The Emporium

So you may or may not know that I recently opened an Etsy store. Why the sudden impulse? you may ask. Well it all started a couple of months ago, when I woke up with start at about three in the morning, with my brain running at a hundred miles an hour. You see, I love the Project Life stuff by Becky Higgins, but there tends to be a lot of girly patterns, pastel colours, and pink. And as much as I like the designs, and think they are lovely, they're just not me. What about the Goths and other weird and alternative people out there? I somehow doubt that I'm the only Goth out there that enjoys a bit of crafting or scrapbooking. I think that it's true of most the craft industry, that there is a distinct lack of items that suit the alternative genre to a T. So, with my three in the morning brainstorming session in mind, I decided to do something about that.

So I created my first kit. I know how many people love the Project Life system, especially with it being a way to scrapbook/memory keep even when you are a bit strapped for time, or lack confidence when it comes to being creative. Because of this I designed my kit to work with that system and any future kits will be designed in the same way. Of course you don't have to use them in the Project life system at all if you don't want to. If traditional scrapbooking is more your thing then, by all means, incorporate them into your pages. Truth be known, even though I like a lot of the kits that Project life create, I personally, wouldn't use them with the wallet system, as I prefer tradition scrapbooking or art journals.

I went with Etsy for the store as you can sell digital files. These are downloadable kits that you can either use in digital projects or print them off and use as part of physical pages. It also means that you by once and then can use it as many times as you like, as there is no limit on how many you can print!

I've also got a couple of smaller kits that I'll post here soon for you to download as freebies so keep an eye out for them!

 

This is the main kit that is available in the shop.

This the Occult Gothic Collection (Take a look in store here.)

There are 73 cards in this kit, although you can use them as many times as you like and print out as many as you want, so 73 is the minimum number that you have here. The cards are a mix of 3 inches by 4 inches and 4 inches by 4 inches, with assorted designs, 17 of which are journaling cards.

These are some of my favourite cards from the kit that I have printed out.

I can't wait to dig out some old picture to create some pages with ones.

(Check out my Instagram for close ups.)

I also created  an 8" x 8" paper stack
(Take a look in the store.). They co-ordinate beautifully with the card kit, but would make gorgeous pages on their own.

I decided to go with the 8 inch square pages, because everyone can print an 8" by 8", no matter what printer they have, but not everyone can print 12" by 12".












I'd love for everyone to check out the Etsy shop (It's called The Enigmas Emporium if I haven't already mentioned it), I'd also love to see any of your creations! Tag me on Twitter or Instagram.

Remember to keep your eyes peeled for some freebies on here soon!

Happy scrapping everyone...

Eye Of The Beholder

Scrapbooking always been good way of documenting our memories and everyday life, and is probably one of the best  known and long running ways of documenting our time that there is. Personally I was looking for something more creative than just scrapbooking. Enter the art journal. I wanted something that would work as a part sketch book, part scrapbook, something that would be fun and interesting to look back at in the future.

As much as I love my Polaroid Project its nice to be able to add more. I don't feel that other keepsakes like tickets, notes and the random little things you find, have a place in something such as my Polaroid frame. I have collected a lot of these kind of things over the years and have therefore been planning on starting an art journal for a while now. A couple of weekends ago I finally found the time to start. By start I mean the front cover is done, but I have begun planning some pages, so watch this space.

So after way too much deliberation this is what I ended up creating.

So this started out life as a 8" x 8" Spiral Bound Kraft Scrapbook from Hobbycraft (£3).

These actually come with black ribbon ties.

I decided to remove these with some scissors, and then pushed any fibers that I couldn't get to back into the slot it was originally threaded through, with a Pokey Tool (Yes it's a real thing. Get one here for £4)

Why did I take them off? Because I don't have the patients to keep untying, and retying things. I'm lazy.

I knew that I wanted text on the cover and wanted the look of old books; so I got an old book.

You can relax. I didn't just go and buy a book in order to tear it up. The Librarian at my old secondary school was told he had to get rid of some of the old books. I use to be a student librarian; since he knew I was arty he asked if I wanted to take some of the old books off his hands and use them for something other than just going in the bin.

For my art journal I went with a page from an old Dictionary/Thesaurus/Medical Dictionary. This one was already fairly yellow from age, but I wanted to add to that along the edges. To do this I used the Antique Linen Distress Ink  by Tim Holtz (you may want to shop around and see where you can get it cheapest). I glued down the book page using Mod Podge (matte finish).

For the main design elements for my cover I chose to use some stamps by Visible Image. I absolutely love their stamps. If you haven't checked their stuff out, then you need to; and be prepared to spend. A lot.

For this I used the eye from the Where Dreams Take You set (I have had this stamp a while, as in before it was a part of this set, so the eye is all I have), as well as the Reveal Your True Colours stamp from the Own It! set and an ink splat from the aptly named Ink Splats set.

To start with I stamped each image where I wanted it using the Walnut Stain Distress Ink. I did this so that it would just about show up against the natural colour of the Kraft card.

I wanted to be able to stamp the ink splat in coloured inks and have the colours stand out. The images stamped in Walnut Stain acted as a guide for me to be able to fill in the areas I wanted to colour with White Gesso first as a base for the colours.

Once the Gesso had dried I added the coloured ink splats.

These were done with the Visible Image splat stamp and just a collection of coloured inks. I used pastel pink, blue and purple inks from a variety of brands (mostly ones that I had forgotten about.)








Next I used a black Versafine Ink Pad To stamp the Eye and True Colours images. I did, however, fine that it took awhile for the ink to dry on the Gesso areas so in future I would probably opt to use a Stazon ink pad instead, just to be sure that it actually dries without any risk of smudging.

Afterwards I just added a bit of a doodle in the top left corner using a black pen. When I was sure that all the inks were dry I sealed everything down with a layer of Gloss Finish Mod Podge . 

And there you have it. I hope to be able to start working on some pages soon so watch this space for more art journal related stuff. 

Happy Scrapping!!

If you have and questions or comments I'd love to heard them! As usual, come find me on Twitter and now Instagram using the buttons at the top of the side bar. Alternatively send your messages via carrier pigeon, flying monkey or magic carpet. Unicorns are also an accepted delivery service!! 

Lost In The Tomb

Okay so I think it's time for an update.

Tomb Buddies Twitter and Instagram accounts are all up and running !! Be sure that you follow if you don't want to miss anything. You can also sign up to the mailing list here so you will be the first to know when we open the store.

The store is looking really good at the moment; I'm really excited for you all to see it. I have to keep reminding myself that I still have a lot to do before we get to that. I already have one mug designed and uploaded, and a few more part done and some still floating around in my brain. I also have some ideas sorted for cushions, most of which, will also work on t-shirts and posters.

The Animals Went In 2 By 2...

So I have been squirreling away in the Tomb, plotting and planning, working on my cartoon project. I feel like this is a good time to share a bit and let you in on some secrets, and even have some input.

I can confirm:

• It will be called Tomb Buddies (if you want to get pedantic, Tomb Buddies From Dead With Tequila. But that doesn't have quite the same ring to it.) 
• There are 9 characters.- Hank the Rhino, Milo the Rabbit, Bert the Bear, Giovanni the Giraffe, Vern the Rat, Finnegan the Cat, Nelson the Elephant, Silas the Lion, and Agnes the Hippo.
• There are plans for Mugs and Cushions (exciting stuff, right?).
• Tomb Buddies will have it's own Twitter and Instagram accounts. As soon as they are up and running I'll let you know the handles for each. Tomb Buddies news and info will still be posted to the Dead With Tequila blog, Facebook page and Pinterest accounts. 
• There will be a new store opened especially for them (basically a second Dead With Tequila store).
• The new store will NOT be on Storenvy. 

The new Tomb Buddies store will be on platform called Tictail. Hands up if you have heard of Tictail before now.....No body....Yeah...Me either until I started researching other platforms that integrated with the company we use to print and drop ship our T-shirts, hoodies, posters etc. 

Here's some basic information on Tictail.

They launch in 2012 and are based in Sweden, and they also have an office in New York. Their aim is to make it easy for indie brands/small businesses (like me) to build an online store that looks great an inviting to customers.

Just like Storenvy, Paypal is available for checkout. Or it will be when the Tomb Buddies store is launched. (Interesting fact: Paypal is your only option to check out with on the Dead With Tequila store. We did have Stripe, but after hearing that a lot of other store owners had been victims of fraud, some loosing hundreds of dollars and their merchandise, when using Stripe, I disabled the account.)

Now onto the part where all of you lovely people come in...

If you know, or think of any puns, one liners/jokes that involve, either: a Rhino, a Rabbit, a Bear, a Giraffe, a Rat, a Cat, an Elephant, a Lion or a Hippo, or a combination of any of them, (if you have something that involves all nine animals you may just get the title of Magical Unicorn) please tweet me or Dead With Tequila or just leave them in the comments below. I would be very appreciative. In the event that I use them on a T-Shirt/mug...any other product that I feel like adding, I'm going to list them on the Dead With Tequila blog kind of like a `Wall of Fame`

Thanks in advance. :D

When The Voices Talk To Me

So I've been working away in the +Dead With Tequila Tomb lately mainly on my cartooning project that I mentioned ages ago. It come on a lot in the last few weeks, you'll be happy to hear.

Some of you may have seen this on the Dead With Tequila Instagram account (follow us @deadwithtequila) This a work in progress shot of that project. In the Tomb it has begun to be know as the Tomb Buddies collection. There will be eight characters in total: a Rhino, a Rabbit, a Bear, a Giraffe, a Rat, a Cat, an Elephant, a Lion and a Hippo. All of which have names, but you'll just have to be patient and wait and see what we have called each of them.

The reason that you can see random limbs and floating heads here is because this is essentially going to be a hybrid style of art. everything will be hand drawn, the old fashioned way, on paper and then scanned in and digitally cut out and posed to make the final designs. I have to draw each character then break them down into individual parts and then draw each part from every conceivable angel; hence the reason that things are taking so long. When it's done this will pretty much just be Posters, T-Shirts and Tote bags. I'm considering perhaps doing cushions and maybe even mugs, but I'm going to think on it some more. Cool handmade bookmarks were part of the original plan, but I still haven't quite perfected a design in my head yet, so that may or may not happen. We are talking about creating a separate store for this collection. Purely for that fact that already I have so many ideas of what I'm going to be doing with the characters, and also because we feel that as much as this continues the Day Of The Dead theme that we try and focus on in the Dead With Tequila store, we feel that it's different enough that it wouldn't necessarily fit in with the other collections. This is going to be kept really simple. Black and White, clean lines, and have an overall cute feel to it. There will also be a separate newsletter that you can sign up to, I'll give you more info on that at a later date though.

In other news, I added this to the the store earlier today. You can check it out in the store here. It's made in the USA, and ships from Los Angeles. If you didn't already know our store uses PayPal, so check out is secure.

  

Heads or tails?

So yesterday in the Tomb we started photographing some of the new collections. As these contain necklaces (yes we're branching out) we needed a way to display these....I came you with this....You don't really see it in the item pics but it makes me feel better knowing that it looks nice.

Here's a step by step/ in progress / stages ......whatever...Basically I took pics as I went along.

From Polystyrene to Paper Mache 

Paper Mache to white primer

Primer to drawing on a design

Designing...

...Designing

...Still designing

...Designing some more

Designing to Painting the coloured areas

...More coloured areas

...Even more coloured areas

...And even more...

...And some more just for good measure

And this is the finished item!!! Just had to do all the really fine black line detail (yay) and fill in the black areas

More detail...Why did I insist on so much detail?

More detail round the back.... A couple of people have said that it makes them think of Harlequin.....But you can make your own mind up there

...More detail again.....yes I like to make my own life hell...

And one form the top.

Wibbly Wobbly, Timey Wimey

So you may, or may not know that I recently started a project for +Dead With Tequila. I'm really excited about this one, because it really takes me back to doing one of the things that I love most, and that's cartooning. 

Now, I would never go as far as to call myself a cartoonist, not by a long shot; I'm a graphic artist. I had an amazing art teacher at school who, before she started teaching, use to work as a graphic designer. She was always so supportive, and was always eager to see what I had in mind for my next piece; she really stoked the fire, and would frequently throw new ideas at me that I may never have considered if she hadn't planted the seed. Not that I didn't get that support at home. My mum is also an artist, as was her mum. Both my younger sister and I, grew up being able to paint and draw before we could read and write. When I was little my mum would collect the +Disney comics and have us drawing the characters, and colouring them in. So cartooning was something I started really young, and it pains me to say it, but I haven't done anything like it in ages; so for me this new project is like being a little kid again, but with my own designs and ideas. 

If I'm totally honest with you...I don't like painting. The whole "It's so relaxing" thing just irritates me. I don't find it relaxing, to me, painting is some what of a chore. I do it because I have to, or because it's the most appropriate, viable medium to use for a piece at the time. it's not because I can't paint. I'd like to think that I'm fairly alright at it (if you disagree, that's fine, I love you anyway :]) I just don't find it all that fun. My preferred mediums are Pencil, Pen, ink, Chalk, Charcoal (I love the mess it gets you in!) and of course digital. Paint certainly doesn't make it onto my list. As much as I enjoy creating things on my graphics program, there's nothing like being able to get out all my pencils and fine liners and... just... drawing things. Like with this awesome project!!

This project will become a hybrid of drawing and digital. I'm creating a cartoon series of little weird characters. For this to work on a mass scale (by mass scale I mean, they won't be one offs) my plan is to draw my characters, whole, and at different angles, as well as broken down into parts.  By this I mean arms on their own, legs on the own, heads, bodies etc plus any little extra bits, like plants or bombs (hint hint). Once I've got all of these parts drawn and inked, they will get scanned and taken into my design program. This will mean that I can then build my characters however I want them, without having to redraw them each time. It will also mean that I can get them printed multiple times.

I'm hoping that once I've done a bit more on this project that I will feel as though I can share some "in progress" pics with you. Keeping it all to myself is killing me. Even Carrie (my partner in crime at Dead With Tequila) hasn't really even seen what I've done so far. She knows the very basic form of my plan, but that's about it! I've already started throwing names out there, trying to decide on what to call the collection already. 

I'll tell you this: 

It's all going to be black and white, if I add colour it will be in small places. All the characters are animals, and yes, they do all have names! It has a strong influence of the Day of the Dead festival. Bookmarks.

Make of that what you will.


So, you still, with me after all that?? :P If you are, you can leave a comment below, or find me over at Twitter (see right hand column)              

Shhhhhh...It's a secret...

For anyone wondering about what's been going on in the +Dead With Tequila Tomb of late, the answer is lots of awesome stuff. Quick summary....

• Givaway: We've finally finished putting together what's going to make up the bundle. Details should be up and ready to let you all loose on really soon  NOW!!.   Exciting stuff!! Click Here
• There's about 6 items in the bundle, I think. Give or take.

• The release date for The Wild Life Collection (raising money for WWF) has been narrowed down to June, so keep your eyes peeled for that. You can already preview most the stuff in the store if you want, there's only a few pieces that we haven't up loaded because they're unfinished.

• We've been playing around with some new ideas as well, but I can't say to much on that right now.

• There will be a 10% off flash sale across the store on World Goth Day, that's May 22nd for those that don't know. Coupon code will be revealed nearer the time.
• I did want to do a whole other collection** for this spectacular celebration of Goth awesomeness, but The Wild Life Collection to a lot longer than expected to finish, so there just hasn't been the time. Fingers crossed we might aim to do one for next year and have it as another charity collection (we've discussed the Sophie Lancaster Foundation as a charity)

• There may or may not be another longer sale in the summer. We haven't decided on this yet, so don't get your hopes up (there's still World Goth Day!) 

**I've been wanting to do some more Goth / Alternative style collections for a while now; I've been thinking and Edgar Allen Poe collection (You may say cliche, but I love his work. Random Fact: I have the same birthday as Poe). I recently got a bunch of new arty stuff to play wit that would work really well with this idea. There has also been talk of a Nordic/Viking theme collection, make of that what you will.... Any thoughts on this, or suggestions even...Let me know via comments, Twitter, carrier pigeon, magic unicorn (seriously, I expect a unicorn)

Because I said maybe...

 So in my last post I said that I might post some pic of stuff I'm working on before I finish, so here they are....  

A slightly wonky pic of my Christmas "doodle"

A closer look at the top half

A closer look at the bottom half

This will go into the +Dead With Tequila WWF collection

This will also go into the +Dead With Tequila WWF collection