Friday, January 20, 2012

IF Twirl: WhirlyGigs

Twirly-Whirly Gigs
Computer Graphic
©2012 BEDeuel/Bronson Hill Arts
When the new IF topic,Twirl, came out today, a few things came to mind: the new Geico ad with the zip-line-riding pig holding his pinwheels; the beautiful swirling garden art my brother-in-law gave me a couple Christmases ago; my first illustrations of ©Little Blaze Berner  doing her hip-hop twirling dance.

But the strongest image I had was of maple seeds. They have many nicknames such as hellee-copters, propellers, Pinocchio noses and, my favorite, whirlygigs.

I’m not sure if anyone else refers to them as whirlygigs, but in my mind, that’s what I’ve always called the seeds. And, it’s a nice, uplifting childhood memory for me: catching whirlygigs, or just scooping them off the lawn, splitting the pod and removing the seed, then sticking them on my nose.

So, here I had this warm, fuzzy memory that I wanted to illustrate, but I couldn’t think of how I wanted to illustrate it. It’s been a long, and unproductive week, so I didn’t have a lot of ambition to put much into an illustration. Colored pencil would be the nicest way, but I had just finished a colored pencil piece which left me indifferent to doing it again. Anything else would‘ve felt like work, not fun. And, let’s face it, illustrating whirlygigs should only be fun!

A young lady I’ve met recently introduced me to her graphic illustration work(check out her work at deviantart.com; don't be put off by the service's name as hers is mostly fantasy artwork). And while there is probably no way in this lifetime that I’ll ever master Photoshop-like artwork as well as she and her generation have, the thought of it intrigues me.

Then it hit me: I’d only done a couple of illustrations on the Paint program so why not try to meld my warm fuzzy with a newer way of illustration?

So this is my clumsy way of uniting a fun and modern art technique with old-fashioned, naturally-inspired fun. It’s certainly not high art, nor is it even good graphic art, but it was enjoyable doing it.

Kind of like sticking whirlygigs on your nose!

2 comments:

  1. Computer graphics are beyond me, but you have very successfully painted a great picture.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks, Ann, as always, for your support. It was fun to do as well as a bit challenging!

    -Barb

    ReplyDelete

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