Hi everyone! It's nice to stay connected to all you artists on the forums. I finished this today. This is my holiday card for 2020, both for friends/family and to sell to the retailers that carry my greeting cards. "Gingerbird House"

Here's a photo of my sketchbook - currently I'm studying Botanical Illustration in colored pencil, and doing one drawing every day in July. The first was an orange day lily using a reference photo I took in a field of flowers. July 2nd (today) was "Dancing Cherries" from a tutorial by Ann Swan. Generally to do a good drawing in realism, I should spend a week on it (or longer). But this is just to practice daily discipline, so the challenge is to draw these faster but not uglier, and to still learn how to create better drawings, which is working for me in this challenge. Yay!

I LOVE everyone's "Love" entries! So much humor and talent. This is my first ever contest entry.

I'm a greeting card artist by trade, and I use old-fashioned things like paper. So my goal for this submission was to just learn how to submit! I didn't have access to a scanner so I took a photograph of the drawing on paper and used GIMP to sorta make the white areas not-grey. This is totally different from the kind of art I usually do, but I got sick this month and couldn't begin working on my first idea (which would've been time-consuming) - so I came up with a new idea and had fun with it. "Finished, Not Perfect," right?

This is a Christmas gift for my best friend. I just finished today, been working on it for about two weeks. It's also the piece I enjoyed doing most this year, coincidentally! This is my first drawing of a furry animal on drafting film using colored pencils, so it was new territory, I had so many skills to learn and feel like I leveled up (sometimes I'd think, no way is it possible to do the white hairs without paint, and then I watched tutorials, experimented, and did them!). 14 hours drawing the final piece, 5x7 inches in size.

It's great to see so many mice in March! haha which reminds me I have not yet done mice for the new art "key" notebook I started last month. This month I've been working on filling it in. Since I work traditionally, this key helps me remember which medium and which color and the process I used to create results, so when I take artwork to finish, I don't have to remember, I just look things up in the key notebook. Does anyone else do this?

I'm thankful for SVS and the forums because I work from home in an off-grid cabin (it's a tiny house on wheels) in Arkansas, so I'm isolated from other people and artists. Without SVS it would be more difficult for me to keep myself accountable to my art, because the challenges of keeping our home going plus the day-to-day busy-ness of business (I own a greeting card business) would drown out the little voice inside me that says "Make great art!" SVS amplifies that voice. I've gained so much knowledge and new skills since joining a few years ago.

THANK YOU SVS!

@eriberart Finally, I got around to redrawing an older piece "Cupful of Bunnies" from 2016 (at left) and 2020 (at right).

Not 10 years but more of a 5 years challenge. Still I really like the idea of seeing progress and having the chance to redo something. I had to rush at the end, because of deadlines, so I'm not 100% satisfied that the redraw is my current best effort, but Finished Not Perfect right?

Update:

Thanks to the information you all provided to me, my friend and I were able to chat online about it very calmly and politely. @NessIllustration you were right after all! We just had a misunderstanding that was quickly cleared up, and actually it was good we discussed it because we were able to share a lot more information than just about who owns copyright. This positive experience helped counteract my past negative experiences explaining copyright. Also I recorded notes from this thread so if the issue comes up again I'll have the information quick at hand and will know to discuss copyright up front with either the gift recipient or buyer. I feel much better about gifting artwork now! Thanks!

Here's the final version I'm submitting to Leanin' Tree, unless you all have feedback about something I should change. This piece isn't my best work but it's been the most time-consuming single piece I've worked on. I started thumbnail sketches for it in 2018. Whew!

I want it to feel like we're out in the graveyard with a flashlight and come upon a scene humans aren't supposed to see. As though this magical, Nightmare Before Christmas Halloween version of Frosty the Snowman put out Trick-or-Treat candy for animals who befriend it; we're not sure its alive, could be just fireflies in its head and a bag of candy left for kids. Yet that squirrel in the pointy hat...and the fact that the right twig is unnaturally higher, holding up the crow instead of sagging down. Hopefully a bit mysterious! Or at least cute enough to buy off a card rack.

THANK YOU everyone for giving great feedback! I'm learning a lot at SVS.
-Amanda

I've had the same negative experiences mentioned here with some of the same Facebook groups. I don't follow them anymore. SVS is way better at meeting my needs. On the plus side, I learned to narrow my focus for these groups. I join and follow social media accounts for colored pencils, for example, because that's my main medium. Or for the company that I want to license my work to. Or for an artist/teacher who gives great tutorials. I've had a good experience doing that. Hope that helps!

@Molambo I found a YouTube video showing the cartridges for the multiliner pens, same as I have, and it describes how to change them - I hope this answers your question? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ikvT5NPsre0

Well I have not tried it but have the refills for pens. I don't think it would work in the multiliner pens because I'm not sure how you could transfer the black marker ink into the black multiliner pen? The refills are narrow tubes that slot inside the pens. Interesting idea though!

Oooo this looks fun! I'm trying to guess....straw-someone? Hay girl? My husband Ryan would love this. A few days ago, my parents surprised me by mailing me a collection of sketches done by my grandfather in the 1920s when he was a teenager. He died in 2004 but I never knew he was a colored pencil artist like myself! We affectionately called him "Pop-pop" instead of grandpa. My husband said, "So your Pop-pop's father would be Pop-pop Pop-pop and his father Pop-pop Pop-pop Pop-pop and if you go back far enough, you'd get popcorn!" I'll have to show Ryan this visual play on words, he will like it

@K-Flagg What an awesome concept!

@Coley this is just so perfectly cute! In my card line I have sketches for a mouse taking a bubble bath in a teacup (tea themed line) but it may not pass development stage, we'll see. Thanks for sharing your work!

@Chip-Valecek Awesome, thanks Chip! Did you have any luck yet? I still can't see or use the Serious Critique category either.

Hi everyone,

I'd like to know your thoughts on this finished 2020 Christmas/Holiday card for my customers, family & friends (retailers will get it in 2021 locally and/or 2022 depending on licensing). Especially what you think is done well (because I have been looking at what was done poorly, and making edits off and on since December 4, 2019) For example, are any elements working well? I'm not sure what's working. Like color, composition, texture, facial expression of birds, concept, rendering etc? Feel free to also share suggestions for improvement, because I can always learn and apply it to future designs! Thanks!

In case it's useful: I did tons of pencil on sketchbook thumbnails, then drew most of this on drafting film using colored pencils and pastels, except for the gingerbread and chocolate chip cookies which were done in copic marker with colored pencils on paper. I used GIMP to combine layers digitally.

@JoshuaDages cool, it's nice to know others here consider SVS the most formal education they've had - me too! No art school. Style is really difficult for me, too. We're in good company!

@jsnzart Yes I did finish the job, in 2016. Nothing to be proud of, but finished!
I think I just need to study harder about backgrounds, including some SVS courses I took (reviewing those). That's a good idea, I should study other people's backgrounds. I've only been able to find a few greeting card artists that do backgrounds relevant to my current line of work but this is a useful tip, thanks! Yes I did use overlapping, so my gingerbread house is behind the foreground subjects which are also bigger/closer to viewer.

Yes I have overcome many weaknesses at SVS since 2016! It's awesome. I was right in the middle of my first picture book job with a self-publishing author friend when I realized I knew next to nothing about this field of art and that's when I found SVS.

There are lots more skills I must learn to apply, but the biggest one that makes my art the hardest currently - I struggle with backgrounds and scenes, choosing objects to go in the backgrounds, knowing what arrangement of objects is best, how to mute colors of background objects without changing the read of the objects (light background, dark foreground concept). For example, my last piece is for Christmas. How does one make red & white candy canes in the background look less bold / saturated without making them PINK? So much to learn! Ha!