A Deal That REALLY IS A DEAL

I'm not certain you have picked this up about me yet... probably not.... but I tend to say what I think.  And, if I love something, I REALLY LOVE it and I want to spread the good word (and vice versa, but we won't go into that).  I want all my friends to know about it and get in on a good deal too!

WELL! Such is the case with AMAZON PRIME!  I have been using it for about seven months now and I have loved every minute of it!  If you take the time to bother reading this you WILL THANK ME, I PROMISE!  I'm excited about it today because yesterday I saved TONS in shipping and that excites me.

Yes, you have to pay $79 for a year, up front, but I have WAY more than made that back in benefits! And I will GLADLY pay it again in October.  

WHY????

You wouldn't believe all the benefits!

(first, you get to try it for 30 days FREE!  Do that just for the free shipping!)

1. "UNLIMITED Prime MOVIES and TV Shows "

It works much like Netflix and Hulu Plus (only without commercials!) ... each of those cost $7.99 a month, making their total for a year $95.88 (see, already saving) ... No, not every movie that Amazon sells is free to watch, but there are thousands that are!  And, you can watch them on any digital data device! TV, cell phone, Kindle, iPad, whatever.  

2. The next, most important (to me) benefit is that you get is FREE TWO DAY SHIPPING on almost everything your order!!  Just yesterday I place two different orders and they will both be here tomorrow!..  FREE SHIPPING!!  AMAZING!  And I order almost everything I buy from Amazon because I don't have to pay taxes or shipping!... and, the prices are usually better.  Like the book I show in the left column iPad for Artists: How to Make Great Art with Your Tablet
sells at my local Barnes and Nobel for $19.95 + tax = $21.54, I paid $9.46 TOTAL!  I bet I order something at least every other week. 

3.  A FREE Kindle Book each month.  Would you believe THIS is the reason I joined?!  And I use it the least.... but, the Hunger Games Series was available and I wanted to read them... and I did, for free!  No, you don't have to own a Kindle to take advantage of this one, they have a PC/iPad/Android app so you can read it on any device.

4. There are more things that I haven't bothered to learn about...like a 5 GB Cloud for storage. So, instead of using up all your valuable hard drive space on your iPad/Kindle/whatever, you store songs, movies, pictures, whatever there and access it through "the cloud"!  

Can You Hear Me Giggling?

I don't know what's up with me today but I decided to treat myself with some fun stuff!  None of this has anything to do with doodling...well, except maybe the last thing, but I am so excited I had to share.

I was on Pinterest and decided to look at my "I WANT" board and then to oblige ...

1. butter slicer, love it!  Love butter, HATE cutting it!  Problem solved.

     






2. An Egg Shaper, HOW FUN!!!  now my eggs will fit!  HA!  Just think, PERFECT scrambled egg sandwiches!  I LOVE, LOVE egg sandwiches but not so crazy about all the overlap and bits and pieces, problem solved:

  




3. This last thing was on the "I WANT" board but I ordered it a couple months ago and I won't get it until January :-(  The 3-D Doodler!  FUN!!!  Just wanted to show you what's coming. It was my first introduction to Kickstarter ... who knew?!

You Can Fool SOME Of the People....

Matthew 7:16-20 

By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them. 

 

 

Did It Work???

This time I'm showing you a couple of REALLY BAD examples of some things I made using another new painting app I found called ibisPaint.  I was more interested in how the software worked than what I was actually doing...these were tests.  The software was created by someone in Japan and their idea of "intuitive" is WAY different than mine!  It took me three emails back and forth to Japan to get it to work!  (Not quick or easy when they are 13 hours in a different time zone.... lots of late night correspondence.) And I'm still not sure what I did or if I could do it again.

There are a couple of things this one will do that the others won't.

1. It records all your key strokes into a movie. (at warp speed!)
2. It has a selection wand so you can select and modify areas of a picture.  This is a tool that I use A LOT on my regular PC and I've missed it!

The really tricky part was saving it so that I could upload it here...but I THINK I have it now, we shall see, you are getting it as I am "getting it".

(EXAMPLE 1: uploaded from YouTube)

(Example 2: uploaded from PC...YouTube not necessary! YAY!)

HA!  IT WORKED!!!  Now, the next step is to figure out how to make that thing be of some value.  Right now it runs too fast and there are only three settings that allow me to modify what you see.

1. You can show it with EVERY window that I opened to get what you see.  That would be a wonderful thing if I could add sound and explain it, but as it is it is kind of like a strobe light flashing so fast it makes you sick! ..... (Example #1)
2. You can delete all the window stuff but you still see where I zoom in to get a close area to work in...again, too fast and nauseating! 
3. Results only, no windows, no zooming ... (Example #2).

I was told that if I want to modify it further I would have to do it with different software so now that search is on!

OH! And I guess I should say that ibisPaint is FREE so I can't complain too much :-).  Just so you know, there are actually two versions, one is free, the other is $2.99.  I went ahead and paid the $2.99 in hopes of getting more control NOT!!!  all you get is the same thing without commercials.  So, if that that matters then you now know the ONLY difference in FREE and $2.99.

Washed Anyone's Feet Lately?

OK, so maybe Jesus didn't mean to wash each other's feet literally.  I know that it was the custom then for the host to wash his guest's feet and we don't do that anymore.... Maybe he was showing that we should serve each other, whatever that looks like.... 

However...

Have you ever actually washed someone's feet literally?  I have and it does AMAZING, amazing things to/for both people.  It is very humbling for both people and walls are broken.

About 10 years ago I went on a mission trip to St. Petersburg Russia.  There were about 10 Americans and 60 Russian ladies meeting to prepare for service on a weekend retreat.  We were all sitting in a circle very much "alone" individuals, not feeling "part of a team" because no one really knew more than one or two other people...even the Americans were complete strangers.  The first thing the leader of  "the team" did was go around the room and washed each and every person's feet!!!  People started crying and hugging each other and we instantly became "THE team" God had gathered together to get a job done.  AMAZING!  

I am convinced that if every Pastor would do that for their staff their church and "THE Church" would become new again! And we SO NEED THAT! Who knows, it may take someone like
YOU to wash your pastor's feet first so he will see its affects???

Go wash someone's, anyone's feet and see what happens.

Re-doing Past Doodles on the iPad

Today I decided to redo some of the doodles I have done in the past with watercolor pencils but do them this time using the iPad.

1. The original picture from Pinterest that I thought was too cute.
2. My original little doodle (9/11/2011) of her using watercolor pencils
3. My re-doodle of #2 on the iPad (4/28/13)
4. On this one I decided to be a little more detailed and I used the original picture as my "paint pallet".... You do that by having a small version of the original photo open and holding the stylus down over the color you want, that will change your current working color to the one you want....kinda like having a pallet of all the colors you need only still in the shape of the picture.  Now  THAT is why all those "color combinations" on Pinterest are so important!... you have a built in color pallet that has colors that go good together, less thinking and frustration involved.  And, its really nice to have the reference there so close.

Are you starting to see why I am recommending the Jot Pro Stylus?!  You get so much more control over where a thin line actually goes.  I still try to draw somethings with my finger and the line never goes where it should.  Now, the finger is great for big wide stokes, like when you need to erase big areas, so I don't rule them out!

Manipulating the Color

I can not begin to tell you how much time I spent yesterday trying to create a "real" looking watercolor brush in Procreate!!!  NOT POSSIBLE! (for me anyway)

So, I finally gave up and took the idea over to ArtRage.  I'm still not happy with it but there are just too many varibles and percentages to play around with and too little patience on my part to bother!

 

*** NOTE ***  See all that white space below the picture ^^^ , well, it isn't really there on the actual picture.  BlogGo is adding it... it is a bug in the software that I have reported and "it is being looked at"....  I really am liking BlogGo  but there are definitely some areas for improvement!  I have mentioned some to the developer and hopefully she will make them happen!  I replaced it with Blogger

ANYWAY!  Back on subject....

One thing I did do yesterday to help me see how things work in Procreate is to create a chart showing how changing a layer affects the layer underneath it.

Layer 1 is the solid green square

Layer 2 is showing how changing the layer to "Multiply", "Linear Burn", etc. shows up on that layer.  I used the same color green as the big square and wrote what I was doing ... see how it affects the color?  

 

Possible appications would be... if I draw a face on layer one, instead of coming up with a darker shade for contouring I can just create a layer above, use the same color and it will automatically produce a darker, or lighter version of the original.

Well heck, let's prove my point....
 

Not bad for someone who is COMPLETELY CLUELESS about how things SHOULD be done and who is just making it up as she goes huh?  I know I haven't discovered a new something, I've just discovered a new something FOR ME.
 

 

Using What's Already There

Almost 2 years ago I did a "Believe" by hand with markers so tonight I started out trying to "redo" that... only different.  I started out natural enough...flowers inside outline on white...but it didn't take long for me to rethink the redo and go with black letters making the flowers pop.  Then I decided to go with what I already had, the background I created for yesterday's girl (that's the bit behind the word).  Then I played with the black boarder and this is what I got:

 

 

OH! and here is the Believe I did two years ago:

 

 

They are the same right???

Same Thing Only Different

Just change/add/hide a few layers and you have a whole new look. 

 Gotta love layers!

I LOVE using the iPad to draw!  HECK, I could have bought one a LOT sooner if I hadn't spent so much money on all those art supplies!  Live and Learn.

OH! and this is a modified 2 Corinthians 5:17

***IMPORTANT NOTE:  I heard from an iDraw developer last night and you can, indeed, convert text to curves so that you can modify them so, no need for both iDraw and InkPad like I thought might be the case on the post I wrote on the 19th.  I personally would go with iDraw....I THINK there is more functionality, but heck, the way some things are hidden ya just never know for sure.

Playing With Brushes

Today's doodle was FUN!

I always have more fun when I learn something new.  Today I figured out what is required to make a brush from scratch.... I decided that I want a brush of eyes so that I can add eyes to any figure with one click.  The thing that I figured out is you have to create a negative or  the opposite of what you want to create...like the thing that is WHITE is what will "print" and the black will show up clear... Example of a "brush" I made:

For some reason that kinda messes with my brain.  It would be an easy fix on a regular computer, just draw it in black then reverse the colors... I don't think I have a package that will do that on the iPad yet so I had to start with a black background and draw in white.  I used the mirroring tool in Sketchbook Pro so that I only had to draw one eye while the software drew the other....in white.

Anyway, you can see the eyes on my girl...easy, easy to modify once they are there.  I LOVE IT! 

I used lots of brushes on the background, some that came with Procreate, some I made.

I went back to fix a couple things that were bothering me and decided to make a cropped version as well, I think I like it better: