All posts tagged happy new year

Happy 2014 with a Free Wallpaper

wallpaper_promo_christmas2014 Happy New Year Everyone! May it shine bright and be filled with lots love, laughter, and learning. I’m going into my fifth year of blogging (I don’t count that one random post from August 08′) and it’s fun to look back on my posts. My design skills have definitely grown and I’ve come across some stellar artists. I’m looking forward to another year. It seems like it’s my tradition to post my goals for the next 365 days, so here it goes!

Be happy as much of the time as possible. Read The Happiness Advantage by Shawn Achor
Be grateful – find 3-5 things to be thankful for each morning
Get a shirt design printed on Threadless
Work 40 hours a week (freelance or full-time) and have fun doing it
Post once every two weeks (or more)
Pick up at least one new technique a week
Become a whiz at coding (html, css, js, wordpress etc.)
Finish Tomb Raider – Hardcore gamers don’t laugh, I don’t play that often and when I do it’s for about an hour and a half and I progress by 2%
Take more photos
Sketch more

and of course design stuff that kicks butt!

Speaking of designs, here’s my wallpaper celebrating 2014. It was inspired by this Illustrator tutorial: Create a Mosaic BBC Inspired Text Art Effect. It’s said to take 1hr 45 mins. It took me longer because I had some issues and deviated a bit. Here are some tips. I messed up a few times by going to the Offset Path in the Object panel, instead of the Effects panel. Also I don’t know if this is because of the version of Illustrator that I’m using, but in Section 2 – Step 2 you may have to drag the Offset Path into the correct fill in the Appearance panel (see image in that section). I also didn’t use the provided build-a-font method. I chose the font Bauserif and filled in its shape. I also broke up the shadow effects into different sections based on my placement of the number and my light source. Again Happy New Year and Enjoy!

A special thanks goes out to my cousin Cara, who always gives great feedback. My background was originally purple, which she was not too fond of (surprising since it’s her favorite color). I made some adjustments and voila!

2013 Free Wallpaper & the Best of 2012

2013wallpaper_screenshot_crop2

Happy New Year Everyone! I’m excited for the year 2013 and I hope you are too. Thanks goes out to my new subscribers and to the ones that have stuck with me for the past 3 years. 2012 was a major year for me filled with highs and some powerful lows, but I’ve learned that it’s how you respond to those lows that makes a difference. I accomplished some of my goals from last year and some will be a continuous effort, like blogging more (at least once a week) and producing a monthly wallpaper. Here’s my design for the month of January celebrating the new year. I wanted something strong and dark, but at the same time pops. I also wanted something that both genders could appreciate. My wallpapers so far have leaned toward the feminine. The font I used was Old English Text MT and the outlines were constructed in Illustrator and brought into Photoshop.

2013 Free Wallpaper 1920 x 1080

Whether it’s due to color profiles, some system setup, or the fact that I’m working at different scales, the image in my psd file is slightly different from the final result. I’ve included a screenshot. I like the stronger red tones.

A new year triggers a review of the previous in a culmination of “Best of” lists. Here are a few “Best of 2012” from some blogs I follow:

From up North – Best of Digital Art & Typography

Line25 – Best Web Designs of 2012

Good.is – The Best Smart Products of 2012

Architnect’s Top 12 for 2012

Blogspoon Graphics – Greatest Tutorial Hits of 2012

Digital Arts – Best Creative Tech for 2012

JUST Creative – Popular Posts of 2012

Wising Everyone a Bright
and Prosperous New Year!!!

New Year! New Goals! Free Wallpaper!

Happy New Year Everyone! My wish is that this is a prosperous year for all! With a the new year comes a new look for my blog. It’s work in progress, so this page may look completely different next week or next month. I’m exploring free themes that allow some flexibility, which for me means a custom header and background. Bueno is the current theme at the moment. I’m still getting a feel for what I like and what I can live without i.e I like 2 columns, I can live without a footer.

So I have some goals for the new year. Actually, most are really a continuation from 2011 with a few tweaks. I plan to:

Blog more – First, I would like to thank those of you who read/subscribe to my blog. I will continue to post content that I hope piques your interest. Let me know if it does or doesn’t. WordPress has compiled a report of my 2011 blogging year, check it out. It’s a definite improvement over 2010, but there were things I failed to do, such as post once a week. My goal is to continue in the effort to write each week, but of course do better.
Build a better blogging network – I plan to be more active in the blogging community by following blogs I like and leaving meaningful comments. The goal is to build connections, make friends, and become more visible.
Update my website – My personal website needs to change since situations have changed. (need more clarification: read I’m Failing and Why That Isn’t So Bad). It needs to better reflect my graphic design work and photography, while paying homage to my architectural work. It’s also an opportunity to flex my design skills and teach myself more HTML and CSS. I’ve decided to drop a flash based site for now. The new website also needs to be easily updatable (I think this word is made up), since my portfolio will continue to grow.
Get a paid Graphic Design Internship or an Entry Level Position – It’s my mission to get hired full time this year at a company/firm/agency/etc. Any suggestions? Want to hire me? Let’s talk.
Read more
Sketch more – I plan to improve my sketching ability. I can replicate almost any sketch, but I want to start creating unique content of my own. I also want to explore different sketching styles. I already have a project in mind, but that’s to be revealed at a later date.
Exercise more
Take more photographs
Create a wallpaper monthly – I plan to make a desktop wallpaper available for free each month. I appreciate when other artists do this and I’ll look to them for inspiration. There will be no continuous theme, just whatever techniques or ideas I would like to try. I’m still figuring things out like what’s the best resolution to use or which colors, since each screen is different. Here is my first wallpaper, a tribute to the new year. It was done in Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop. The color palette was chosen from ColourLovers and it’s actually called Happy New Year by ljoobitza. Click the image for size 1440 x 900.