Illustration: Thank You Cards

I didn't manage to get any thank you cards out last year, and I felt really bad about it – I always send them out, but I was really busy around Christmas 2013 and couldn't find time until it was really too late, and then I was horrendously sick on my birthday for 2014 and was knocked out for over a week, and then flat out trying to catch up on missed work. Even with these excuses, I've been feeling guilty, so this year I've succeeded in doing thank you cards for Christmas, at least!

Here's the illustration I did for them. For the past six years I've been doing thank you cards featuring this girl, but I decided to depart from that theme. 

I did the sketch on Christmas Eve. I'm still really busy, and haven't taken many days off over Christmas, so I'd already done some work and just wanted to vege in front of the tv and sketch something brainless, with no plan whatsoever. I started by deciding to sketch a girl in the dress I was wearing for Christmas (although mine is navy blue with while polkadots, not red), and then just let it go wherever it wanted – and I liked it enough to turn it into my thank you cards. 

I had a lot of fun painting it, I haven't been able to find time for much painting lately, and it was fun to do something a bit messier and without having to worry about perfect linework. 

The font I used in the background is the Harman family – it has a nice variety of of font styles that all work well together, along with a nice selection of flourishes. 

I decided I wanted the cards to look shiny, so I printed off the images onto photo paper, cut them all out and mounted them on plain white cards, using a bit of double-sided foam to give a bit of height. 

And then I wrote in all the cards tonight, and that's something I can cross off my list! I'm quite pleased with how they all came together – a few wonky bits, but that's okay. =)

Sketch using a 0.7 mechanical pencil with a #B lead in a Moleskine sketchbook

Painting in Adobe Photoshop CC with a Wacom Intuos Pro 5