sources of inspiration

good lord, it's been a long time since i posted here! things have been crazy. if you read my nicblog, you know that my dad got very sick on march 1st and passed away on march 25th. it was a terrible month. to make matters even worse, i had to prep for the stationery show in the month and a half after his passing. so, life was pretty much insane.

now it's a bit lighter. work has slowed down to a normal pace again, and we're all sort of adjusting to our new world without my dad. 

in good news, work is great. i now get to spend all of my time illustrating, and that to me is the best gift ever. after years of giving up on an illustration career, i've found my way back to it. and that is brilliant. to check out my new notecard line and my new wedding invitations, all illustrated by me, please go to my site. 

image courtesy of jennibick.com

in more inspiration, i was given this sketchbook yesterday by my hubby. it's the fabriano artists journal. a colleague of his used it for his sketching, and i fell in love. well, that colleague was nice enough to give him one for me yesterday (thanks jeremy!). it's a fun sketchbook, with multi-colored pages, and it inspires me to want to sketch fun things. sort of being like a kid again with a construction paper pad. i absolutely adore it.

hoping to fill this book up with tons of inspirational sketches. =)

so what inspires you?

my little girl's birthday gift

last year i made an illustration for my daughter's 1st birthday party invitations. i made the original large enough to print and frame, and i put it up in our home above her toy chest. my goal was to make a new one each year for her birthday, so she could keep all of them and look back later to see the changing pieces.

of course, this year i have been completely swamped with work, and waited until last night to start -- and finish -- the piece. thankfully it worked out.

the theme is 2, for her second birthday. so she has two toys with her -- her "ivy doggy" and her "baby ocean", as she calls them. rainbow is her "favorite color" (ha!), so she's wearing a rainbow shirt, and the floor is based on her bedroom carpet.

she came out this morning and immediately pointed to ivy doggy. so i've done my job. happy birthday anna jae.

my super-secret holiday gift, revealed!

my grandpa, al maddalena, 1920-2007

i wanted to do something special for my family's christmas gifts this year. when you're lacking in available funds, it's great motivation to be creative and thoughtful...

since my grandfather passed away on christmas eve, 2007, i thought i might do a portrait of him. i didn't tell anyone that i was doing it -- the only one who knew was my hubby. i worked on it for about a week and a half (painting on the computer helps -- no drying time to factor in). and when it was finished, i did a print for each member of my family, my mom and my grandma getting framed versions and the rest were unframed.

a lot of happy tears, and clearly this piece went over well. =) i must admit, it was the most fun i ever had doing a portrait. i got to look at my grandpa's smiling face every night. what could be better than that?

the progression/process is below.

photo i was working from. our wedding rehearsal dinner, april 6, 2006.

first rough blue sketch...

 first layer of color throughout...

 all dark colors in, highlights and finishing details to come...

finished piece.

detail of my grandpa's smiling face. =)

cross-post: wood inspiration

i'm currently working on a drawing for a ready-to-order set to add to the nic notes marriage line. it involves winter, and wood, and all those great outdoor things. 

so i started thinking, how many illustrations out there really involve wood? how many will inspire me? well, i have my answer. check it out:

 my dishonest heart by audrey kawasaki.

 aesop's fable cover, illustration by milo winter.

 illustration by kristiana parn.

 winter woods abstract by joseph rossbach photography.

 we in winter woods, morton lloyd garchik.

 winter woods, illustration by vivien blackburn.

illustration from lokomotywa, by jan lenica

 the old woman in the wood, illustration by arthur rackham.

winter woods, illustration by karin neumann.

new illo started!

this illustration will be a print as well as a notecard. all about brooklyn and its wacky individuals.

it still needs color! but it's a start!

top secret project is complete!

woo-hoo! just finished the painting for the top secret project. again, if you know this person, then shush.

detail of the face.

detail of the hand.

this is the pic i was working from for the piece. it's actually 2 photos put together. i like to work from multiple images, and had some other photos of the subject here for inspiration and feel. 

top secret update!

*almost* done. just need to do the hair and i'm finished. but i can't complete it tonight. we will meet again...

update on painting progress...

i got a lot done!

sneak peek! current portrait project...

this one is on the DL. big secret surprise portrait. if you know who this is... keep your mouth shut! LOL

sneak peek! new invites fresh off the press...

can't give you guys all the details yet. but i just got these back from peter kruty editions, and they are FABULOUS. they just look better than i could have imagined.

can you guess the setting?

a newly found old commisssion

i'm in the process of updating my websites, and i was looking for work that i have not yet shown off. sadly, it seems as though i've lost a lot of files throughout the years.

that's the bad news.

the good news is, i found something i thought was lost forever. a private commission i did in 2006.

"the girls", a private commission. © nicillustration 2006

this piece was commissioned by my then-boss of his 3 daughters for his wife. it was a very large painting -- 4 ft wide by 3 ft high, i think, or something like that -- and was to be hung in their second home in miami. he wanted something modern, but his idea of "modern" just, you know, wasn't (like warhol was actually current).

so i started going through my library for inspiration. sebastian kruger is always a major source of inspiration for me, and i found just what i needed in his collection -- a group portrait of the stones (his favorite subject) that showed each band member in a different "panel" of sorts. they all had their own background and color schemes. yet, it works together.

so i took that idea and pushed it a little further. i took photos of my client's daughters, each in a different location at their home. different lighting, different backgrounds. then i took a group shot of them together. i used the images to come up with a composition where each of the girls had their own color scheme and setting, but yet were actually interacting with each other and reaching across the panels, taking on the new setting/color scheme of the panel they carried into.

it took me a long time to work on the piece. about 6 months total. but i think the end product was worth it.

glad i found the photo.

just for you, mr. trump

hello mr. trump! i hope that you are reading this after my tweet to you today @realDonaldTrump.

i did this painting of you in 2004, for an illustration for Online Degrees magazine (no longer in publication). i was thinking of selling it, and i thought i would offer it to you first.

so, if you're interested, make me an offer! i'm happy to deliver it in person too. =)

all the best,

nicole block

designer and illustrator, the nic studio

poster for the haiti poster project

i finished my poster for the haiti poster project! the concept centers on all the countries in the world that have donated help for haiti, to help rebuild. the sizes of the flags shown represent how much one country may have given in relation to another. the building is based on a number of painted metal shacks in port au prince's la saline market.

the poster may be printed generously by the folks at red dog graphics. however, they can only donate printing for one designer, and since a few of us finished by their deadline, there will be a vote held online to decide who is the lucky designer. i will alert my fans as to when the voting begins. =)

cross-post: drawing for new project

what do we think? hand-drawn illustration for a current project. i think it's pretty damn, well, pretty!

sketch of DUMBO brooklyn

i'm doing studies of brooklyn neighborhoods for some stationery work i'm doing. this is of DUMBO.

final illustration!

here's how the final illustration looked! client is very happy.

cross-post! my little girl's first birthday invitation

i just finished illustrating and designing our daughter's first birthday invitation. i did the illustration rather large, so i'm actually going to hang it for her in our apartment, and then switch it out each year with her new birthday illo.

i hope you enjoy it!

second baby illustration -- little boy blue

to welcome a new little boy into the girl-laden lot, i made a piece for mr. spenser everett that was based on little boy blue. again, i accomplished it all on my wacom cintiq, and i documented a bit of the process below.

i started out with a brown grounding in the background to work off of, just as i would a painting. i wrote out the colors that i wanted in my sketch layer, and then quickly blocked them out in my painting layer so that everything could come together faster.

as you can see, i started to lay in the dark details, like these on the house, after i had layed in the majority of the basic colors. my "brush" technique was influenced by this tutorial from digital arts online.

i started to actually lay in the brighter color details after that.

as you can see, the sketch layer remained available to me to work from as i moved forward in the project. i tried to bring all areas together at the same time so that it was a united piece. the last this i had to address as of this point was the boy himself.

when the sketch level was hidden, you can see the level of completion in the overall piece, and how the details had yet to be added to the boy.

and the piece is complete! i'm really happy with how this turned out. i hope you enjoyed seeing the steps in the process! it's good to know that you can still get a fulfilling "painting" experience when you cannot use paints at the moment. its definitely not the same as a palette, a brush, and my pigments, but it's the next best thing.

baby gift #1 - mary mary quite contrary

there are an awful lot of babies in our lives right now! we're meeting new little people every day, and getting ready for the arrival of others. i decided to make a few gifts last week for some very special babies in my life.

first, there is the gift for my friend kelly's daughter-to-be, kayla aubrey. kelly is due in january (the day before anna's bday), and her shower was saturday the 24th. i decided to go to nursery rhymes for inspiration, and decided on "mary, mary, quite contrary", as kelly is an avid gardener.


the piece was started and completed on my cintiq screen, since i still haven't figured out how best to paint in the house without harming anna with the fumes. but as i've learned, i can get the feeling of painting really easily with my cintiq -- no wet paint and brush, unfortunately, but otherwise it's pretty close.

i went with a very fantastical version of the nursery rhyme, as i found out what the rhyme really was about (bloody mary!) and i had to move as far from that as possible.

kelly seemed to love it! i really hope she did.

enjoy!

the next installment...

can you tell where i'm going yet? probably not...