You might have noticed me on Facebook and blog posts mentioning designing my own fabric. I have explained a little bit about how I create my designs on Photoshop in other posts. For some this might feel like a mysterious process. Others might be wondering, "Is digital art cheating, is the computer doing the work for the artist?"
Well, that is a great question! The short answer is, no, the computer only does what I tell it to do. All of the vision and design and creation is by my own hand. The computer does allow me to do some intricate designs more quickly. For example, I can save patterns in a repeat then draw with that pattern so that my solid line becomes "fancy".
At first I was printing all of my digital art onto fabric and quilting it.
Then I started printing some designs onto clothing.
Dawn Allen (me!) wearing my "Classic Truck on Cape Cod" shirt at the artist reception for my solo show at the Rinnova Gallery.
Now I have started a new series, "Cars with Curves" and I love the look of the digital art with a shine, so I plan on printing this series on metal and metallic paper! Cool right?
Below is a perfect example of what fun digital art can be. Each part of the picture was drawn by me using a Wacom stylus (looks like a pen on a mouse pad). I did each element as a separate layer, which allows me to move things around easily. For example, I can click on the lamp post and move it across the street without redrawing it.
1955 Chevy. What you see here is a computer file, soon I will have it printed on metal.
I am sure there will be more to say about digital art in the future... for now thank you for reading!
For those of you with a love of classic cars and trucks from the 1950s you can look forward to seeing more of my Cars with Curves series. Prints are available for purchase in my store!
Peace and Love, Dawn