The Alphabet Game

Zazzle has been looming large in what I've been doing the last few days. See, I started doing all those initial mugs over there, and then within a couple of days of my signing up with them, they changed their software. They upgraded me out of making certain changes on my site! So while I wait to buy a new operating system, I'm bringing the initial mugs idea over to CafePress.

So I've been toiling away over 4 sets of initial products. Each set involves 26 uploads of the lettered designs. So, I design the "A," upload it, and put it on a bunch of products. Then I design the "B," etc., and I do this for all 26 letters of all four typefaces. Whew.

So here's an example of the "Swirly" font I put together.

I took a funky, bold font and filled it with a pattern I cobbled together out of free clipart designs. Backed it up with a black-to-white gradient, and it looks excellent, imho.

If you'd like to check out the page, here's the link:

http://www.cafepress.com/feelgoodgraphix/6893236

Have a great weekend!

Robo-Robinson

Wow, two posts in one day! But I'm so enthusiastic about Robo-Robinson I have to get this out.

As are so many of my pieces, this was created for an album for Mahaffay Musical Archives. Perry Robinson and the avant-garde Tres Gone Sextet play big jazz! Perry is the flaming-clarinet-wielding monster setting fire to the skyscrapers of Portland while displaying a photo of the boys of Tres Gone on his in-chest monitor.

This illustration was created in Photoshop, using a real robot as a template, and building layer upon layer to achieve a realistic effect. He could be positioned to play the guitar or the drums too, so he's a versatile guy, and I'm proud of him.

The photo of Portland was taken by my stepson Matthew from one of his classrooms at Portland State.

The image was made into a cd cover, and then proved so popular (among a select group) that I made it into a poster, which is available at www.cafepress.com/feelgoodgraphix. Or, if you'd like to see what all the hullaballoo is about, the album is available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/tresgone8.

Steaming Brew

So I got inspired by the Halloween display at my local Fred Meyer yesterday, came home and designed some cards and mugs, which I think are pretty cute. Spent some time creating skeletal hand bones in Photoshop, added some text that says "Steaming Brew" in a suitably scary font, and here it is.

It's a wrap-around design so it looks like 2 skeletal hands holding the mug, one on each side.

 

There are greeting cards too, in a slightly different design, which involves a white skeletal hand against a black spattered background, with "Happy Halloween" written in a ghostly font above it.

So if you like them and you'd like to tuck a few away for Halloween, just go to www.cafepress.com/feelgoodgraphix. Choose from this year's design or last year's, take a look around and maybe do some early Christmas shopping!

I've discovered Zazzle!

Wow, it's been a long time since my last post. Well, I told you I didn't think of myself as a blogger, but life's a long song, and I'll learn.

Lately I've been working on initial mugs and other products for CafePress, and for Zazzle, another t-shirt site I found which doesn't charge a fee for putting your designs up for sale. Yay.

Plus they have a really cool "Zazzle Panel" you can put on your blog to showcase your products, like this:


make custom gifts at Zazzle