Pattern Bliss

Here's to all the amazing women that make the world a better place. Strong women lift each other up. Happy International Women’s Day!

Winter is almost over and I am sharing a wintry mix of nature images. I think the slate blue color is a fresh neutral and calming color perfect for so many design projects.

Feeling all those warm fuzzy feeling today. Wishing you a lovely and loved day. xo

"Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get–only with what you are expecting to give–which is everything." -Katharine Hepburn

Illustrated cocktail for your weekend. (Mojito illustration and animation by Chris Olson)

Mint Mojito ingredients:

• 5 mint leaves

• 2 ounces white rum

• 1 ounce fresh lime juice

• ½ ounce simple syrup

• Ice

• Club soda or sparkling water

• Lime slices, for garnish

Directions

1) Muddle the mint. Place mint in the bottom your cocktail shaker and use a cocktail muddler to press it. You should press on the leaves until they release the fragrant oils. T

2) Add the rum, lime juice, simple syrup, and about a handful of ice to the shaker, and shake it vigorously until the ingredients are completely combined and chilled.

Amazing things are happening for the Suni Lee. On Saturday, in her sixth meet of her freshman season at Auburn, the reigning Olympic all-around champion posted a 10.0 on the uneven bars to help the Tigers keep pace with LSU on Saturday. My sketch above features her skill on the balance beam during the summer Olympics in 2021.

Sunisa Lee is an amazing role model for athletes. I am in awe of her for winning the gold medal in the women’s individual all-around final in the summer Olympics in 2021. Not sure I captured her magic on the balance beam in this sketch. I love everything about her backstory—her perseverance as a gymnast and her respect for her role model and Team USA teammate Simone Biles.

Happy Lunar New Year! It’s the Year of the Tiger. (Illustration by Chris Olson)

Hello, weekend. I have been waiting for you. (Collage by Chris Olson)

Curating a collection of holiday palettes for future projects. Do you create color libraries for designs and artwork? Let me know in t he comments.

Editing a photo transforms your image and takes it to a whole different level. By combining two or more images in a photo composite also brings a storytelling element to the image. In this example I did several things:

• Selecting the subject and removing the background.

• Adding a black and white edit.

• Adding color back into select areas in the image—the glasses and lips.

• Carefully editing out specific elements such as the glasses chain and tattoos transformed the image.

• Adding my botanical illustration to the background.

Black and White Editing

Some thoughts on adding a black and white edit. There are so many ways you could make this adjustment to a color image. I like to use Lightroom or Photoshop to adjust saturation to zero and next adjust the high and then low vibrance. You can also adjust the temperatures too.

To view photo retouching service options and purchase retouching services visit my Photo Editing page.

The newest version of Photoshop saves you time by reducing the number of steps in your photo editing workflow by using the new Sky Replacement feature. In the past, replacing the sky required multiple steps and careful fine tuning with masks and the pen tool to achieve a seamless look. Now with Adobe Sensei, Photoshop will do the masking and blending for you. In this project, I created a digital collage featuring Chinstrap Penguins.

This conceptual photography project includes Unsplash images by the following photographers: Derek Oyen (Chinstrap penguins); Renè Müller (sun); Guillaume Galtier (sky) and Karsten Würth (road).