Tags, Calendars, and a figure

I haven't been drawing, well not much anyway, only my usual Monday night figure sessions. But that doesn't mean I haven't been doing any art. I have just been working on the computer with Illustrator or my photographs. Above is a Christmas tag I finally finished using Adobe Illustrator. I started this last winter just after Christmas and got most of it done but only in the past few days I actually finish it off.

Lots of layers and I know I should have more reindeer but... other than that I rather like it. So not like my drawing style that it was rather fun to do. I used photographs of a sleigh and of reindeer to draw my sleigh and deer, course the both are simplified versions, and the colors are my own. This makes the 4th gift tag I have designed in Illustrator, have to think about what I want to illustrate next.

My other computer project was to finally assemble the calendar that I also started last year. But this time I found a script on the internet that would create the layout in In-Design for the days of the month. I added the photographs. Photos are from the past 2 years and each photograph was made in the month it is representing. That was fun to do, and I am very pleased with how it came out. The photo above shows units in the process of being assembled, a finished calendar, a bone folder and the printed sheets still waiting to be folded.

I am working on a butterfly calendar to go with it and basically h ave that one done also, just need to head out to Staples to get it printed. I set it up to print on legal sized paper so it is smaller than most commercial calendars but otherwise I think it looks pretty good. Selecting photographs is almost the hardest part of creating a calendar. If I can focus on my animal drawings I would love to create an animal drawing calendar for 2014.

I am thinking about putting them in my Esty Store, but haven't figure out how to show them off.

Above is a week ago Monday's figure drawing. Not totally happy with it, though parts aren't too bad.

I finished what I wanted to do on my drawing a bit early so did another pen sketch, I think I got her head a bit too large, but feet and hands are almost better than in the graphite drawing. 

The photograph above is the one I have used on the calendar cover. It was such a beautiful sunset and I was lucky enough to be at a location where I could photograph it without any buildings or man made objects in the way. It can be very tricky to photograph a sunset without telephone or electric poles not to mention buildings sticking up in the middle.

That is it for today. Hope everyone here in the States has a wonderful Thanksgiving Thursday. Per usual comments are always welcome.