Another Look at ATCs.

I just adore how these ATCs turned out.  The hand drawn elements balanced well with the papers I selected and the inking.  The hardest part was not getting burnt out on 30!!! little hearts.  However, I enjoyed the challenge and loved the process.

What's a favorite project you've done?

My creative process-- ATCs

STEP 1

It is time to work on another set of Artist Trading Cards, and this time, I thought I would share my design process here.  Looking at the end product that someone shows is lovely, but a lot may be learned from the struggle that an artist goes through to create.

This set of cards is themed “Spring”, although I always use the theme very loosely.  This round is a little bittersweet because the group that I have participated in ATCs with had some upheaval, and I stepped away in the process. That leaves me with a group of people I love and dearly miss, with a melancholy feeling around the situation as a whole.  That and spring are divergent ideas at first glance.

In looking for something common between the two ideas, I find myself drawn to “hope”, “wish” or “growth”.  Both hope and growth fit nicely with a spring theme, so I am narrowing my card theme down to those two.  Flowers and blooming align with either, so I am going to look at my papers/embellishments/resources to see what it have.  I also want to include a hand-designed piece, so I am searching for a transparency to see if I can add a home-made rub on to the mix. 

Now with a theme, and an idea rumbling around, I am going to look at my resources, and see what I can do...

How do you start a project?

ATCs Again

I am loving making Artist Trading Cards (ATCs). I enjoy the limitation the size brings. It's a fun challenge to explore an idea or theme on a mini canvas.

For this round, I wanted to touch on an Asian theme. I mixed Kaiser Kraft and Crate Paper patterned papers with some black and white cardstock elements.

I like keeping a hand designed element on my cards, so I used a white Signo pen to draw designs on the seals.

To design my ATCs, I sketched out some ideas to get an idea for proportion and layout. I had decided to make these cards limited to stash items, and the Kaiser paper was one I loved, and it fit perfectly with the theme. The Crate Paper was left over from a layout, and was literally lying there when I was trying to put things together, which was a happy mess. I used my sketch to finalize the idea and made a prototype. Once it was fleshed out the rest of the series were created assembly style.

Artist trading cards (ATCs)

I made these for a swap. Each heart is hand drawn, and the cards are collages with a plain Kraft paper, and two text pattern papers, the darker is 7 gypsies.

I am excited to see what the other artists created. The challenge in making ATCs is adapting a technique to a 2.5x 3.5 in size. Many patterned papers are too large for the format, creating a unique way to share talent in a compact size.

Have you tried ATCs?