!
I started to draw them. First realistic with pencil to get to know them more.
After that I played with shapes, lines and used all kinds of other materials.

I found it very challenging and fun to add various expressions and attitudes to the foxes.
Also interesting to find out what makes a fox a fox: his pointed ears, his sharp nose
His color and ofcourse his beautiful tail.

It was funny to see, the more foxes I drew, the longer his tail became :-)

After several hours of drawing, cutting, scanning and playing,
foxes were everywhere in my house.

Here a picture of my work in progress on my kitchen table:

I came up with a fox character. I've played with the idea of his long tail.
That would be a nice idea for a story and it could bring my fox in several situations.

We knew there would be also a crow involved in the story, so I worked a bit
on their relationship too. And  tried to keep the character consistant,
which is quite a challenge:

On Wednesday we got the big assignment: a cover or spread
after Aesop's fable: 'the fox and the crow' in your own style.


I first made several possible composition sketches. Here are two of them:

And  there was his loooong tail again:-)

At first I thought my fox would be too sweet to do something rude
to the crow (stealing his cheese) because in my head they where friends.

I liked the idea the fox was using his tail as a violin to seduce the crow to sing.
I chose that option to work on and built the spread.

We also worked on handlettering, which is also quite new to me.
I played a little bit with it, but I must say I need to explore this a lot more.

I came upon this inspiring handlettering site including
lots of tips, tutorials and videos about this subject.

Before I submitted my final spread, I first placed it in our facebook group,
I asked for some feedback, I thought there was someting missing, didn't know what.

A very good suggestion was to let the text follow the tail of the fox.
Besides all the information we get, is that another thing what I like so much about this course: the stimulating, supportive and positive atmosphere in the class :-)

If you want to have a closer look on my final spread click here

Will be contined, another two weeks to go...

new valentine postcard: 'cats in love'

Valentine is coming soon. I made a brand new postcard:
'cats in love' their tails form a heart, isn't that romantic? :-)
If you like it, you can order it here

color your world

And again I've made a new print
It's called 'color your world'
It's available here

New print: Circus Cats

A cheerful, joyful and playful start of the year:
I made a brand new giclée print: Circus Cats
If you like you can purchase it in my Etsy shop

world animal day

Hurray, it's world animal day!

a wolf in Holland

Last week they found a real wolf in Holland
Not in the zoo, or in a fairytale, but here in Holland, in de Noordoostpolder
The poor animal was dead. Probably hit by a car.

They say the wolf walked all the way from Eastern Europe.
They expect more wolves are coming this way.

A bit scary idea, I often wear a red jacket with a red cap,
when walking in the woods... ;-)

hot hot hot

It's so hot here in Holland,
that you could eat two ice-creams at the same time :-)

red pouch

IF: secret

illustration friday: looking for the secret

tromfanters

experimenting with drawing and collage

all about emotions

This was the last week Animals in Art class from the
Dancing Cat Art School. This weeks theme: Animals in Emotion

I've chosen the goat as my subject. To emphasis the different emotions
I've made this animated picture: 'mixed feelings'