Lost In the Forest

Hello! How are you all? I'm hoping you all enjoyed the Easter holidays and ate lots of chocolate. I was so excited by the number of days off that I woke up at 6am on Friday morning! Darren and I had an enjoyable few days away up on the central coast at our spacious holiday home aka the in-laws house :-) They're currently away travelling in their equally spacious caravan, so we had the honours of their lovely home.

So what did I do? I set up my sketchbook and pens on their dining table and gazed out of the window at the trees, flowers, leaves, herbs, fruits and grass that adorn their garden. It's a fantastic inspiring view for someone visual like me. It gave me a few ideas for the commission above I was working on.

We also visited the beach, I had breakfast & a good old natter with Nicole from Gary Pepper Vintage, went to the Anzac Day March at the Entrance in the pouring rain and read two books in 1.5 days...not bad for a few days off. I highly recommend reading The White Masai and it's sequel which documents the real life adventure of a Swiss lady who falls in love with a Masai Warrior. It's a fascinating little read, I don't think I could live without my creature comforts!

I'm also loving the BBC series - Human Planet. The trailer is below (if you're reading from Facebook you won't see it). It's a magnificent documentary on various tribes/races across the world and how they survive around nature. I especially liked the episode where they fly over the Brazilian rainforest and filmed tribes that have never been documented by cameras before. The reason for documenting their existence is to prove that tribes exist in the rainforest which makes it harder for loggers and multinational companies to come and bulldoze their habitat. If they were never documented they would simply vanish with no proof that they existed. It's epic!

Polka Face

Hello! Well how are we all today? Above is an illustration I worked on a couple of months ago for Gary Pepper Vintage - I hope you all like her in an oversized polka dot bow. I had a bit of a crazy morning with confused commuters at the train station wandering around like headless chickens due to a power outage. After waiting about 45 minutes I decided to head home and wait for shitty (city) rail to get their act together. I finally made it to work a few hours late.

I thought I would give you a little insight into you! This is a little map of where you all come from who read my blog.

These are the top 10 countries that visit me:

1. Australia

2. United States

3. United Kingdom

4. Finland

5. New Zealand

6. Indonesia

7. Canada

8. Germany

9. Malaysia

10. Singapore

That's the end of my geography/stats lesson, hope you enjoyed it! :-)

Hungry Monstr Competition

Hello! How are you all?

For those who have been long time readers of my blog you may remember this post about an iPhone game called Qbism developed and released by Blowfish Studios who are an independent game development studio. Hungry MonstR is their second game to be released. I take my hat off to the developers I'd love to create an iPhone game one day but I wouldn't know where to start, so I'll leave it to these experts.

Thought I would introduce you all to these cute little Hungry MonstRs that have just been released for download on the iPhone, iPad and Android platforms. I like the simplicity of this game, it's fun and doesn't require too much brain power - always good after a hard day at work I think, especially on Mondays. If you're like me and addicted Angry Birds then I would highly recommend checking this game out.

The aim of the game is to stop these little critters from pinching ice creams from the ice cream cart by flicking the little MonstRs into their matching coloured tunnels. If you flick them into the wrong tube they clog it up and their little legs are left flailing for a few seconds! I'm actually stuck on an Angry Bird's level at the moment, I've even asked for assistance from the husband but we're still stuck so something tells me that I'll be putting some hours into Hungry MonstR!

They're also running a competition for the chance to win 1 of 10 Just Mobile AluPens™ all you have to do is play Hungry MonstR and be one of the top 5 players in either the iPhone or iPad leaderboard for the chosen level for the chance to win. Full competition details, terms and conditions are available at: http://www.hungrymonstr.com and Hungry MonstR is available for download here. There's also a trailer below so you can see these MonstRs in action! (if you're reading through my Facebook Fan Page you won't be able to view the trailer).

Well I hope you enjoy the game as much as I do, let me know what you think!

Jenny - A Friend of Mine

Introducing Jenny...

We're old school friends that used sit in Art, German and Business classes together. School seems a long time ago these days but Jenf is now a PhD researcher in British experimental literature at Durham University. Check out her blog here.

She posted this awesomely colourful outfit on her Facebook and I just had to draw it. Bang on trend with colour blocking this season, the yellow and red compliment each other so well. The lovely leopard print booties break up the colour with an accent of pattern and I love the black and charcoal scarf that keeps her cosy. Don't you think she looks effortlessly chic? Thanks Jen for the feast of colour and for inspiring me.

Flowers In My Hair

Hello!
How are you all? Thought I would introduce you to 'flowers in my hair', an illustration I finished tonight after it had been sitting around in my pile of art work that was to be finished off. She's looser in style with a little hint of colour and reminiscent of Mexican folk patterns.

This week has gone quick and I'm glad that the weekend is a little closer. Tomorrow I will be attending my Diploma in Marketing class, there's not many sessions to go and I've really enjoyed the course. I'm up to date will all my assessment submissions having done my homework last night :-) I also caught an interesting documentary on SBS yesterday evening called Tibet:Murder In the Snow, it's definitely worth a watch. It tells the tale of innocent Tibetan pilgrims who come under gun fire from Chinese border patrol resulting in a young nun being shot dead. From afar a group of Western hikers document the action in disbelief. You can catch the full documentary on Youtube but here is a trailer below (if you're reading through my Facebook Fan Page you probably won't see the video embedded).

Oh one more thing, remember the last post of the commission I drew for two best friends? If not you can see it here. The receiver of my Need a Tea Party commission loved it and even shed a tear because she was so touched that it represented their friendship so well. I was very happy to hear that I could put a big smile on her face!

Chat soon!

Jobs a Good 'Un

Hello!

Did you all have a nice weekend? It was a late start for me today since my iphone alarm decided not to go off at the right time due to the change in daylight savings here in Sydney. I've updated the OS so tomorrow I will be awake on time. I do have to admit I did quite enjoy my little sleep in.

I thought this illustration (for Gary Pepper Vintage) would nicely depict last week having spent some time with my head in books. I passed my two Google exams which means I am now a qualified Google Adwords professional which is an industry recognised qualification and proves I know what I'm doing in my job - always a plus ey? I also read The Happiest Refugee by Aussie comedian Anh Do - it will make you cry with laughter and tears as he relives his life story from escaping war-torn Vietnam on a little boat, arriving in Australia, coping with his father walking out of his childhood and eventually turning down a career in law to make it as a successful comedian. It really resonated with me that he completed an art course at TAFE whilst studying law at uni. During my years studying law there was so much reading and writing that it seemed to drive my creativity even more. I've always been drawing ever since I was little but it was at uni where I decided I would make illustrating a career too.

It's a must read story that will inspire and entrust that you will achieve your dreams through hard work and determination.