National Peanut Butter and Jelly Day!

Happy April everyone!! We all know yesterday was April Fool's day but know it or not, today is ANOTHER April Holiday!! Today is the day to celebrate the most iconic pair to hit the USA; it's National Peanut Butter and Jelly day!! I took time out of my week to create this fun typographic graphic to celebrate:

I created the peanut butter bread illustration from a sketch and even took the time to hand letter the jelly looking text in Illustrator. Not something I typically challenge myself with but it was well worth the effort! I also spent an hour making these yummy Buttermilk Peanut Butter and Jelly pancakes:

And yes they tasted as delciious as they look. So pick up a jar or two and celebrate the classic taste combination of Peanut Butter and Jelly today!!

2012 Facebook Cover-Illustrations!!

Hello everyone!! It is almost the weekend, yay! I wanted to update the blog with another one of my 2012 projects. Ever since Facebook made me make the official switch to timeline I challenged myself to create a different illustrated cover photo with my name and title. I am an artist afterall and wish to show off my skills and remind all my friends what I do, graphic design and illustration!!

The first month I created for was August. I started out with my favorite thing, cupcakes!! The cupcakes are an original illustration against a stock background.

Next was September. This was an official premier of my NerdyCupcakes characters. We have strawberry on the left and cherry chocolate chip on the right both original illustrations of my creation on a stock swirly vector background.

October was next and I am such a huge fan of Halloween!! The little NerdyCupcakes were such a cute concept I couldn't resist dressing some up for the season! Pumpkin spice is on the left with a spooky little black cat cupcake on a stock background.

Even though it's plenty cold out in November I couldn't keep the idea of a sweet little couple of Ice Cream cone kids in love!! The illustration is based off of a sketch I created on some notebook paper on some downtown at my job at the time. The background is a stock photo of a chocolate swirl mmmm!

And last but not least my cover photo for December!! This little kitten character was inspired by a pair of pajamas I saw while Christmas shopping. This entire illustration is original with no stock elements this time.

I had such a fun time creating my different cover photos and already have a new one up for the month of January on my personal Facebook page!! If Facebook keeps timeline for the year 2013 I will make sure to make a review post of all the ones I create this year!!  Hope everyone has a great day and a safe weekend!!

Holiday Helper 2012 Cover Design

Hey everyone just wanted to update the blog with another Holiday themed post! Back in November, Thanksgiving Day in the states to be exact, the newspaper distributed a full cover Holiday magazine inserted in their Thanksgiving issue. I got the opportunity to design the cover for it.

 

I created about 8 different sketches and the publisher decided on a Christmas theme with two children gazing into a snow globe. The amount of time I got to spend creating it wasn't a lot but being the master artist and multitask-er that I am I cranked it out before the deadline. Full color illustration, title design AND ALL! Whew!

 

Sadly this was the last thing I had worked on for the newspaper. Due to circumstances out of my control, changes were made to the ad design process that no longer included room for in-house designers. I appreciate the opportunity I had though and hope to find another full time Graphic Design position soon :) Here are some detailed closeups of Holiday Helper:

Hope everyone enjoys their weekend!! I will be baking and crafting for the Holidays!

Out and About won an AWARD!

Hey everyone just wanted to update the blog with some EXCITING news I received a few weeks ago about a publication I was involved in called "Out and About" magazine. It is a FREE local publication I created with my fellow Graphic Designers at the Daily News that got distributed all over area businesses.

 

(Table of Contents of OUT & ABOUT  featuring my illustrations and crediting all the designers!)

My responsibility as I had posted before was to lay out a few of the stories, create illustrations and bring summer content like recipes and activity lists. I wrote another post about it here http://lauradoodleshere.blogspot.com/2012/07/out-about-illustrated-recipes.html and you can even view the publication in it's entirity online over here http://lebanondailynews.pa.newsmemory.com/special.php?date=2012060

Well as you can tell from the title of this post the publication won an award!! It took FIRST PLACE in the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association's Advertising Tear Sheet Contest in the "Special Section/Niche Publication" category!!

We got a plaque for winning. As you can see I was really excited to be holding the glorious FIRST PLACE trophy. The newspaper even ran an article of it for their print edition as well as online at http://www.ldnews.com/business/ci_21684853/lebanon-daily-news-graphic-design-team-wins-pennsylvania. For a full list of winners be sure to check out their website at http://www.pa-newspaper.org/events/contest/awardtearsheet.

Creating Automotive Ads

Hey everyone!! Just wanted to post on my blog about some updates I made to my site!! As you may or may not know, I got a fulltime job working at the newspaper. I get to create ads all day for advertisers, still have fun illustration work to do and I'm learning a lot about page layout and programs I never used before like Xpance.

I started out doing classified ads which include automotive. Although it may not sound like the most exciting thing in the world, especially to a fellow graphic designer, I have to say it is both challenging and fun.

You get ample room for space, some ads run as long as 21.5 inches. Wow! And full color.

Sure it's no cupcakes or rainbows or cute little fuzzy animals, it's something different. The difference it has from my usual work is what makes it challenging.

I posted two of my favorite ads in the Graphic Design section of my portfolio on my website (violet-ink.com).

EveryoneLovesRobots - Spring Youtube Layout

Hey everyone!



Just wanted to post about a big change to the EveryoneLovesRobot, the solo music project of James Long.

His youtube layout I recently created was due for an overhaul. Who better to redo it than Violet Ink Design? The new scheme is hues of blue and a nice white in the mix for contrast.

This was the before if you do not remember...


and now the after!



Perfect for spring! Just some simple color changes to freshen things up a bit! See if for yourself by clicking on http://www.youtube.com/user/EveryoneLovesRobots

The channel has risen to 118 subscribers. So while you're there, if you haven't subscribed do it today!!

Youtube Layout, Zazzle, and more JERSEYLICIOUS!

Well I finally finished creating the "Youtube Layout" for the EveryoneLovesRobot's channel. Making a youtube layout is something I have never done before. Not sure if I mentioned this already though but I slaved over this epic masterpiece only to find out that the customization options I wanted were for Youtube Partner's only. Live and learn!!

But we managed to tweek the background around enough so that it still looks awesome with what little options that were available. Here is a screenshot of the layout:

(click it to see the larger version)

To view the full thing, check out the channel @youtube.com/user/EveryoneLovesRobots. Don't forget to subscribe.

Also the logo I created is now available on merch such as shirts, pins, and hoodies at the Zazzle Store: http://www.zazzle.co.uk/everyonelovesrobots

The best thing about Zazzle is you don't have to have your shirt white, or your hat black, you can pick nearly ANY color you want with no extra cost. I ordered two of the small pins and cannot wait for them to arrive.

ALSO I cannot wait for my Artrade with the awesome Nicky to arrive either. I re-sent out the envelope containing mine and hopefully it arrives VERY soon. I will take a picture and finally reveal the secret print I created for her.

Third thing, Tracy DiMarco from Jerseylicious on the Style Network has requested I create her a new avatar!! She's gone much darker with her hair right now. She informed me she FINALLY got the prints I sent her, signed them, and shipped them off to me!! Yippee!

One more thing worth mentioning, tonight I decided to do some photoshopping:

That is it for today!!