Quick sketch for an illustration helps me design

Posted on February 10, 2012 by samantha dellinger

Here’s a quick sketch I did for an upcoming page design for flipside weekend. The story is about how chocolate can go with just about anything from fruity to salty pairings.

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Proofing sheets for Smart magazine

Posted on February 10, 2012 by samantha dellinger

The proofing sheets for Smart magazine arrived via UPS this morning. Kara, editor, of Smart and myself were eager to take a look at our first full color view of the magazine. We recently change printers so we wanted to check for quality in the proofs. We were both happy with the quality and proceeded to check closely each page.

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Fun and oh-so-easy illustrations in the style of cut paper, but created in Adobe illustrator

Posted on January 31, 2012 by samantha dellinger

I love the look of cut paper art.

But cutting paper art can be time consuming.

That’s where Adobe Illustrator comes in handy.

Simple shapes and adding a drop shadow help give the feel and dimension of cut paper art.

Want to see some real cut paper art then checkout of dots & things blog

How to get started with cut-paper art

First you need an X-acto knife and plain paper.
Start out simple, perhaps a simple shape like a heart, since Valentine’s Day is on its way.

Optional tools are a self-healing mat and other types of paper.

Check back and I will soon post a more in depth tutorial on cut paper art.

Another great website to check out is The Heart of Papercuts.

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Remembering Joe Paterno

Posted on January 26, 2012 by samantha dellinger

I recently finished designing two posters for the York Daily Record/Sunday News in remembrance of Joe Paterno. The keepsake posters will be published this Sunday in the York Daily Record/Sunday News.

I went through hundreds of photos looking for just the right image. I found two that were uncanny in their similarities to one another.

Photo illustration. Photos: York Daily Record/Sunday News and Associated Press

The image of JoePa on the left was taken in 2008 and the photo on the right was taken roughly late 80s or early 90s. Look closely, see if you can spot the similarities in the two photos.

The photos were composited in Adobe Photoshop. The photo on the right was provided in black and white. I simply added a layer mask and to the BW image and blended the two images together. The top photo was on a separate layer and I change the blend mode to Luminosity.

I drew the Joe Paterno signature in Adobe Illustrator and the brought it in as a vector smart object. (love that vector smart object editability) A simple drop shadow was added to text.

Another poster was created in a tab layout, meaning it’s basically a square. I had to find some new photos to work. I still wanted to convey the idea of past and present and that was again just a matter of a search through our archives. I also wanted to find photos that were celebatory.

Here is this poster version.

To order a full-page reprint click here

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Ravens posters for print and desktop wallpapers

Posted on January 19, 2012 by samantha dellinger

I designed three exclusive posters for the York Daily Record/Sunday News. The first poster publishes tomorrow, and then one on Saturday and Sunday.

You can even download a desktop wallpaper version of them at ydr.com.

I had a lot of fun designing these. And the designs for each one came to me pretty quickly. I designed the posters and showed them to my editor, who had just minor tweaks and they pretty much were ready to go.

The three posters were all created in Adobe Photoshop.

Photos were courtesy of ASSOCIATED PRESS.

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Downloaded WP app for my iPhone

Posted on January 10, 2012 by samantha dellinger

I’m excited about my Word Press App on my iPhone. I hope I’ll be able to blog more.

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2012 is the Year of Dragon

Posted on January 9, 2012 by samantha dellinger

I’m working on an illustration for Flipside Weekend. It’s an illustration of a dragon in celebration of The Year of the Dragon.

I’ve drawn this using various pencil weights.

Pencil drawing of chinese dragon

Here is the color version and a preview of how the illustration will work on the page. The page design was created in Adobe Illustrator. I was going to ad color using color pencil but my color setting on my flatbed scanner isn’t working so I was able to scan the gray pencil drawing and then add the color in Adobe Photoshop. I use a Wacom tablet instead of the mouse to color sometimes. I like how the Wacom tablet has a stylus, it gives a more fine art feel to my illustrations. And because a Wacom has pressure sensitivity it has then ability to change the weight of lines much like a pencil on paper.

Pencil drawing and color added using PhotoShop

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Go to smartmagpa to color in a turkey

Posted on November 26, 2011 by samantha dellinger

Check out an interactive coloring page I created for the kiddies at smartmagpa.

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I’m a busy, busy artist at the York Daily Record/Sunday News

Posted on November 26, 2011 by samantha dellinger

I want to apologize for not posting regulary, but I’m the sole graphic artist in the Editorial department at the York Daily Record since the end of October.

Former graphic artist Carrie Barlup recently took a design postion at the Journal Publications in Harrisburg, Pa.

So, for the time being it’s just me churning out the graphics and illustrations at the ydr. But I’m not totally alone, several of my co-workers are pitching in with some of the graphic art duties, which really is a big help.

Most recently, Features copy editor, Sarah Chain designed a Flipside Weekend page in Adobe Illustrator. Sarah already does a fantastic job designing pages using Harris, which is a very basic and somewhat tempermental page layout program that the entire newspaper uses to design with.
Continue reading →

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Transform plain white canvas sneakers into walking works of art

Posted on October 19, 2011 by samantha dellinger

I took some permanent markers and drew a koi fish on a pair of canvas shoes.

Canvas shoes decorated with permanent markers.


The shoes cost $5 at Wal-mart.

How to:

I stuffed the shoes with newspaper so they would hold their shape when I drew on them.

I placed the shoes side by side and used a pencil to sketch out the main shape of fish.

Line drawing before color is added to canvas sneaker.


I then checked to make sure my drawing lined up and then drew over with permanent markers. I used ultra-fine and fine tip markers.

Don’t press too hard because the ink bleeds into the canvas easily.

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