Wednesday, November 28, 2012

I have moved!


I have moved!

My blog will now be found at www.helenaecija.com/blog.
I migrated all the content so all posts in this blog are already in the new one.

Also, for RSS lovers the new feed URL is http://helenaecija.com/feed/
Update your readers!!

See you there!!!

www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Draw it again contest: Cetrina II


I decided to enter a contest on Deviant art. The goal of the contest was to re-paint something you have painted before to see the progress in style and technique. I chose an illustration from 2007. I feel my style has evolved quite a bit, I like the more hand drawn feeling my illustrations have now, but I have to say that I still love that illustration from 2007.

Original 2007
Remake 2012

As usual, here is the process:

1. Sketch on Photoshop CS5

2. Overal values in b/w

3. Rendering in b/w

4. Color and final


The contest is now on the jury stage, wish me luch, 50 semifinalists and 10 finalist will win premium memberships in DA.

www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Friday, September 21, 2012

Yard sale!


Yard sale people!

My bf and I are moving to Europe, everything must go!
 If you live in Chicago close to Uptown, come join us!!

Sep 29th 2012, 4703 N. Malden St. 9 am to 5 pm

It's on!


www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Saturday, July 21, 2012

Hand Lettering Week - Saturday



And finally.... Saturday!

I think I might continue with the hand lettering, Maybe one style per day this time :)

Other days in Hand Lettering Week:
Friday

www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Friday, July 20, 2012

Thursday, July 19, 2012

Hand Lettering Week - Thursday


Rainy Thursday deserved a warm color to compensate the lack of sun :)

I tried to make a nice ligature for the TH... ligatures are the best!

Other days in Hand Lettering Week:


www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

Hand Lettering Week - Wednesday


Half way there! 

Wednesday is very pleasant so far. Blue for a nice day.




www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Hand Lettering week - Tuesday


Musical tuesday.

The project has decided that this will be Scripty Week. I have been trying other styles that I want to show you guys but I want to make all the days in Script style first.

The next step is to try some of these letterings with my illustrations.

Check out the other days:


www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Monday, July 16, 2012

Hand Lettering Week - Monday


Happy Monday!

Easy peasy.

Check out Sunday's entry to learn some insights about my "Hand Lettering Week"


www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Hand Lettering Week - Sunday


Typography.

I went to school for Fine Arts with emphasis in Illustration. Typography was never my forte, I never took a single class about it. I didn't even understood how people would like to make their own fonts, it just seemed boring. However, when I left school and started to hang out with graphic designers, my desire to get better at typography has grown exponentially. I would say they brought me to the dark side. I have been getting better and better at graphic design, typeset and all that thanks to my pirate friends. But it wasn't enough to turn the switch and made me love it.

And then it did hit me: hand lettering. 

Hand lettering is the perfect marriage of my passion (Illustration) and one of my pending subjects (Typography). It's like drawing, but you have to think in different terms. You have to think about your kerning, your leading, your stylistic alternates, your swashes... It's Open Type Live! 

 It's so addicting that I decided to hand letter all the days of the week for one week.
I don't have a lettering pen (yet), so I have been using a Pilot pen and filling in the strokes. It's  time consuming but I am getting better at it. I like how this "sunday" looks. So far my letter repertoire it's kinda limited but I am trying to make more and more variations as I go. Capital letters are far harder to me. You know what they say though, practice makes perfect!

So, see you on Monday! 



www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Sunday, June 10, 2012

Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Queen Designs


I have been working on designs for a Deck of Cards. I am not yet decided on the suits. So far I have tried to sketch the Queen of Woods, the Queen of Birds, the Queen of the Sky/Sun and the Queen of Mammals. I like to start with the queens because drawing women is my favorite and helps me get in to the zone. I  am deciding if I want to incorporate Type as a really prominent part of the card's design or not.  I want to do so as a challenge, because I love type but I am not to good at it. I think I should, illustrations will get to a whole new level.


Maybe I will put them as part of the frame? We will see, First I need to decide the suits. I would like the suits to make sense with each other as a ecosystem of sorts. Or like layers of the woods (sun, sky, woods, roots, underground water...). I really like the idea of the queen of birds so I don't want to give that one up, but I think that is precisely the one that I could live without concept wise.

What do you guys think? Birds, Sky, Woods and Mammals? Seems incomplete, where is the water?

www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Sunday, April 8, 2012

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter everyone!

We had so much fun decorating eggs! Check out some of the eggs I did! My boyfriend helped me with the Stormtroopers and the death star! I think they came out really good. You can tell I got pretty intense by the last ones. Ha ha

Monday, March 12, 2012

Nonami Toy


I made a little toy! 

This is my little girl without name (but for short "Nonami") She is a character that lives inside Pi's head and explains her whimsically how the world works. Pi has Aspergers Sindrome. Both are characters of mine for a project about autism. It is a long term project but I like to treat myself into doing some fun stuff while some other projects take the priority. I hope I can find some time to get back to it soon


The sculpture/toy measures about 4 inches (10 cm) and it's made out of Sculpey. Spray painted white and then painted with acrylic paint. It was really hard to keep the symmetry, I tried to do my best.

Here is an old drawing of the Girl without name:


I am proudly exhibiting my master piece on my living room. I love it! 
Now, Toki Doki, do you want to do business with me? ha



www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Japanese crafts

My sister in law brought me some fun little novelties from Japan. I used to them today as a good end point to the weekend. It was really fun (and relaxing) to decorate the girl in the kimono and make some sushis. I paint and design dress up dolls for work so this was a really thought full gift.

This are the packages:

 My Creation:

I put some on my computer and the sushis look so good on there!


Thanks Yoko!

www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Thursday, February 23, 2012

Shizue in the woods

Things that I like. Day #1
Here is a drawing of my girl Shizue, she is a BJD doll and character of mine. Shizue (Zoe for short) is a Halloween elf that helps to spread the spirit of Halloween all across the world. I have made some other drawings of her but I think this one really captures her gaze.


I am starting a new challenge today, 30 days of drawings of things I like or things I have made illustrations of before (that I like). So, I expect to do some illustrations of my characters and re-illustrate some of my pin-up-type illustrations, but who knows, I am not really planning anything. This will be another 30 days, because that seems to work pretty good. It is just for fun! Fun drawings to help me strengthen my style and my drawing speed. I hope to move into a more concept-oriented challenges after finishing with this one if I get the results I am looking forward to achive.

This is the process I used this time:

Pencil skech

Work on values on black and white in a multiply layer

Work on color with Overlay layers and multiply layers

Add detail on layers on normal mode.

I hope you liked it! Tomorrow more!



www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Saturday, February 4, 2012

Making wood block textures



I want to make some new illustrations in Photoshop with wood block feeling and I decided to make my very own textures with what I had at hand. I didn't have wood block paint so I used Blick's student acrylic. I also didn't have etching paper so I tried a couple types of papers from my sketchbooks. A mat to avoid making a mess and big brush and I had everything I needed for some experimentation!

It was a little tricky to make them look just like the wood block etching but it was lots of fun. Here is how you can do it.

1. get a piece of wood
2. Apply the paint with a roller. I didn't have one so I used a big brush.

3. Place your paper on top and apply pressure with your hands or another utensil. I some times helped myself with other piece of wood, a coworker told me you could use a wood spoon. Ultimately the amount of pressure depends on the type, thickness and quantity of the paint you used. This one of those trial and error thing:

4. Peel it up and enjoy!!

I got several good ones!

Like this one

I am looking forward to use them!


www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt

Monday, January 30, 2012

Pickling

Pickling carrots, mushrooms and celery. I had had pickly carrots before so I think that would be cool. Who knows about the mushrooms and the celery and the fact that is all mixed together!

We will see!

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Pirate dinner IV - Puppy Treats Design

Today, it was Pirate Dinner.  Some very talented friends of mine and I hold a monthly design challenge, that means getting together, eating some good home made food and laughing a lot. Each month's host proposes a theme for the challenge and gives us especial directions if needed, we make a design and bring it with us.  There is no pressure, it's just to have fun designing.

January's challenge was Puppy Treats.
This was my design.

I thought I will tell you a bit about my creative process. The name that was picked for me was "Lick, sniff and bite" which is a very dirty sounding name. So, I wanted to make into a yuppy, kinda classy design to add some drama. I was thinking that it would be a good contrast. I started by doing some research and drew some title options in my sketchbook:


I liked how the last one on the right looked, so I went on the computer and worked on the idea, tried different typefaces and color combinations. I usually choose few font options with Font Book, but I am open to try other things along the way. 

I start designing on black and white first, then I keep duplicating the logo and make slight changes to it until I am happy with the result, same with color schemes, diecuts and all. After a few hours I decide to stop and make a decision. I choose a design and then apply it to the different flavors. I like to see how the idea will be implemented in series. That helps me decide how big the type should be (for instance I had to reduce the type on the flavor because longer titles needed smaller type and I wanted to keep it consistent). Or what color schemes I am using, I had to make changes to my bacon color scheme in favor of the beef flavor. 

This is what my file looked like when I finished.


For a professional job I would probably had more comps and more sketches but this is just for fun. And I had lots of fun in fact this is what I devoted pretty much the whole Saturday afternoon to.

Looking forward to the next challenge of the Pirate Day/dinner/awesomeness!

www.helenaecija.com | Ecija on DeviantArt