Behind the Scenes with Segmation: Meet Digital Artist Ana Villanueva

Most of you know that Segmation is the Art of Pieceful Imaging, but very few of you get to experience the magic that goes on behind the scenes.

For this reason, we are eager to answer a burning question some of you have asked:

Where do we get the artwork that YOU bring to life?

Digital Artist Ana Villanueva creates some of Segmation’s pattern sets. Her most recent creation included our Independence Girls.

                            “One of the best things in life is to love what you do, so you can get better at it.”
~Ana Villanueva~

Ana Villanueva is a digital artist from Valencia, Spain. Since she was a child she was always drawing and creating characters. She has been able to make a living of her talent and provide illustration and animation services all around the world. A lot of her inspiration comes from comics, funny cartoons and pop culture. Ana really enjoys making people smile with her art and to illustrate beautiful and colorful characters.

 

 

 

 

Ana’s artwork can be printed on t-shirts, prints, phone cases, mugs, stickers and other goodies. AnishaCreations is available now on Society6 and Redbubble.

“If you really want to catch your dreams you will have to chase them.”
~Ana Villanueva~

She majored in Fine Arts and focused on computer animation and illustration. At a very young age her talent in drawing and creating characters was easily noticed. Years later she turned her natural talent into a career.

Other Segmation Sets by Ana

Have some Ghoulish Fun!

 

 

 

 

Santa’s Girls

 

“Whatever you decide to do in life makes sure it makes you happy!”
~Ana Villanueva~

In addition to filling Segmation with stellar pattern sets, Ana provides illustrations, animation and creative services all across the globe. She pulls a lot of her inspiration from comics, cartoons and pop culture. The digital artist enjoys making people smile with her art and to illustrate beautiful, colorful and fun characters.

Demo Reel: Anisha Creations from Ana Villanueva on Vimeo.

“Life is better when you are laughing.”
~Ana Villanueva~

We hope you enjoyed meeting Ana, digital artist for Segmation. Follow Segmation on Facebook and Twitter to see what pattern set Ana will create next.

Read more Segmation blog posts about art

Tips for Improving your Landscape Drawing Skills

Extracting Art from Science

The Creative, Artistic and Inventive Mind of Leonardo da Vinci 

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FEATURED ARTIST: JASMINE FLYNN

“The latest involvement I see would be “holiday fantasy” which I am using bright colors, amusing shapes, and “magical” touches such as glitter.”

-Jasmine Flynn

Jasmine specializes in visual design and contributes her talents into many designing factors. Whether it’s fashion design, illustration, product design, advertisement, or constructing finalized projects she places her best effort in the completion of any work she assigns herself to or assigned to. The process of design has always intrigued Jasmine artistically, to possess the ability to create is something she holds dearly as something valuable. Jasmine describes her work by allowing to communicate for itself to the viewer, and to allow herself as an artist to simply contribute her gift in limitless ways.

Stop by Segmation’s SegPlay Mobile on iPhone/iPad and Android to see young talented Jasmine Flynn’s Dressy Gals and Dressy Guys Segmation Patterns. Dressy Guys includes various styles including a Green vested, Checkered, Gentlemen, Circle Fashion, Family Fashion and the ever popular Doo Wop! Dressy Gals is another set from Jasmine Flynn, who has an eye for fashion. Dressy Gals includes several neat looking colorful outfits and models, including the Blue Square, the Blue and Purple, the Red Diamond outfit, Ballerina, Summer Outfit and the Pink Haired girl!

Dressy Gals – Pink Haired Girl

Dressy Guys Green Vested

Read more Segmation blog posts about Art:

Tips for Improving your Landscape Drawing Skills

Extracting Art from Science

The Creative, Artistic and Inventive Mind of Leonardo da Vinci 

Be a Artist in 2 minutes with Segmation SegPlay® Mobile for iPhone/iPad and Android https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/segplay-mobile/id395127581?mt=8 and https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.segmation.segplaymobile.

On Jasmine Flynn’s flickr account http://www.flickr.com/photos/simplyjasmine/, you will find a large variety of drawings that she has posted since 2011. She also is a contributor to Keel Magazine at  https://www.facebook.com/KEELMAGAZINE.

Hole-Punch Portraits Make Artist Famous

There are many different mediums with which to create art. Some of those art constituents include various types of paint, chalk pastels, charcoal pencils, mosaic fragments, metals, and the like. But would you ever imagine that hole punch dots could be used to craft incredible portraits? An artist from the United Kingdom is proving to the world that these dots are definitely a worthy art medium.

Artist Nikki Douthwaite has made a practice of collecting hole punch dots for the past three years. After sorting them by shade, she uses the dots to create portraits, which are “inspired by magazine photos,” of pop icons. The artist was led to use this particular medium after studying Gorges Seurat (pointalist artist) in school.

How exactly does one craft a large portrait out of hole punch dots? The answer is, with patience and very carefully. Douthwaite uses tweezers to place the dots onto her canvas. She commented, “I use the dots like paint. I do different colors for the feel of the picture, and there are thousands of colors in each piece.”

According to the artist, the most time-consuming aspect of the portrait process is composing subjects’ hair. Facial features are reportedly “easy.” Oddly, Nikki Douthwaite admitted that “the younger and prettier (a subject is), the harder I seem to find it, as there seems to be less distinguishing features.” Douthwaite reported that each of her works of art takes 6 to 15 weeks to complete.

Some of Nikki Douthwaite’s portrait subjects include Marilyn Monroe, John Lennon, Jemi Hendrix, and Simon
Cowell. Monroe’s portrait required about 100,000 dots, whereas Cowell’s took an amazing 189,000 dots. The artist spent a liberal amount of time on all her pieces, include the portrait on John Lennon, which demanded 140,000 hole punch dots.

More and more artists are bringing art out of the box and demonstrating that the sky is truly the limit when it comes to art mediums. If hole punch dots are being used to create attention-grabbing art, imagine what other elements could be used to compose art that makes the world turn its head.

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More Anders Leonard Zorn – Swedish Portrait Painter

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Anders Leonard Zorn was born in Sweden in 1860. Though his parents never married, he was allowed to take his father’s name. Raised by his grandparents, Zorn spent his childhood in Yvraden and attended Mora Strand and a grammar school in Enkoping.

From a very early age, Anders Zorn showed great potential as an artist. He desired to become a famous sculptor and spent many hours carving pieces of wood into realistic objects. His love of sculpting and obvious talent transferred well into the realm of painting. From 1875 to 1880, Zorn studied this art medium at the Royal Academy of Arts in Stockholm, Sweden.

Initially, Zorn enjoyed painting watercolors. His 1880 watercolor, In Mourning, drew attention for its detail and realistic portrayal of a grieving woman.

Knowing that he wanted to marry, Zorn set off at an early age to make a substantial living as an artist. Fortunately, his talent made him quite successful all over Europe. He had a unique knack for painting portraits. Anders Zorn believed that a portrait should be painted with background detail appropriate to the subject’s own life setting. He became well known for his true representation of both culture and character when painting a portrait. Zorn’s portraits contained a variety of subjects from the esteemed political and royal figures of his day to typical rustic images. In England, Zorn was especially known for his nude paintings.

By 1885, Zorn had made his fortune and was able to marry his wife Emma. They spent the first eleven years of their marriage traveling abroad, but always returned to Sweden for the summer. Emma was instrumental in Zorn’s career. She willingly took on the role of critical analyst. It was during these years that Zorn mastered the complicated task of painting realistic water scenes, which is a feat he is still praised for today.

Zorn switched from painting watercolors to painting oils in 1887. The second oil painting he completed, A Fisherman in St Ives, was a quick success.

By this point in his life, Zorn had mastered three incredible talents. First, he was making money painting realistic and lively portraits. Second, he could paint light reflecting off water – a rare technique at the time. Third, the paintings he created during his summers in Sweden proved he could manipulate light and create both shadows and sunbeams. To combine all three, Zorn painted many subjects in and around water.

Being recognized as a great artist allowed Zorn the opportunity to travel to the United States in 1893. He served as superintendent of the Swedish art exhibition at the Columbian World Fair held in Chicago. Throughout the rest of his life he traveled back to the United States for work and pleasure. His talent for painting portraits had reached America and he was in constant demand. Two Presidents sat for Anders Zorn; Grover Cleveland and William Taft.

Zorn also enjoyed etching. He even illustrated an etching of Theodore Roosevelt. It was an art form that Zorn began practicing in the early 1880’s and continued to use as he created masterpieces throughout his life. In all, he completed 289 etchings, most of which were portraits.

In 1896, Anders and Emma moved back to Sweden for good. A cottage from his grandfather’s farm was relocated and the Zorn’s spent several years remodeling and expanding it. The pair quickly immersed and invested themselves in the community. They started reading programs, a library, and a children’s home, in addition to opening a local school.

Zorn’s passion was to discover a way to preserve Swedish folk music. His work sparked a renaissance of folk music in Sweden and kept it alive. Even today, the most prestigious award for a folk musician is the Zorn award.

Zorn continued to paint until his health began deteriorating. In 1920, Anders Leonard Zorn passed away. A diverse group of people attended his funeral as a true testament to a life of dedication and talent; from the Swedish royal family to colorful characters from all walks of life and from many places.

The Zorn cottage in Sweden still stands today. Part of it is devoted to a museum. It is preserved not only as a historical testament to the era in which Zorn lived, but in memory of a giving, adventurous man who shared his talents with the world.

There are 33 paintable patterns.

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Anders Leonard Zorn

Anders Leonard Zorn (1860 – 1920) was one of Sweden’s best portrait painters. Although skilled as a sculptor and printmaker, Anders achieved his fame with the use of oils and watercolors depicting rustic life, nudes, and an assortment of portraits. His skill with portraits lies with his ability to depict the individual character of the person.

Lighting and the treatment of water were particularly extraordinary in his works. Anders believed that a portrait should be painted in an environment that was natural for the model.

Our collection of Anders Zorn patterns contains many of his most recognized works including Margit, Midsummer Dance, Our Daily Bread, A Fisherman in St. Ives, and Night Effect. There are also several self-portraits included.

There are 33 paintable patterns.

Would you like to enjoy painting Anders Leonard Zorn masterpieces yourself? If so, visit http://www.segmation.com/products_pc_patternset_contents.asp?set=ALZ to see our Anders Leonard Zorn patterns. These patterns are basically paintable images of Zorn’s paintings.

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Colors to Market by…

Using a particular color to market a product or brand is nothing new — but it’s effectiveness has never been higher.

All colors have some sort of symbolism that contribute to traditions, cultures, religions, concepts, superstitions, and feelings. Some of these colors are even thought to stir physical reaction in people. This encourages companies and organizations to choose their branding colors carefully.

Mr. Marketing, Rob Weinberg offers this advice: “Extend your message with colors as you would your logo, tagline, URL or other branding tools. Reinforce your color choices at every turn and you should find people recognizing them…and you.”

Do you think this is true? To draw on an example from his article, Make Selling more Colorful (http://www.pomeradonews.com/2011/10/26/ask-mr-marketing-make-selling-more-colorful/), Weinberg points out how Tiffany and Company uses robin’s egg blue boxes to wrap jewelry. This has been so effective that the color is recognized as their own (even though no one can own a color). If another company chooses to use the same color, their products or services might be mistaken for the jewelry company. In this situation, the company who follows may generate business from doing so or they may be looked down upon as a cheap knock-off. In other words, they’d have to return to the drawing board — literally.

While this approach may not produce the desired results, the thought process is right on target. They noticed how a certain color attracts a niche market and encourages those people to buy a particular product. This means the start-up company is probably close to developing their own branding package with a carefully selected color scheme — just like Tiffany and Company.

Weinberg implies the chief reasons why companies and organizations use colors in their marketing campaigns and branding techniques is because they are effective tools for non-verbal communication. Since colors can evoke a physical response from individuals, company’s use all sorts of colors and color combinations to advance their purposes.

A good example of this is the color red, which is said to encourage the feeling of hunger. It also attracts attention, elevates heart rate and gets people excited. Therefore, is it a surprise that fast food chains like McDonalds, Wendy’s and Burger King all use red in their logos? At the time when fast food was becoming popular in American culture, a lot of thought was going into the cognitive and subconscious effects of colors. Confirming studies and business successes encouraged other companies to approach color branding with high regard. This is why American grocery stores like Costco, Jewel-Osco, and Winn-Dixie use the color red in their logos, along with pharmacy stores like Walgreens and CVS.

This branding technique is widely applied. With the competitiveness of the marketplace today, it is necessary for companies to perform some sort of market research, or in depth study of color before unveiling a campaign, logo or new color scheme.

After all, the secret is out. Colors are great marketing tools. Now, allow us to ask; what color defines and promotes you best?

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What to Write About on Your Art Blog (www.segmation.com)

 

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In a previous blog post, we explained 3 ways that artists can benefit from blogging. Basically:

• A blog provides exposure for you and your work.
• A blog provides insight into your working process.
• A blog facilitates connections between you and your fan base.

Now that you’ve set up your blog, what should you write about? Let’s take a look at a range of topics you can blog about to keep your readers interested in coming back for more!

Give your readers an inside glimpse into your studio. Show them what you’re working on and tell them about your working process – what inspires you, what materials and techniques you are using, what challenges and surprises you’ve encountered.

Show your readers a bit about your personal life – but not too much. An art blog is an ideal way to get “personal” with your fan base and potential gallery contacts. By including cute anecdotes about something you experienced or by sharing photos of your new dog, your blog readers will see you more as a real person than as a bunch of pixels on a screen.

At the same time, be careful not to get too personal. Be aware that everything you write can affect your image, so don’t write posts about what you ate for breakfast or what TV shows you watched last night. There is such a thing as “too much information”, so before you hit the “publish” button, ask yourself, “Does it help or hurt my art business if people know this about me?”

Plug your upcoming gallery shows, competitions you’ve entered, workshops you’re leading or attending, and any other art-related events. Your fan base will be interested in seeing that you are active in your field, so keep them updated on your artistic activities. It’s okay to toot your own horn, but try to avoid “sales talk”.

Write about things that inspire you. You can write about other artists you admire, your favorite place to paint, or a cloud formation that caught your eye on the way to the grocery store that you quickly captured in your sketchbook.

Provide tips about making art. By sharing what you’ve learned about art, you can help establish yourself as an expert in your field. Other artists will appreciate your openness and potential collectors will take note that other artists look up to you.

Above all, remember to make your art blog both friendly and professional. Think of your blog as a combination of:

• an ongoing conversation with a trusted gallery owner whom you have known for years
• a warm welcome to a new fan of your artwork
• a chance for friendly art talk over a cup of virtual coffee

In other words, many different types of people will be interested in reading your art blog, so try to write with these various audiences in mind.

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How to Make Your Own Oil Paints

In a previous blog post, we discussed the benefits of making your own paints, rather than buying commercially-made paints from art supply stores. Two of the most appealing reasons for making your own paints include the ability to control the color and the quantity of the paint that you make. In today’s blog post, we’ll take a more in-depth look at how you can make your own oil paints using just a few simple supplies.

The two main ingredients you’ll need for making your own oil paints are powdered pigment and an oil, such as linseed oil (which most oil painters usually have on hand anyway). The tools you’ll need to mix the ingredients can either be a mortar and pestle (shown above), or a sturdy spatula and a flat glass surface. The mortar and pestle is the preferred choice because it will allow you to grind the pigment into finer particles.

To make your own oil paint, place your desired amount of pigment onto the glass surface or into the mortar. Add a small amount of oil and grind together the pigment and the oil using your pestle or spatula. Be sure to start off with a small amount of oil, because you don’t want your mixture to be too runny.

As the pigment absorbs the oil, note the consistency. If the mixture looks too dry, add more oil. If it is too oily, add more pigment. Your goal is to create a mixture that resembles the consistency of toothpaste.

Once the pigment and oil are thoroughly mixed, then you are ready to paint! The process is as simple as that. Your homemade oil paint can be mixed with commercially-made oil paints, and it may be stored in tubes or airtight jars for future use. segmation dot com.

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The Benefits of Making Your Own Paints

Did you know that you can easily and affordably make your own paints right at home? The supplies needed to make oil paints, acrylics, watercolors or pastels are fairly inexpensive and they can be easily purchased online or at a local shop. You don’t need a giant studio or an excessive amount of supplies to make your own paints – all you need are a few basic ingredients pertinent to each medium, and a tabletop that you can use as your work area.

You might wonder, “Why should I bother making my own paints?”

There are a number of reasons why it is beneficial for artists to make their own paints. For starters, when you break down a specific medium to its individual components, it helps you to understand the nature of the medium. Taking part in the process of creating an oil paint or a pastel stick provides invaluable insight into the qualities of that particular medium. Plus, the magic of watching loose powdered pigment transform into a usable paint can become part of the overall creative experience.

One of the best things about making your own paints is that you can control the hue, value and intensity of each color. If you need a specific shade of green that is difficult to mix using commercial paints, you can create your own. If you need a range of blues to create skyscapes and seascapes, you can create the exact colors that you need and save them for future use.

It’s easy to forget that there was once a time when all artists either had to make their own paints or purchase these supplies from a local artisan. The vast majority of artists today buy their paints and art materials off the shelf. Most artists don’t even think twice about how these materials are made or what is actually in them. This has changed our relationships to our art materials. By making your own paints, you can reinvigorate your connection to the materials that you use to create art.

In future articles, we’ll take a closer look at the process involved for making oil paints, pastels, watercolors and acrylics.

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