A punt

I got intimidated by the "emerald forest" theme (which they specified to be forest-themed, and use at least some shade of something you could reasonably call emerald green) because I wasn't able to make a big, detailed forest illustration look the way I pictured it in my head. So, inspired by my younger son's love of pinecones, I just made a repeat of pinecones (specifically, those from coastal redwoods) in various shades of green. Not my best effort, but at least something.



It didn't go anywhere in the contest. My favorites were the sorrel, this array of leaves & berries, and this dreamy illustration.

"Princess Awesome" gives second chances

This week's contest was a sponsored one in concert with "Princess Awesome," which makes clothes for girls that includes some areas outside of the girly norm (dinosaurs, science, fire engines, etc). I've gotten my niece one of their dresses before. So the idea was to make a fabric they could use - something you would want to use for a girl's clothing, but not completely traditionally "girly."

Well, as it happened, I had a (nearly) complete idea ready to go for this. For the "ballet" theme a few years ago, I made a new version of my "ballerina plumbers," but unfortunately failed to submit it in time for the contest.  (TLDR on why I keep doing "ballerina plumber:" it was my desired profession when I was about six; plumber by day and ballerina by night.)

Sooooo, I tweaked my previous design a little - I boosted the pink (and tweaked some of the other colors) for a better contrast, and redid the pipes in the background so they are nicely curved. Thanks, me of three years ago!



This came in pretty much smack-dab in the middle of the pack for the contest, which is not too shabby considering how much of a "niche" idea it is.

My favorites were the ones about beetles, chess, fishing, pirates, and outer space.

Four wheels

For the "four wheels" contest, most of the suggestions in the theme were for vehicles, so I went with inline skates.



I used the "summertime" colors from the set of shared palettes created by the "synergy" group I'm part of. I'm not 100% on how it came out - I just couldn't get it to look the way I pictured in my head. In any case, at least I made it out of the bottom third of entries! My favorite was the "rolling robots."

Bauhaus

This week's contest was for a Bauhaus-style design. I really like the work of Anni Albers and Gunta Stölzl, so I tried to do a little patchwork inspired by some of their work.



This did pretty well, and it got into the top quarter of the contest again.

Cubed Manatees

For the ocean animals design challenge, I drew manatees:



I tried to arrange them in the classic cube optical illusion. This actually did pretty well - I got into the top quarter of entries!

My favorites were the kraken spirals and cartoony fishes.

Dancing spiders

For the "land animals" challenge, I drew peacock spiders. If you haven't seen these before, they're known for lifting up their colorful hindbodies and doing a little dance.



This almost made it into the top third.  My favorite was this very impressionistic take on African animals.

Three types of wings

For the "animals by air" challenge, I did a bunch of drawings of my favorite flying animals:



Swans, barn owls, hummingbirds, ravens, Stellar's jays, fruit bats, bumblebee bats, butterflies, ladybugs, honey bees, and wood bees. This actually made it all the way to the middle third of entries.

My favorites were the geometric owls, the china-pattern swallows, and the birds and butterflies carrying letters.