Jen Gagne's art journal
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I keep a separate journal for personal stuff. Visit:
[http://jengagne.livejournal.com/]
Below are the 25 most recent journal entries recorded in the "Jen Gagne's art journal" journal:[<< Previous 25 entries]
07:20 am [jengagne]
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Go see my other journal!
In case it isn't already obvious, I haven't used this "artjen" account for ages. I'm posting pretty much exclusively here: http://jengagne.livejournal.com/... including an art supply giveaway: http://jengagne.livejournal.com/127998.htmlThat's because I'm making most of my art these days in http://secondlife.com which has been fulfilling and successful for me. :D My SL-related journal is here, although I don't use it much: http://jenshikami.livejournal.com
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02:15 pm [jengagne]
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Redirecting your attention...
As you've likely noticed, I haven't made or sold any physical artwork all year. Instead I've been making virtual artwork in Second Life. So, I'd like to redirect your attention from artjen here over to my journal at jenshikami. I'll continue to post my personal news over at jengagne. Thanks!
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09:56 pm [jengagne]
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Holiday presents on the way!
grubbyfox, shadrad, nicci, lirazel, aoi_usagi, lneuman2, and ladyblue56, I just shipped (or in the case of magnets, ordered) your requested art. :) For the magnetic-art folks, I ordered 'em to be shipped direct to you from CafePress -- the sample magnets I got from them were SO nice. It's a busy season, so their standard shipping means it will take a couple weeks. (E2A: They shipped out already, on 12/16!)Wait till you see 'em though, it's worth the wait.
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01:46 am [jengagne]
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Shop your hearts out!
I plan to also start listing some of these products on eBay, but for now, here are my two shops of products I feel confident about.
My Printfection Store
Use this shop to buy anything on fabric -- t-shirts especially! Many colors available even though the previews only show white.
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My CafePress Store
Use this shop to buy non-fabric items. Magnets (now in stock!), buttons, mugs, a clock...
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I'll expand my offerings later, but here's what I feel good about selling so far. Yay! :)
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07:00 pm [jengagne]
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Comparison tests for Printfection and CafePress t-shirts.
Click each photo for a larger view.
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Here's a comparison of the t-shirt print tests from Printfection (left) and CafePress (right).
I'm happier with Printfection's overall print quality... the black lines on the CafePress white shirt are either doubled or blurry. The black CafePress one has weird semi-transparency in the fins which wasn't there in the original image (?) and the color fields seem less smooth. Still, I could make do with the CafePress shirts.
Those differences don't really show in these comparison shots, not at this resolution -- no, what I'm trying to show here is the major difference in impact the image _size_ makes. I'm just plain happier with the larger images Printfection can print.
This leaves me with something of a dilemma, as CafePress offers all the OTHER items I'd like to sell (magnets, cups, etc.) I guess I could set up a separate store on each site, and also use them to drop ship items I sell through eBay, or... something. Hrm. I think I'll stop by the Printfection forums for advice on how to have my cake and eat it too.
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11:29 am [jengagne]
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About that CafePress store...
I'm starting to set up a CafePress shop. See the warning at the bottom of the post about shopping there, though! Right now I have it subdivided into 3 sections: Magnets, Clothing, Other. But, I'm starting to think that -- considering the whole point is that people can pick an image they like, and then decide how they want it -- that I'd be better off slicing it up like so: Cats, Fish, Dogs, People, Other. Or I could further subdivide it, since I have multiple cat images, multiple fish images, etc. Opinions? I'll probably also make some with text on them, like "I won't bite... much." and "Biting the hand that feeds you is underrated" and maybe some cat or dog mugshots accusing them of various crimes against humanity, and so on. Suggestions on that front are also welcome. :D Warning: I haven't bought all these products yet to see how good they look in person, so this is not ready for shopping yet. ... well, maybe the mug and circular fish magnet. I've seen those. But otherwise, buyer beware. (I've heard some inconsistent quality warnings from people like aoi_usagi who has very delicate art with subtle shadings... but in my experience thus far, the sheer boldness and brightness of my designs covers up issues like that.)
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05:46 pm [jengagne]
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Printfection t-shirt scans, black and white.
T-shirt print tests from Printfection arrived today! The CafePress ones will be here next week. Click for larger views...
( My analysis...Collapse )
In other related news, I worked up some nice rectangular magnets in CafePress. Alas, they are out of stock... but the magnet previews look good! If I can get them in time, I'll send these to the magnet-requestors from my previous entry. Ve vill zee.
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03:26 pm [jengagne]
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Want a lil' holiday present from me?
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06:13 pm [jengagne]
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LJ icon image search, plus some free icons.
(Edited later to add: I changed the search a bit. It might work better now.)
I found myself wanting one of these, so I made one.
Like it? Link back to artjen. Whee P.R...
Oh and... on a related note, here are some LJ icons you can use if you'd like!
Download a copy of the icon you want to your hard drive, then use this form to upload it to your userpics. In the comments field of the upload form, please put "from <lj user=artjen>" and it should create a link back to me.
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10:26 pm [jengagne]
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New mixed-media original art, 1/1.
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02:18 pm [jengagne]
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Epson matte vs. Somerset Velvet watercolor paper -- a visual comparison.
As I mentioned the other day, I've fallen in love with Epson's double-sided heavyweight matte paper for printing on my Epson R260.
See the test on the right -- click for a larger view. The center is an overlaid piece of this new matte media, and the underlayer (outer edge) is the watercolor paper I had been printing on before, Somerset Velvet watercolor paper. Both were printed using this printer, so the inks and resolution are identical.
As you can see, the new stuff is SO choice. I never thought I'd find something I liked better than the watercolor paper, but... yay. :D By the way, I think those vertical lines on the new paper are a scanning or resizing artifact... I don't see them on the print itself.
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10:56 am [jengagne]
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The printer is dead! Long live the printer!
Printer woes solved! First off, thanks to all my friends that patiently listened to my ranting about my (now headed for eBay) old printer, my flailing search for a new printer candidate, and my general digital art frustration.
I didn't want to blog about it sooner because I was so agitated and upset... ( Here's the summary, if you want the full scoop.Collapse )
The pic shown on the right here is a scan of output from my new Epson R260 printer. The colors are great... really rich teals and greens which I couldn't get out of my old printer. The dots are completely invisible as far as I can tell, resulting in a smooth continuous-tone which is perfect for the color gradients in my work. I can get high-capacity cartridges for this printer, too, which makes the ink that much cheaper per milliliter.
So. My master plan for this branch of my artwork is to try doing one of a kind pieces... 1/1 instead of 1/12, perhaps with some overpainting to further differentiate the originals. I'll see how they sell. I can do the twelve-way color shift in the open-edition reproductions instead, at any size, and I can make ATCs too. And, perhaps I can get some frame shop galleries to pick up my prints in their inventory if eBay doesn't work out.
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10:38 am [jengagne]
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Jewelry and ACEOs for a buck!
As some of you have already discovered, I've started my jewelry and art card auctions at a dollar. Shipping is only $2 for jewelry and $1 for art cards. There isn't a ton of bidder competition yet, so you could get a great deal. (And even if you lose the auction, hey, at least someone else paid me more than they would have otherwise. So thank you for that, too!) I also listed the rest of the glass at $15 so you can "buy it now" at your leisure, except for the two pieces I'm still saving for icaro and malakim.
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12:26 pm [jengagne]
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Best eBay feedback ever...
My latest feedback, from mattwg1: "Seller's prehensile tail very strong, has mighty beak and colorful underbelly.A+"
I love it. Because let's face it, it really doesn't matter what you write there as long as the rating's positive. :D
In other news, the glass pendant yesterday went for $6.49... not bad for the first week of listing glass, I suppose. Today's seems destined to hit that same range. I'm hoping that if I keep that category stocked, I'll get more cross-selling and suchlike. But, that means I need to list more stuff, starting tonight. :)
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10:41 am [jengagne]
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Glass on eBay this week
I plan to post more over the weekend, but here's the glass up for auction. :)
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11:50 am [jengagne]
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Note to self: art doll swap.
Jen, this Creepy Cute -- Art Doll Swap is due Valentine's Day. Post updates to that thread.
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06:35 pm [jengagne]
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Sparklies to sell! Tempt, tempt...
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10:42 am [jengagne]
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DAZ models for anime poses.
 Now that I'm happy with my 2D toolset, I've been pondering anime poses and proportion. While I have a few real-life poseable artist's models, the proportion and flexibility leave something to be desired... So, I snagged DAZ Studio, which is free (whee!) with currently-free models for Aiko and all their other free people, like Hiro (anime male) and others. I picked up the others since they had poses I could apply to the ones I actually care about.... The poseability is REALLY nice and the preset poses are handy starting points. Click the pic for a larger view of this sample render I did. Now, just like the real-life balljointed dolls, they sell all kinds of new face-ups, outfits, eyes, wigs, etc... but since I want to use these for pose drawing, I don't need any of that. ^_^
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10:47 am [jengagne]
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GITS:SAC, digital coloring.
Now I'm just playing around. I wanted her eyes to look a little more mechanical, and added gratuitous cyan sidelighting. Hee.
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10:25 pm [jengagne]
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Motoko Kusanagi, practice sketch.
More experimenting with Illustrator and the tablet, using some custom brush strokes I built. I traced this pic off of reference, as practice and to see whether the strokes could handle her eyes.
... then I went a little nuts coloring, since I always enjoy that part. The first color pic used the thick-lined original sketch. twoflower suggested the lines might be too thick for a color pic (though the B&W looks great). So, I did another one with very thin lines in the hair. I think it worked, mostly. I also really love the texture in the irises.
Someday I'll learn to make dramatic shadows, but meanwhile, here's a neutral glowy look.
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| 06:10 pm [jengagne]
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Cats and dogs, living together! (digital paintings)
Forgot to post these last night. I'm still fooling around with the tablet.
See, if I could draw my monoprints completely on the computer, and if it's quicker than the usual way, then I could use this approach to make one-offs instead of editions of twelve. Print at 8.5x11 and sell them as one-of-a-kind originals.
As you can see, I think this experiment was fairly successful. ^_^ I haven't printed these yet, so I watermarked the zoomed-in views.
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10:36 pm [jengagne]
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Self-portrait with tablet, ArtRage.
 The Autodesk Sketchbook Pro demo wouldn't download for me on either computer... complained about cookies. twoflower is helping me with that. So, meanwhile, I've been playing with ArtRage. Here's a self-portrait using a photo beneath as reference... so far, so good. It was really hard though... I definitely need practice!
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06:23 pm [jengagne]
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ArtRage, a free (or free-ish) digital painting program.
 Jen and traditional paint don't get along well, but this is neat, so I thought I'd review it. I found a painting program called ArtRage that's made by some ex- MetaCreations folks. As a result it has that intuitive touchy-feely interface that I liked about Bryce. Something about this program felt really nice to me. As soon as you open the program you can immediately start scribbling and I got this instant sense of, "Oooh, look at that." I've used Corel Painter before too -- do I own it? I have to check, I think it came with my tablet. I can't remember. I definitely need practice with the tablet. I'm not even using my tablet with the demo yet... this is just quickie testing with the mouse, and even with the mouse the strokes feel and look nice. If you go really fast you get a drybrush effect at the end of a stroke, etc. Best of all, it's free! Well, there is a free version anyway, and aside from a few missing tools you can do all the key things. Save, resize, yadda. No icky watermarks, so I wouldn't call it crippleware. The full version is a whopping $19. Here's a Bob Ross style tutorial I found for ArtRage. Of course, for $179 I could get Autodesk Sketchbook Pro, which I heard about via Penny Arcade. Reportedly that's more of a drawing program. Here's cartoonmonkey's blog entry comparing the two. I'll try a demo of that too, see which of the three programs (ArtRage, Painter, or Sketchbook) I like more. Mayhap I'll post some test sketches so you can see my pathetic tablet-drawing non-skills. Okay, added an example I painted using only the mouse.
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08:19 pm [jengagne]
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How to make your own bat wings.
In honor of Halloween and because someone emailed me to ask, here's how I made these batwings for my costume...
Click for larger views.
( See a pattern sketch and written instructions behind the cut...Collapse )
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02:10 am [jengagne]
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Glass candle cups.
Picked up some swirly black/clear glass with iridescence today, along with some cobalt/clear swirl. Mm, tasty... Made these four glass bowls.
They fit tealights perfectly and they have such nice fluffy edges. I mean, I like the one from the other day too... but these have the edge-waves I was hoping for!
That iridescence came out looking GREAT. Maybe someday I'll find an irid. cobalt/clear.
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