Friday, August 09, 2013

Time to Challenge Myself...Design-Wise

Apparently I am not busy enough.  Cough, cough, CHOKE.  So, to add even more pressure to myself, I have decided to undertake a Designer's Challenge over at Pixel Scrapper.  The goal is create one item a day with prompts from our fearless leader, Marisa Lerner, and create elements for a kit that will have a total of 30 of them, by the time we are done.

I've never really participated in a forum--well a designer forum anyways.  I did participate in a few forums back when I was working for a living to keep current on what was going on in the field of learning disabilities, but I digress...

Anyhoo, since you guys are my inspiration to keep on creating, I thought I'd share with you all, a snippet of what I have created so far.  The first week was all about papers: 
  • floral/damask/ornamental
  • stripes 
  • plaid
  • grunge/distressed
  • polka dots
  • geometric
  • fun shape
Here is the colour palette I chose to work with:


I found this really awesome blog where the owner, Jessica, produces the most incredible palettes.  The bog is called Design Seeds and some of you may be familiar with Jessica's work already.  To get this palette, just click on the image and it will take you right to the originating post

So this is what I came up with:


While it is hard to tell, there is some texture woven into each paper.

Now the last paper in the set, the fun shapes, isn't all dragonflies.  So here is what that one looks like:


Now most of you know that I am a beginner at all forms of digital design.  As such, I often use templates from the ever fabulous Pixel Scrapper when creating many of my papers and other designs.  This time around I've made three by scratch, three using paper templates and one shape template (see credits below). Their licensing is so awesome because you can choose whether to spend your daily credits for personal use or commercial use.  The commercial use costs more but it allows me the opportunity to offer you guys freebies which is really important.  Additionally, it gives me the opportunity to actually make some money if I ever decide to establish a store front or sell through an existing store (which would be my preferred choice).  However, I think I'm a long ways from being good enough to actually sell me stuff yet.  That will come in time--hopefully.  Given that I spend so much time working on these things, time I should be spending with my hubs, it would be nice to actually make a little money again and feel like I'm a contributing member of this household.  But as I said, that will come in time.  Even then, I know how difficult it is for the majority of digital artists to make ANY money selling their wares so I am going in with my eyes open. 

I'd love to hear what you think of the papers I've created so far.  Over the course of the next week I'll be working on the second set of prompts which are some more papers but with different patterns.

Not sure what I'll be doing with this kit or its various parts.  I have been thinking it would be nice to jump in and sponsor a challenge or two; so, maybe I'll start caching some sets for this purpose so that winners will have something to choose from.  What do you think?  Is this a good idea?

Big hugs to you all and thanks for your continued support and feedback.


Until next time,
 
Credits:
I used paper templates from Marisa Lerin for the floral and plaid papers. I also used her cool dragonfly image template to make the fun shapes paper. I used a grunge template from Brooke Gazarek. Both these artists and their templates are from
Pixel Scrapper.

9 comments:

Suze said...

I suppose you knew that I'd give you some feedback as soon as I saw this post. I love using papers! Firstly, haven't we got enough on our plate already! Lecture over, these are fabulous. The second last one reminds me of a certain snowflake paper that I've used once or twice (Ha!Ha! - about 10 times!) The dots just appear to pop up out of the paper. That would be my fave of this set. I like that you have done a dragonfly one - they are popular images. A lot of challenges are "Things with Wings" so this paper would be suitable for those challenges. Actually looking closer at the third last one that appears to have some dimension as well although not as obvious as the polka dot one (or the infamous snowflake one). Like the dimension look as it gives it more interest. Like the small snippet I can see of the other ones and with the colour scheme that you have used (I presume you got to choose that yourself) they look as though they would work well together. Hope this helps.

ike said...

OMGoodness - the papers are GORGEOUS and that's a super colour palette. I don't know about anyone else but I'd like to be first on the list to BUY this set when you have finished it. I adore the colours :-D You ARE good enough to sell them Lisa, so GO GIRL !!!!

Huggies

IKE (the expectant customer) xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Donna Ellis said...

gorgeous lovely beautiful VERY COORDINATING versatile (that's important!) and I think the papers would work for any time of year, too. I like the color palet a lot! (shabby damask, stripe and grunge are my favorites!) Have fun! hugs, de

Karon said...

I think your first set of papers looks fabulous!!! Love them! TFS

Crafting Vicky said...

WOW another endeavor ;o) But it's totally fabulous! Looooove what you have done so far. I really wish I could be that good to create digital things!

Spyder said...

These colours are too cool! I had to take a second look at the name on the front and then the light came on in my head....(shhh I didn't read all you typed I just skimmed over it thinking you were showing off someone else's papers!! They are brilliant. I'm rubbish I wouldn't know where to start!

(Lyn))

Jennifer said...

Oh Lisa, what are you like. lol Another string to your bow, congrats. I love the first set of co-ordinating papers, they are really lovely. Can't wait to see what else you are going to do. Hugs, Jen xx
Krafty Keepsakes

KT Fit Kitty said...

I love these papers - great how they all coordinate! Beautiful color palette too. I like your idea for sponsorship prizes too - I enter a lot of challenges and would love to win something like this!

Nice work!
Kitty

Edwina said...

Oh, wow! These papers are so gorgeous! I would love to use them.
I think these would be great for sponsoring a challenge. Do you think you would do that soon?
it is hard for someone to sell their digital work, but not impossible. You could try it. If it is not worth while you could always add it to someone else's store so you could share the cost. i hope it all works out for you. Edwina Brown