Hope you enjoyed this post.
Enjoy the rest of your week!

XO
Christina

The Art Director wanted me to illustrate one of the oldest and now hippest neighborhoods in Denver- The Highlands. It would be an opening spread illustration of a place I’ve never been too and I had to somehow capture all the housing styles, buildings, famous shops, boutiques, tourist structures and ‘young hipster families’ in a single illustration with not much time before the deadline. I had no idea how I was going to pull it off but I knew this was going to be a BLAST!

CREATING THE HIGHLANDS ILLUSTRATION STEP BY STEP

Step 1: Intensive image research on all the notable places in Denver.
Step 2: Google map the locations and try to figure out where to place each building/structure in relevance to each other.
Step 3: When there isn’t much time, I quickly send off one sketch first and wait for immediate feedback before sending off another one. Here’s how the sketches evolved after communicating back and fourth with the art director:

Step 4: Quickly map out colours over the sketch, do the lineart and then colour, colour, COLOUR!

Step 5: Final illustration.

Hope you enjoyed this post.
Cheers,

This is a personal piece inspired by the warm, sunny beaches from my travels last year. Because I received so much help from the people following me on my Facebook and Twitter page, I’ve decided to do a 100 limited edition postcard for $1. You can get your copy by clicking the link:

// Get Your Postcard Here //

Here’s a quick illustration I did today inspired by the warm weather.
Ever felt so hot that your socks felt like they were melting?

 Happy Friday :)
~Christina

Option B seemed to be the obvious winner because Option A and C were to painful to look at, haha. Here’s the thing though.. I love bright colours and it’s hard to tame myself because I understand that these bright colours don’t always work together but they get me excited!

So, Here’s Option B for you:

And this really bright one just for me and those who are just as crazy.

Cheers,
Christina

Here’s an update on the illustration I was working on last week. I posted up a lot of progress and details shots online so if you’ll like to see them, be sure to check them out on my social profiles: Facebook, Twitter or Google+.

Have a great week :)

~Christina

I made several trips to the States last year and I must say, I’ve fallen in love with the warm weather and beaches. I often draw inspiration from my trips. The photo above was taken at Santa Monica beach back in 2011. There’s a lot of snow where I’m staying right now so last week while brooding about the cold weather, I decided to do a personal sketch inspired by the warm, sunny beaches. The image is still very incomplete but I will be completing it very soon.

If you would like to keep posted on the progress of this image, be sure to follow me on twitter, google+ or facebook. Have a fabulous week and for my readers living in colder climates, I hope this image gives you some warmth!

~Christina

Valentines day isn’t just for couples, it’s for anyone who feels love and appreciation for the people in their lives. I feel so grateful to be able to create art almost everyday and share it with you. As a sign of my appreciation, I’m preparing a special gift for you all. It’ll be a week or so before I post the surprise so stay posted.

My New Website

And I’m sure you’ve noticed the new website! If you follow me on facebook or twitter than you know about my accident a couple of weeks ago. I accidentally deleted my entire website and I didn’t have a back up… I was devastated for a good 10 mins, but I tried to make good of the situation and got immediately excited about the opportunity to build a new website that is more user-friendly.

There is a rule that as illustrators, we should post our best 10-15 illustrations. However, being an art lover myself, I love to see all the artist’s work and it makes me sad sometimes when certain images start to disappear from their website. So for those who are interested in my old images as much as my new ones, I have an image archive in the main menu that dates back to 2007. For those who just want a quick portfolio, I have my quick portfolio that you could also view.

I’ve also integrated my blog in my new website so that everything is more conveniently located in one place. If you followed me in my old blog, then remember to update your bookmarks!

Let me know if you enjoy my new website. I’m personally excited because the interface is more organized and allows me to post up more artwork in an orderly manner so I will be updating more frequently.

~Christina

Last night I pulled up an old sketch to work on. I posted up snapshots of my progress on twitter, google+ and facebook as I took the sketch to final. Here it is:

Here’s 2 version of the final illustration.

And here’s the one I decided to go with:

Let me know if you enjoyed this post by commenting below.