New Collection with Spoonflower
Vibrant Wild Forest Collection
First - some pictures!
Vibrant Wild Forest Hero Prints, Vibrant Wild Forest Collection, Spoonflower
Gallery images: Vibrant Wild Circle Tile with quarter for scale; Vibrant Wild Lattice with quarter for scale; set of coordinating blenders: Vibrant Acorn Heart Stripe Large, Vibrant Forest Treasures, Vibrant FireFlower, Vibrant Feather Stripe, and Vibrant Acorn Heart Stripe in the Vibrant Wild Forest Collection; The hero prints of Vibrant Wild Circle Tile Black and Gray and Vibrant Wild Lattice Black and Gray; the blenders: Vibrant Acorn Heart Stripe Large Black and Gray, Vibrant Forest Treasures Black and Gray, Vibrant FireFlower Black and Gray, Vibrant Feather Stripe Black and Gray, and Vibrant Acorn Heart Stripe Black and Gray with a quarter for scale; the Large Acorn Heart Stripe prints in black and gray and in original color from the Vibrant Wild Forest collection on Wallpaper.
Some background…
When I first started putting my art on Spoonflower, I really didn’t know what I was doing. At the time, I just wanted to have fabric that I could use to make bags to sell. I came across Spoonflower, and began experimenting with making images that could somehow repeat, which for me meant single images that would be the sole motif, put into the various repeat options offered by Spoonflower’s designer tools. They also provided access to a photo editor, PicMonkey, that I played with in various ways, but without any clear idea of how to use it properly or what I was even hoping to achieve. I gamely tried some challenges, and felt very out of my depth.
Immersion in Illustrator
In the years since, I became dissatisfied with with my repeat pattern design limitations, and tried learning different ways to make a seamless repeat for fabric. I finally started getting some traction when I took the Immersion course offered by Bonnie Christine, in which she includes intensive instruction for Adobe Illustrator. It opened my eyes and inspired me so much! It renewed my interest in making designs for fabric, and I was so excited by what digital editing tools can do to expand an artist’s work. However, I struggled to adapt my art to the vector tools, and wondered how I could make the color nuances that I love so much.
From Paint to Pattern in Photoshop
Enter Sarah Watts and her Adobe Photoshop expertise! I found her From Paint to Pattern course just before it closed signups for the season a few years ago, and I loved the way Photoshop let artists keep their art texture and color gradations and play with them. I took From Paint to Pattern twice - the first year to learn Photoshop, and the second to start working out how I would use my art styles with Photoshop. Additionally, I joined Sarah’s Photoshop Support Club for alumni of From Paint to Pattern, and also her Sketchbook Squad to continue my art practice. It was in those spaces that I re-engaged with my art, learned to make art with an eye for creating surface patterns that pleased me, and it is in those spaces that I continue to learn. And, I’m so very happy to now be releasing my first truly cohesive collective and first surface patterns for sale in several years. Please visit my Spoonflower shop and view my Vibrant Wild Forest Collection!
