PDF zine: Summer Journaling

Written by AnnaDenise on Wednesday, July 25, 2012 at 12:00

Hiya! Just wanted to let you know that I'm selling the Summer Journalling PDF zine that I've been using for my workshops this summer. Buy it here (if you want).

Etsy Labs & 101 Woonideeën: Illustration!

Written by AnnaDenise on Saturday, June 16, 2012 at 22:44

UPDATE: My workshop is now fully booked. Still a few spots left for Annemarie's workshop!

Yesss! I will be teaching another Etsy Labs art journalling course! WOOT! It will take place on July 23rd and is organized in collaboration with this great Dutch interior design magazine 101 Woonideeën.

This time I will be co-teaching an illustration course with some pretty amazing teachers:
> Kim Welling of Kim's Little Monsters (I am a HUGE fan of hers, check out my interview with Kim on The Yellow Umbrella).
> Annemarie Schumacher of dertigdecember (LOVE her shop!)
> Lieke van den Berge from Geek de Chique (another favorite of mine, check out my interview with the GdC ladies on The Yellow Umbrella).
Serious sweetness, you guys.

Oh, and there's me. Me and my lovely assistant will be teaching an art journalling course (what else) to get you started on your summer journals!

When? Monday July 23rd, 2012 - 19:00 - 22:00h
Where? In de Ruimte, Oudegracht 230A a/d werf, Utrecht
What else? It's free, but be sure to sign up on time.
SO SIGN UP HERE

Etsy Showroom + Startersdag

Written by AnnaDenise on Friday, March 30, 2012 at 17:30

A small FYI: tomorrow I have the absolute pleasure and honor to be moderating Etsy's first ever Dutch 'Startersdag' ('start-up day') in In De Ruimte in my hometown of Utrecht. The theme is #HierGroeitIets ('something is growing'), a number of experts will help creative (Etsy) start-ups in getting a handle on things like marketing, accounting, law, product photography, and financing. Tickets were sold out even before the official announcement went out, which is why I didn't announce it here before.

Fret not, however, as this event will be taking place in conjuncture with the Etsy Showroom, which will be open the entire weekend of March 31st/April 1st. This unique showroom marks the one year anniversary of Etsy's arrival in Holland and showcases the work of over 30 Dutch Etsy designers, crafters, and artists. It is going to look absolutely amazing and you won't want to miss it, so please make sure drop by on Saturday or Sunday (12-18h).

See you there!


Etsy Showroom in France

Registrations 'a Visual View' Open

Written by AnnaDenise on Monday, October 10, 2011 at 18:00

UPDATE October 11, 2011 17:00: THIS CLASS IS FULL! We will no longer be accepting applications. Stay tuned for our spring course!


Over this past week since we announced our first-ever online illustrated journalling course 'a Visual View', many of you have expressed your interest in signing up for the course. We are very excited about the course and are curious to see your response to the curriculum we've worked so hard on over the past few months.

We're pleased to announce, that course registrations are now OPEN! You can sign up by clicking the link below.




Payment & Registration
Once you have filled out our registration form, you will receive an email confirming your registration within a day. As you know, unfortunately there's only a limited number of spaces available in this first class, so we will also let you know right away if we could not process your registration.

We will then send you an invoice through PayPal to the email address you provided us with. If you do not have a PayPal account, you can easily set one up with your bank account or creditcard via PayPal.com. For our European students, we also accept bank transfers. If you prefer this option, please let us know by email and we'll send you the payment details.

Once we have received your payment, we will invite you to the 'a Visual View' Ning group we've set up for this occasion. Here you will find more information on how to navigate the Ning website, where to find all assignments, where to post your homework, and the schedule for the duration of the six week course.


More Information
You can find more information about the course [here], but should you have any questions at all, please do not hesitate to email us via anna [at] annadenise [dot] nl

Announcement: 'A Visual View' online art journalling course

Written by AnnaDenise on Wednesday, October 05, 2011 at 10:58

Hip hip hooray! I have a BIG announcement.

This fall, Julie-Anne of Turtlewings and I will be collaborating on hosting our first-ever online art journalling course, called 'A Visual View. Daily Illustrated Journalling'.


This introductory course into illustrated journaling will help you to view your world, your experiences, and memories in a creative light whilst reconnecting with your inner artist through keeping an art journal. During this six week series of exercises Jules and I will work with you to find out where your creative heart lies and how to translate this into great-looking journal pages.



The course is easy, hands-on, and fast paced.
You can expect some very concrete assignments each week, but in the individual critique sessions we’ll talk more about your personal progress, about what inspires you, and how you might incorporate keeping an illustrated journal into your daily life or creative practice We want to create a private, safe online space, where we can all share our work and support each other in out creative journey. Students are invited to comment on each others work (but in a constructive manner only). This course is designed for absolute beginners with no experience whatsoever, but we suspect more experienced artists or creative professionals might find that an illustrated journal might help them view their own creative process differently.

10 students only
Because this is our first time and we consider this a trial run, we'll accept 10 students only for the special price of €70,-. Signups go through me on a first-come first-serve basis and registration opens the 10th of October (I'll put up a reminder here as soon as we've got the Paypal situation all figured out).

More information
You can read more information about the course [here], or by emailing me via anna [at] annadenise [dot] com!

Zine Winners!

Written by AnnaDenise on Wednesday, August 10, 2011 at 23:08

Wow! Picking out a winner was much harder than I thought - you guys all had great suggestions, thanks so much! :-)



I picked this evening's two winners based on the fact that their suggestions touched upon a subject that I feel like I have some expertise in and would feel comfortable and excited about creating a tutorial about. As you know, I am self taught and some things I would just feel uncomfortable teaching, as I have no clue how to draw or do those things myself (thanks for your confidence in me, though!).

Anyways - the winners are:
Maria Trujillo, who would like me to do a tutorial on how to get the best out of your markers!
Lally Fider, who would like me to create a how-to on keeping a travel journal!

Congratulations ladies! Please email me your postal address (via anna [at] annadenise [dot] nl) and I'll make sure the zines find you asap!

For all the other lovely people who responded to the giveaway: thank you so very much for your support and hopefully you'll win next time? I do plan on selling the zine once I've perfected it (and figured out how to bind them properly). I'll make sure to blog about it when they're up!

Have a great Wednesday evening everyone!!! I love you!

Zine Giveaway!

Written by AnnaDenise on Sunday, August 07, 2011 at 18:23

Or, in other words: Giveaway time!

I still have two crappily stapled but handc colored zines left over from the Etsy Labs events and I'm giving them away!

Let me know in the comment section what you'd like my next tutorial to be on and the two people with the best suggestions get a zine! Oh and the deadline is Wednesday-morning, as I will be leaving on vay-cay-sjahn soon after!

Have a great Sunday, folks!

PS: And yes, I did do something more useful than taking silly Photo Booth pictures of myself. I paid bills. Paying bills always makes me kind of loopy.

Spring Events at Turtlewings!

Written by AnnaDenise on Saturday, January 29, 2011 at 22:50

For this spring Julie Anne, founder and owner of Turtlewings got together and figured out what courses to offer this spring. As promised, we're working on an online course, but before putting that out we want to make sure we understand the platform we're working with to offer the best experience. Also, we've got a couple of one-time adult classes coming up that we need to find a good time for that I'll announce shortly.

BUT! I can tell you about these two things already. So mark your calendars, and sign up!

February 5th, 12th, 19th, 26th: Art Journalling with Anna
(Parents + children ages 8-14)

Back by popular demand this DIT (do it together) course for parents and children ages 8-14 is the first in our monthly serious of Saturday Afternoon’s with an Artist/Designer. Learn to view your world, experiences, and memories in a creative light whilst reconnecting with your inner artist through keeping an art journal and have fun collaborating and communicating in a different manner with your child! This art journal course is for parents and children and will take place on four consecutive Saturday-afternoons in February.

After completing this course you will have a clear idea of what keeping an art journal can bring to your family and creative life, be able to translate your experiences into journal pages, you will have a small personal library of prompts and inspirations to work on in your personal journal, have learned about materials, techniques, layouts, and colors!

This course will be run by Turtlewings designer, owner and creative director Julie Anne Verbeelen, and art journaller, illustrator, and blogger Anna Denise van der Reijden.

Spaces are limited so sign up today.
Fee: 168€ (for both child & parent)
Times: 14:30-16:30
Place: Turtlewings Atelier, 165 Rue Washington, 1050 Ixelles, Brussels

[SIGN UP HERE]
---------


I love keeping an art journal, painting and sewing, but it's not quite a social hobby like tennis is. So, we decided it's time to change that and set up a monthly meeting for art nerds! Whether you need to update your website and need help, want to finish that novel you've been working on, or just want to swap ideas on what stamps to use in your art journal - this is the place for you!

* Think art journalling + drinks + sweets + creative talk + a welcoming space full of likeminded people!
* Swap art ideas, tips for supplies and techniques and find your art loving buddies right here in Brussels!
* Meet art journaller and illustrator Anna Denise and other fellow art geeks every 2nd Friday of the month at 19:30 at the Turtlewings Atelier!

[Sign up for our next and first meeting on Facebook]
---------



With special thanks and lots of love to the amazing Julie Anne of Turtlewings, who has been so fantastic as to welcome me into her studio, life, and amazing circle of friends. I can't thank her enough, so the least I can do is put up a great big banner to her wonderful wonderful company (and she's setting up another amazing company, which I will blog about later)!!! If you're a parent or creative in or near Brussels, craving for more fun and creativity in your life - be sure to check out Turtlewings.

These drawings I made with fellow artist and son of Julie Anne, Natan (age 9). I love his style and I love working with him - there's a project here, I can tell!

How to draw a simple puppet?

Written by AnnaDenise on Monday, December 27, 2010 at 16:25

Hello my darlings!

I hope you had a nice Christmas and are now enjoying some well-deserved time off as I am! I figured it was time for another quick tutorial, and because some people emailed me about drawing puppets, I figured I'd do one on that!

As you probably know, I wasn't trained as an artist. Never went to art school and missed all of those fun classes on figure drawing and human proportions and such (which is good, I think, I have no patience for art classes, to be honest). I went over them in art history, of course and remember some of the basics, but mostly I like to do my own thing. My own thing being very far from realistic. And since I'm lazy, I like shortcuts and easy tricks, some of which I will share with you today!

Here we go!

I start out in pencil, drawing two oblong shapes almost stacked on top of each other. The top one is going to be the head, the bottom one the torso. Now, fortunately my torso doesn't (yet) look like this irl, but you know. It looks kind of cute.


Then, I add very simple arm shapes. To determine how long the arms are supposed to be, I often check the mirror asking myself where does my hand go? where does the elbow bend?. It doesn't have to be perfect, but asking these kinds of questions and checking myself out in the mirror (uh-huh, hi handsome!) has helped me develop somewhat of an intuition for these things. For the legs, I start at the outer edges of the oval shape, down to the knees.


For the hands and feet, I first make two very rough outlines. A mitten shaped kind of hand will do for now.


Then, when you're done with the rough outlines of your body - you can dress it! This is always the most fun part, I think. Today, I'm wearing a short cardigan over a long shirt, bootcut jeans and sandals. My clothes aren't form fitting, so I don't follow the outlines of the body completely.


Now we're going to fix that hand. If you drew a mitten shape before, you already have the thumb. Now all you need to do is fill in four fingers into the mitten part. As if you're looking 'into' the mitten. I actually stole this trick from a documentary about Disney, so it's a legit technique, i think.

See, so pretty.


Now, to determine where your eyes are supposed to go on your head, draw an even cross over the skull shape. Make sure it isn't completely flat. Your face isn't flat either, so the lines are going to be bent a little. If you want your puppet to look to either side, move the vertical line into the direction you want the puppet to be facing. I don't draw noses on my puppets, but the vertical line is where the nose would be. My puppet is looking slightly to the left.


The egg-shaped eyes are centered on the horizontal line (yes, your eyes really are halfway on your skull). If you're drawing the face from the front, keep an even distance from the vertical line. I think officially the distance between the two eyes is supposed to be as big as one eye. So that could be a nice trick to determine how far the eyes should be apart. Now, place the mouth (in this case a simple line) halfway on the bottom part of the vertical line. Then. the ears start at the bottom of the horizontal line and go to about the spot where your mouth is (if you're using a help line for this, make sure it's bent as well).


Draw in the iris of the eye. For a relaxed look, I like to place the irises to the top of the eye, partly covered by the (imaginary) eyelid. Make sure the irises are the same size and placed at the same spot within the eye. If you don't do this, your puppet is going to look kind of crazy. Also, make sure we can never see the entire iris - you puppet will look like it's on crack.


Hair time! You can use the top half of the head for bangs, or strands of hair. Make sure the top edge of your hair is removed a little from the skull to avoid 'gollum-hair'. If you want big hair, make the space bigger.


Alright! Now it's time to finish the outlines with fineliner. I used a Faber-Castell sepia toned fine-liner in this case, but as long as it's waterproof, you should be fine.


Always by inking in the parts that go in front of other parts. It sounds kind of stupid, but I've made so many mistakes with this, it's now something I automatically do.


Ink in all the outlines. Take your time for this and make sure you ink in only the lines you want visible in the end.

For the eyes, you might have noticed I never really 'do' colored irises. I don't know why. I color in the entire iris, with one exception. I leave two little highlights out. It makes the eyes look more lively, I think. You can place them in any corner of the iris - just make sure you've got them in the same place in both eyes. Also, placing them in the bottom parts of the eye, makes the eyes look upwards.


And you're done! Easy, right?
You can now color in your puppet, or experiment with more complicated postures and positions. Just practice and you notice it'll get easier!

Pleas let me know if you've got any questions! Have a great day!
Love, Anna Denise

Art Journal Course + Free PDF

Written by AnnaDenise on Monday, November 29, 2010 at 21:21

I know it's getting a little quiet here, but it's not just because I'm spending a lot of time over there. I'm working on a few new step-by-step art journal tutorials (they will be free of course), based on some of the questions that came up during the 'Do It Together' art journal course I taught every Saturday at Turtlewings this November.

I had so much fun teaching this small course. Actually, I didn't feel like a teacher at all. Guiding our small group through our art journalling exercises just confirmed to me how much creativity is inside each and every one of us. It was great to see the parents and children interact during this course. I think the main thing that I've learned during this course is that how little 'teaching' kids and adults really need. I had definitely expected I would have to 'interfere' more than I did. In fact, I would just explain a little bit about my techniques and some of the tricks I use, explain the exercise and, well, they were off creating the most beautiful journals!

As an extra, I turned the art journal 101 tutorial from the blog into a PDF and now that the course is over, I'd like to share the PDF with you. It's exactly the same as the blog posts, just neatly bundled into a PDF. [You can view and download it here]

Also, because I love you, you can download a list of prompts here.

Enjoy!!!

---
Psst! You're all still invited to the opening of my exhibition at Turtlewings on December 7th, 19:30 pm. More info [here].