My Illustration – Page 10

Posted on April 29, 2016June 6, 2016 by ellajohnston12

Sparrow! Finished Bird of the Fortnight

When Dr B urged me to draw sparrows for Bird of the Fortnight I did so reluctantly – what a fool I was! Through working up the black and white sketches, then exploring the bird through watercolour and ink, I’ve come to realise how charming these creatures are.

Their mottled black, brown, golden and coffee-coloured plumage is really quite lovely. The bird’s bodies are great for an artist too; depending on the individual creature it can either be cute, full and fat or sleek, slim and almost svelte-like. Now I think I’m going to work on a few more sparrow sketches.

I’m not the only one who loves these birds. In fact as I was working on these drawings I was approached by someone who is opening an antiques shop in the US. She wanted a logo featuring a sparrow wearing a crown. I was only too happy to oblige. Here’s the finished commission.

Posted on April 29, 2016April 28, 2016 by ellajohnston12

#FreebieFriday! Stationery Giveaway

In honour of National Stationery Week I thought I’d giveaway some items from my favourite stationery collections (plus some little extras) via Twitter and Facebook.

I’ve gathered a set of my garden bird postcards wrapped in twine, a cute little Thank you notelet, and my last remaining set of screenprinted blue tit writing sheets and black and white bird greetings featuring a scops owl and redshank. In all the collection is worth more than £25 and I’m packing it all up in a handmade box for an extra special gift.

For your chance to win, go to my twitter page @ellajohnstonart and tweet me with the hash tag #loveellasstationery and what you love about stationery. If you’re not on twitter you can visit my Facebook page and post onto the wall what you love about stationery with the hashtag above.

Posted on April 26, 2016April 21, 2016 by ellajohnston12

Beginner’s Guide to Wading Birds

As you know last week myself and Dr B launched our latest book The Migrant Waders. The publication features 21 illustrations of wading birds by yours truly. To accompany the book I’ve produced an illustrated poster of wading birds inspired by vintage bird guides I’ve come across in various antique shops and thrift stores as well as on pinterest.

These illustrated bird guides have been enduring classics in terms of design and I must admit I’m very pleased with my own version. It’s great to see the birds all together and I’m tempted to do a guide featuring my garden birds too.

As well as the poster I’ve also produced a set of postcards featuring the birds.

There are six postcards in the set depicting a redshank, lapwing, curlew, greenshank, avocet and golden plover.

Both the postcards and the poster were printed on textured high-quality gesso paper – I love the way it holds colour and it also shows off the fact that these illustrations were originally created on watercolour paper.

The poster and the cards are available at my various online shops on Folksy, Etsy and Not On the High Street. You can also buy them (along with the book) at the Dunlin Press online store.

Posted on April 25, 2016April 20, 2016 by ellajohnston12

Bird of the Fortnight wc 25.04.16: The Sparrow

For ages now Dr B has been on at me to draw a sparrow; “People love them, I love them. I think they’ll be really popular.” So to please the man I love, this fortnight I’ve done some black and white sketches of these chestnut coloured creatures.

Although I grew up slap bang in the middle of London, our flat was next to a park that used to be full of sparrows when I was little kid. But, by the time I left home in the mid 1990s there wasn’t a sparrow in sight. This wasn’t because I simply wasn’t noticing them anymore but there has been a decline the UK sparrow population. It has been estimated that they have dropped by 71 per cent between 1977 and 2008 with substantial declines in both rural and urban populations. They now have RSPB red status; red is the highest conservation priority, with species needing urgent action.

It seems that where I live now didn’t get this memo. Wivenhoe is full of them and you can’t pass a hedgerow, gate post or indeed our local train station without hearing them tweeting away. It’s quite a comforting sound and creates quite a quaint atmosphere while you’re waiting for your train or taking a stroll around the ‘village’. So it’s only fitting they be the subject of illustration.

Check in later on this week to see more worked-up colour sparrow portraits.

Posted on April 22, 2016June 6, 2016 by ellajohnston12 — 1 Comment

Finished Plant of the Fortnight: Iris

I’m really pleased with my finished plant of the fortnight illustration. I love the way the layers of watercolour have captured the deep blue and purple tones of the iris flower. I’m also happy with how the different nib weights of my felt-tip drawing pens add texture and structure to the petals, stem and leaves.

We’re attempting to grow irises in our garden this year. Regular Ella’s Place readers will know that my garden can be a be of a diva, only growing the things she likes. The garden is lovely as occasionally we agree but I wouldn’t mind her doing me a favour this spring/summer. I’ll let you know if the irises appear and if they look nice I’ll post photos.

Posted on April 15, 2016June 6, 2016 by ellajohnston12

Finished Bird of the Fortnight: Black Headed Gull

As I mentioned earlier this week with my black and white drawings, the black headed gull is a constant companion for any Wivenhoe resident.

The gull isn’t a particularly glamorous bird I suppose, however it is quite a handsome creature in my opinion. It has a gorgeous sleek head (this dark colour comes along in the spring and summer for sexy mating times) and rather lovely white and silver feathers. I love these guys and I’m so lucky to have the opportunity to see them everyday!

I didn’t have to overwork this piece for the final illustration. Although the colour looks light, there are actually several layers of washes in a range of silvery, blue, purple, pink and grey watercolours. Because this bird is quite sleek I don’t want to go to town on fine detail on this drawing, so I kept my ink lines gestural and fluid, maybe a little rough and ready like the birds themselves.

Posted on April 13, 2016April 13, 2016 by ellajohnston12

DIY: Update a wooden box

I’ve had this little wooden box for years. It was plain and unloved for ages. I kept pencils in it and every time I retrieved them I thought “I should really do something with this” and then I’d leave it.

Then a couple of weeks ago I was asked if I wanted to do some projects with Uni-ball the makers of Posca pens. Before I started on the projects I thought it best to re-familiarise myself with them and have a little practice. The pens work on a range of surfaces, so after I used them on a set of notebooks I thought I’d give them a try by drawing on that plain old wooden box.

First I painted the box to give it an even white background. Then I used my wood anemone sketch as a basis for my hand-drawn box design. I wanted to make it look quite retro so influenced by sixties and seventies floral patterns I gave the flowers a bright blue colour.

What I like about these pens is that you can layer them without them bleeding and apply lighter shades over darker ones which means I could add depth to the flowers with lovely yellow centres and white pollen.You can set the design by simply spraying some varnish over it.

You can set the design on the box by

Posted on April 11, 2016March 31, 2016 by ellajohnston12

Bird of the Fortnight: Black Headed Gull

This fortnight’s bird may be rather mundane to some but to me it’s rather special.

Essentially we share our home town with the black headed gull, you only have to walk around the corner from our house and you’ll see these critters flying about or picking at the Wivenhoe mud. They make a great racket too, especially if you’re having chips on the quay!

So if you haven’t seen my bird of the fortnight posts before then what I do is start the week with three black and white pen sketches. I then finish the week with a worked up colour watercolour and ink drawing. Join me on Friday to see the final illustration.

Posted on April 8, 2016April 1, 2016 by ellajohnston12 — 1 Comment

Completed Plant of the Fortnight: Thistle

After whipping up a set of black and white thistles earlier this week I got carried away and did two final watercolour illustrations and a fabric pattern using this gorgeous flower as my motif.

I love a thistle and used them a lot when I style photo shoots – I admire their structural quality and blue, green, two-tone colours. I particularly like drawing them though, you can be really expressive with both the watercolour and the pen work as you can probably tell. They also work incredibly well as an indigo and white pattern – I’ve ordered some fabric in this pattern from my Spoonflower shop so I can make some nice stylish textile bits and pieces.

Posted on April 6, 2016June 6, 2016 by ellajohnston12

Hack: make your own storage buckets

Okay I’ll come clean, I’m using these as storage buckets but they are actually waste paper bins.

I originally bought two Needcraft bin making kits for our upgraded study (pics coming soon) and our ‘continual work in progress’ bedroom. The kit is really easy to use with simple step by step pictorial instructions, I’m not a particularly neat sewer so I like a no-sew quick fix when I can.

The thing is when I made the bins and I didn’t have the heart to put rubbish in them.

As I’m aiming for a relaxing cool blue vibe in my bedroom and I covered the first ‘bin’ in my storm-grey Scandi leaves fabric from my Spoonflower shop.

I was really happy with the end result, so much so that I really couldn’t face filling it with make-up removing cleansing wipes, laddered tights and other bedroom rubbish stuff. It looked too pretty!

So, inspired by a rather nifty idea from Black Parrots Studio’s Sarah Mitchenall on her first round of The Great Interior Design Challenge my bin turned into a book bucket, which has proved to be very handy, as the one thing our house has got is an abundance of books. So this now lives at the bottom of our bed for all our reading needs.

Now the study REALLY needed a bin so I set about making the next one in my tropical trio design, also available at my Spoonflower shop.

Because the instructions are so easy to follow you can make these bins in minutes with either fabric or paper. I’ve had this tropical design for a while and, although I loved it, I was at a loss as to what to do with it. However the fabric’s subtle hues and graphic design suits our workspace perfectly.

And you see that was the problem – too nice. Once I finished that one I could not face using it as a place to throw receipts and scrap paper for recycling. I do however have lots of gift wrap, large format paper, bookbinding cloth and posters I need to keep in one place so my tropical bloom bucket is being used for precisely that.