Our Home

I got mostly caught up on the projects I'm doing for other people, so I'm back to working on my picture book! 

Above is my tracing paper and the art drawn onto the linoleum block. I do a clean drawing on tracing paper and then lay it upside down on the block. Then I rub the back of the tracing paper with something very hard, often the non-sharp end of an X-acto knife. That transfers the lines backwards. But the graphite sits on top of the surface lightly and is pretty easy to rub off. So I usually redraw all of the lines directly on the block with a pencil.

I decided to carve all of the text, mostly because I can! It's fun for me to be able to play around with the lettering. If I decide to, I can erase the text out of the digital files at the end and add it back in traditionally using the computer. So I'm not too worried. Another thing I can do is make a print without inking the text, then I could get a nice image for framing without text.

The top and bottom are the cover and an interior spread, and the middle is the block I'm working on now. I'll be sharing lots of progress photos on Instagram if you'd like to see!

CD Cover

I'm finishing up a really exciting project! You may know that I went to music school. And even though I don't play anymore myself, I do have friends from my (distant) past that are professional musicians. Christopher Farrell is a friend of mine that plays viola for the Nashville Symphony and is in the process of recording the first album of his classical compositions. And he asked me to create the artwork for his album cover!

I started with a bunch of thumbnails that were influenced by different elements of the compositions, or images of Chris or the violin soloist, Jessica. Chris liked the tree on the top right and the viola with a bird that is the second in the top row. Those 2 images went well together, so I combined them to make the front and back of the cover. Below are some process photos of carving and printing the block.

The professional recordings for the album will be happening soon, then we will be able to finalize the text on the cover. And after it's printed we will be able to hold it in our hands--- and play Chris' wonderful music! I've heard each of these pieces and I promise they are great. If you'd like to hear more about this project, you can read about it on his Indiegogo page.

This it how the print turned out. The tree will be on the front cover and the viola on the back. I'm excited to see it all finished and I'll share a link to buy the CD once it's available!