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Photographers—Kayak Tanzania in 14 Days
Set for Feb 17th – Mar 2nd, 2012, Jansen Photographic Expeditions teams up with Infinite Kayak Adventures in an upcoming trip, specially designed to present the best photographic opportunities available. Two spirited and adventurous leaders, Mark and Holly Jansen, former Oak Creek Printworks Featured Artists, head the expedition.
The journey is timed to present locations affording a chance to witness not only the great wildebeest migration, but also their calving and the attendant opportunities this attracts. You’ll witness and record nature in the raw.
As well as wildlife, the vistas presented in this ancient and diverse terrain hold fantastic landscape photography potential. Capture the mystery and romance of Zanzibar, from the highly sculpted Zanzibar doors to the modern fish market. The colorful Maasai are also very photogenic.
Optional activities include guided kayaking in the sheltered mangrove inlets of historic Manza Bay near the Kenyan border. This is a rare photographic opportunity offering some of the closest bird encounters possible at water level. Here you’ll have access to places usually inaccessible. You’ll also have the chance to study traditional wooden sailing dhows, fishing villages and sunsets.
You’ll stay at high quality, reputable lodges throughout, chosen for their excellent locations and varied photographic possibilities. The Jansens’ photographic travel experience, coupled with their technical and artistic expertise, means you’ll be traveling and shooting with seasoned professional assistants. In addition, a knowledgeable American guide, Alan Feldstein, will accompany the group for the entire trip.
Find a detailed itinerary and pricing information at Jansen Photographic Expeditions.
Featured Artist Pays for Mission Trip by Making and Selling Greeting Cards
Graydon McKoy is a nine-year-old boy finishing third grade, and is in his first year of home schooling. He lives with his parents on Wadmalaw Island in South Carolina, a very rural island with a farm rich history located in Charleston County. Graydon’s father, one of the few farmers left on the island, grew up farming with his father. Graydon’s mother has an advanced degree in biology but is now using her knowledge to home school the budding artist. With the background both of his parents have to offer, it is no surprise that Graydon loves the outdoors and every creature that inhabits it.
Since he was very little Graydon has loved books about nature and enjoyed taking walks to observe God’s creatures, no matter where, or how slimy they were.
In addition to searching for wildlife, Graydon cares for three horses, one German Shepherd and a cat, but what he really wants is a snake. His mother has not yet consented to that request, but they have spent the last three summers documenting the snakes they find on their farm. To date they have spotted over 13 species of snakes and look forward to participating in the annual springtime snake round-up that the local serpentarium conducts.
Graydon’s art began at the young age of four, and highlighted the favorites of all little boys: sharks, alligators, dinosaurs and snakes. Thanks to a great art teacher from first grade, his talent was cultivated and his horizons expanded with the love for animals remaining as the main theme in all of his work.
In a span of just three years, Graydon has developed quite a portfolio, which his mother has saved, and scanned onto computer discs. His talent was put to use this year when Graydon’s family decided to go on a mission trip with their church to Costa Rica. They did not have all of the funding needed to pay their way, so his mother had an idea to use Graydon’s art work as a fund raiser.
She took some of his pieces that had been scanned and then put them on her computer and converted them into note cards. The cards sold really well, and not only raised enough money to pay for all of them to go to Costa Rica, but, also raised enough to pay for a home school trip afterwards.
As a result of this success, Graydon now has his very own business and calls it “Graydon’s Critters”. He is working on two new series; one focusing on Charleston and one highlighting the fish served at a local seafood restaurant. He continues to practice with mediums such as chalk, watercolors and oil pastels, but is expanding to acrylics and looks forward to learning how to mat his own work.
To see Graydon’s portfolio, visit his website – www.graydonscritters.com. You’ll also find Graydon’s Critters on Facebook.
Oswald introduces the characters at Oak Creek Comics
Oak Creek Comics is all about encouraging individuals to follow their passion, whether that passion happens to be creating or collecting art.
Comics, graphic novels, newspapers, magazines, Anime, note cards, greeting cards, baseball cards, Magic The Gathering® cards, etc. all have something in common. Artists want to preserve and protect their artwork, either for storage or for sale. Collectors want to protect their paper collectibles.
To that end, the characters at Oak Creek are following their passion by introducing Oak Creek Comics. From time to time, the Oak Creek Comics characters will appear in strips published on the Oak Creek Printworks blog, introducing you to the land, art and artists of Oak Creek.
And don’t forget, we’re always interested in helping artists follow their passion, so tell us what your passion is. Maybe we’ll feature your artwork and your story on our blog, and maybe you’ll be our next “featured artist.”
As always, we’re standing by to help you protect and display your artwork. Visit the Oak Creek Printworks Store to view the wide range of products for packaging and presenting artwork in any format.
If you’d like to see more Oak Creek Comics, then let’s go visit Oswald and the gang.
Image of the Week
High resolution photos are hard to find without purchasing. If you are looking for photos to use as backgrounds in your artwork, look no further. To download this week’s image, click on it. When the high resolution copy appears, right click on it to copy or save it.
Terms of Use: You can use this image for anything you wish (e.g. advertising, printed materials, product packaging, presentations, brochures, greeting cards, postcards, book covers, etc.) as long as you do not copyright it or resell it. Oak Creek Printworks and Oak Creek Marketplace, Inc. are not liable for any damages incurred by your use of the image. ©2011 Oak Creek Printworks
Image of the Week
High resolution photos are hard to find without purchasing. If you are looking for photos to use as backgrounds in your artwork, look no further. To download this week’s image, click on it. When the high resolution copy appears, right click on it to copy or save it.
Terms of Use: You can use this image for anything you wish (e.g. advertising, printed materials, product packaging, presentations, brochures, greeting cards, postcards, book covers, etc.) as long as you do not copyright it or resell it. Oak Creek Printworks and Oak Creek Marketplace, Inc. are not liable for any damages incurred by your use of the image. ©2011 Oak Creek Printworks
Take Five Dollars off any order through Feb. 28, 2011
We’ve had a great year, and we want to pass our good fortune along to you. Visit the Oak Creek Printworks store and take $5 off any order through the end of February, 2011. Just enter the code 8YEARS when prompted at checkout. Thank you for visiting Oak Creek Printworks. Our staff wishes you a prosperous and healthy 2011.
Flowers, Color, Form Background for Business Card
Graphic designers have lots of problems. With every job we accept we’re presented with problems that are begging for solutions. Recently I was presented with a problem…a purple and green flower for a business card for a massage therapist in the middle of winter…in Southern California. No sweat.
This is the full frame of the image that became the foundation for the business card.
When I took a series of digital photos on the macro setting, I was thinking about colors (purple and green) and holding still enough to focus the camera on a target that was swaying in the breeze. I wasn’t worrying about composition. Just keep the flowers in the frame before the wind catches them.
I had no idea if these Lily of the Nile would have any chance of working on a business card. I had taken the photos weeks before, and when it came time to buckle down and create the image that would carry the business card, I found my answer by looking at the flowers, not as a whole, but for their “parts.” Perhaps there is just a small part of the image that contains the necessary elements to play a supporting role to the typography?
In order to isolate just the right section of the image, I worked in Adobe Photoshop, but most image editing software has a cropping tool or a selection tool with the ability to crop to a selection. In Photoshop, I fixed the width, height and resolution of the cropping tool to 3.75 inches by 2.25 inches, 300 pixels per inch, adding one eighth of an inch to all four sides to allow for a bleed. When fixing a cropping area, the size of the area can change, but the correct proportions remain constant.
Photoshop's cropping tool can isolate a precise area, resize and resample the pixels to the desired resolution in a single step.
Once a specific area of the image is isolated and cropped, that segment of the photo now stands alone at the correct size and resolution to become a unique background for the business card. The same image could just as easily be cropped and sized for greeting cards, postcards or bookmarks.
Typography is always a challenge. When white type is reversed out of a background, in this case, a moderately busy background, it begins to get lost. It’s almost gobbled up by the very background that’s intended to support the type.
To prevent the white type from becoming too difficult to read as it moves over alternating light and dark leaves or purple petals, a dark green is sampled from the background and used to give it an “outer glow” effect. If reverse type is placed over a purple petal, sample a slightly darker purple for the outer glow to allow it to “pop” off the background.
type before outer glow
type after outer glow is applied
Because we designers are never satisfied with just one version of our layout, I used two different photos with a variety of type alignments before sharing them with the client.
Ireland’s Colors Drive Niamh Slack to Paint
I am a landscape artist, and I am particularly attracted to coastal and woodland scenes. I believe that there is much beauty and colour in the Irish landscape. It is that which I aim to capture in my paintings.
My art is primarily about capturing the essence of those places that speak to me on a personal level. Perhaps more importantly than this, my paintings are about my love of colour. When working in oils, I am continuously experimenting with the placing of heavy layers of colour on canvas, and I strive to see colour in the seemingly ‘mundane’ and ‘ordinary’ things around us.
I especially enjoy painting ‘en plein air’. When possible, I like to complete as much of the painting outside as possible, in all types of weather! The unpredictability of the Irish weather means that sometimes I can only spend short periods of time outside, completing quick sketches, and memorizing the scene before me.
My favourite stage in the painting process is that magical stage at the very beginning of a painting, once the design has been executed. I am then observed to work furiously and frantically!
Layers of paint are heavily placed with a palette knife, and I try to capture every part of the landscape before me. I work at this rapid pace for as long as my body will allow me. Eventually, I force myself to stand back and I continue to touch up and retouch the painting at a slower pace, before bringing it back indoors.
Once dried, even further layers of paint are added. This results in landscapes that have been described as vibrant, energetic and full of life. When depicting seascapes my interest often lies in the wealth of colours and tones that can be explored in rock formations by the sea. I am especially taken with exploring the tonal ranges that can be found in such formations. Woodland scenes have always and continue to strike a chord with me, and my work here focuses on the changing colours of the seasons, both on the foliage and the woodland floor.
My paintings are inspired and influenced by the work of Irish artist Jack Yeats and the contemporary art of Kenneth Webb. The colour, energy and movement in my brush and palette knife work have been greatly influenced by impressionists such as Monet, Renoir and Van Gogh.
Image of the Week
High resolution photos are hard to find without purchasing. If you are looking for photos to use as backgrounds in your artwork, look no further. To download this week’s image, click on it. When the high resolution copy appears, right click on it to copy or save it.
Photo courtesy of Nancy Haberman
If you use our images, we would love to hear from you and see a sample of what you did with it. Who knows, we might just post your creation in a future blog…with your permission, of course! Contact us at admin@oakcreekprintworks.com.
Terms of Use: You can use this image for anything you wish (e.g. advertising, printed materials, product packaging, presentations, brochures, greeting cards, postcards, book covers, etc.) as long as you do not copyright it or resell it. Oak Creek Printworks and Oak Creek Marketplace, Inc. are not liable for any damages incurred by your use of the image. ©2011 Oak Creek Printworks