Thanks for checking in today! A new Activity sheet is ready to download here. Have fun creating characters this week! If you feel like sharing on social media, use #theblobblog.
BLOBS #124 RESULTS
Thanks for stopping by!
If you follow me on Instagram, my inspiration may look familiar. Since last weekend was Mother’s Day, I felt extra loved (I hope you enjoyed the day too!). It seemed only natural to use the shapes from my Mother’s Day moment surprises as my inspiration.
I began spotting shapes first thing in the morning. When I walked into our dining room, two cards greeted me along with a vase of glorious flowers. I knew I could pull something special out of my daughter’s affectionate handwriting.
A savory breakfast of omelets, cinnamon rolls and fruit soon followed and the mix of berries popped from our table.
We visited my mom later (while practicing social distancing) and as we were sitting outside, an unusual butterfly fluttered by and landed right next to us. It’s inky wings were trimmed with blue and yellow spots. This was definitely a butterfly I had never seen before (but later learned it was a Black Swallowtail). Have you seen one before?
The last shape I pulled came from a plant my sister gave me. I loved its curly green leaves and the contrasting flat flower petals. I have yet to identify this plant. If it looks familiar to you, let me know!
Here is a BEFORE and AFTER look at my Activity sheet pencil sketches from Wednesday.
When it came time to create characters, designs were not flowing out of me. I was stumped right away. After tossing around themes, I settled on celebrating…moms. Being a mom to me means being loving, attentive and…fun!
Since I was stumped with my characters at first, my concepts were not crystal clear in the beginning. My sketches were much softer because of the subject matter. I needed to jump right into color sooner to help with character development. My pen drawings actually came after my color studies.
BLOB #1 was the character that came to me quickest. I saw a female profile right away. The indentation felt like the perfect place to have a baby nestling.
BLOBS #2 and #3 were the hardest for me this week. They actually morphed away from the original shape when I got to color, but the theme was maintained.
This profile is very different than the original! I felt like I was forcing my first character idea, so abandoned it!
BLOB #3’s butterfly inspiration was the character I spent the most time thinking up. I had to spin it around, again and again to help with ideas. Can you spot the detail from the butterfly wing that became part of my character below?
If you guessed the baby’s braid, you are right!
BLOB #4 was also a challenge. It needed a few spins. When I did my pencil sketch the idea was a daughter playing with her mom’s hair. But the design felt forced. It wasn’t until I used color when a dancing grandma and granddaughter came to life.
My Mother’s Day inspired designs may turn into cards for next year!
Thank you for visiting today. I hope you enjoyed watching my character design process. I’d love to see your characters if you tried BLOBS #124 out!
I’ll be back on Monday with a new Activity sheet! If you spot any interesting shapes this weekend, let me know! Stay well.
BLOBS #124
Thanks for stopping by! This week’s set of BLOBS were inspired by Mother’s Day. Do you recognize any shapes? My inspiration and character designs will be posted Friday. Download a CREATE A CHARACTER Activity sheet here. Enjoy!
BLOBS #123 RESULTS
Happy Friday! It is Results Day. I am so happy you stopped by.
Let’s jump right in! Here is the inspiration behind my CREATE A CHARACTER Activity sheet…
These are all items on my front porch. What sits on your porch?
So, why did I pull shapes from this familiar place? My activity sheets are built with things I spotted over the weekend and although we didn’t go anywhere or do anything terribly exciting, there was one moment I enjoyed especially. It was watching my kids play Frisbee in our teeny, tiny front yard. I sat on my bench with my tea and soaked the moment in (the diamond pattern belongs to our bench). On a normal day, my kids would most likely not be playing Frisbee together. Restrictions may be inhibiting us these days but they are also strengthening relationships.
Another item on my porch is an old kitty I received as a gift years ago. As you can see, it has unfortunately met some accidents while living the porch life. What I love about this statue the most is its’ smile. I can still see it during winter even when snow has toppled on it.
The potted plant picture is a sage plant my daughter is trying to grow. She named it Florence and is always checking on her health. I love hearing her reports.
As for the greens, we have bright jade ground-covering plants near our porch. Their clusters are captivating. I chose one of their petals to complete my sheet of four BLOBs.
I didn’t get to my pencil sketches until Wednesday this week. I was still coloring up last week’s characters which are now posted on Instagram.
When I sat down to create characters the theme that popped up was….playgrounds. Last weekend we had one lovely summer-like day and spent the afternoon driving around. Along the way, we drove past our children’s former elementary school playground. It was strange seeing it empty on a beautiful spring day! That image popped back up in my mind when it came time to create characters. The lack of play inspired me to dream up my own playground where kids could play.
Here is a BEFORE and AFTER look at designs..
and a time-lapse of my pen drawing.
Now, a closer look at my character transformation process…
BLOB #1 turned into a large lizard structure. Since the shape was bubbly, it reminded me of scales on a reptile. I needed some sort of feature kids could play on though so I decided to have lizard holding a climbing pole (maybe lizard could be climbed on too?) He was inspired by the green basilisk lizard. Introducing LIZARD’S POLE…
Would you try climbing Lizard’s Pole?
BLOB #2 turned into a tossing game kind of playground structure. It has a farm kind of feel and led me to wonder what do farm animals eat anyway?! Below is my FEED PIG tossing game. An alternative to basketball for the younger kiddos. I had to modify this shape quite a bit to work in the end.
Feed Pig Toss
BLOBS #3 was challenging even though it was so simple! Possibilities seemed to be endless (talking box, talking house, talking square, etc.) but having a playground theme helped me narrow my focus. Introducing the DIAMOND TREE play structure for kids...
Diamond Tree
Can you spot the design changes I made with my swing? My first sketch showed the swing gliding to the right but I experimented with a left swinging direction in my pen sketch. I liked the original best and stuck with that in the clean-up sketch.
The last BLOB was also challenging! My playground theme helped me focus again and I soon spotted a springy seat structure (which I learned is called a “spring rider”). My character looked like it could be the head of a dinosaur. After some quick research to find S named dinosaur types, BLOB #4 transformed into a SPRINGY SALTILLOMIMUS…
It was fun designing my playground characters, especially the kids that could play on them! I hope to add some color soon. Do you have a favorite? Let me know what it is!
Thanks for stopping by. I hope you are staying healthy and keeping busy. If you notice interesting shapes this weekend, let me know!
See you on Monday!
BLOBS #123
Thanks for stopping by! Download this week’s CREATE A CHARACTER Activity sheet here. What characters do you spot? Check back on Friday for my results!
BLOBS #122 RESULTS
Welcome! It is Results Day! Did you create characters this week?
Here is my inspiration…
Can you spot a theme?
The first rock was discovered during a morning run. The rest came from my windowsill garden.
Here is a BEFORE and AFTER look at my Activity sheet…
My theme was “If balloons came to life.” Specifically, bug balloons, with the exception of BLOB #4.
My time lapse pen drawing is below…
Here are the character transformations including a clean up sketch…
SPIDER BALLOON EYEING ICE CREAM
A color study of Spider balloon and bug-loving girl.
BLOB #2…
BEE BALLOON AND BABY
A color study of the Honey Bee balloon and baby.
BLOBS #3
TWINS WITH THEIR LADYBUG BALLOON
A color study of Ladybug balloon and twin sisters.
And the last one, BLOB #4
DOG WITH BONE BALLOON
A color study of dog with a bone balloon.
My dog’s shape and features changed quite a bit from my original concept. After noodling around with it I decided to turn the original bubbly features into a chunky sweater detail. So, voila! What version do you like better?
Thanks for stopping by! Stay well.
BLOBS #122
A new batch of BLOBS are ready to be transformed! Download this week’s CREATE A CHARACTER Challenge here. What characters do you see? Use #theblobblog to share your designs on social media. Thanks for stopping by!
BLOBS #121 RESULTS
Happy Friday! It is Results Day. Thank you for visiting!
Let’s get started with inspiration. Last weekend my daughter created the floor plan for her dreamhouse and we decided it needed to come to life! So, I searched for scrap pieces of foam core in my office and spent Friday + Saturday cutting interior and exterior walls.
Here is what my cutting space looked like…
When it came time to create BLOBS I pulled inspiration from the rug I spent much time on. I needed help with the rest of my shapes so I asked my daughter to find interesting inspiration in the backyard. She took the camera and had fun searching. I loved what she came up with! It made me happy that we worked together over the weekend and helped eachother out.
Below are pictures of inspiration and the BLOBS I pulled…
I did pencil sketches on Tuesday. Here is a BEFORE and AFTER look at my Activity sheet.
BLOBS were challenging this week! There were a few do-overs. I wasn’t entirely happy with how some characters were coming together so I kept trying until I found something I liked. A couple of characters changed between my pencil and pen designs. See if you can spot which ones below.
My themes were hair and care. HAIR, because we haven’t had haircuts in a while (like many!). And CARE, because we still are so grateful for all of the healthcare workers, grocery store employees and everyone else working to keep us safe and healthy during this quarantine. I hope they are able to take extra good care of themselves during this time.
Here is my time lapse in pen…
Here is the first HAIR-themed character transformation…
This toddler is in quarantine. She is keeping herself busy by teaching her dog many, many, many, many tricks.
I decided to color this one up!
The second BLOB shows the character change. Can you spot the “caring” theme?
Which character do you like better, cat or bird?
The third shape is another caring character…
GRAM CLAM WITH GRANCLAMS
After a few character changes, I settled on another hairy character…
And that is it! I was quite busy this week helping clients with their children’s picture book manuscripts (I am a Detroit Writing Room Picture Book Coach!) so did not create Character Cards. If you love these characters, let me know! I’m happy to design a set for you.
Wishing you a safe and healthy weekend! Thanks for stopping by.
