Getting Settled

It's taken me almost 2 weeks but I have finally made progress in the office/sewing room. That's not to say I'm completely set up yet, but I do have all of my computers (most of which are having issues) set up. I have started the process of transferring all my precious files to the new laptop. This is very slow going folks. Especially as I try to get my work files (mostly profile silhouettes, about 90% of the ones I have made.) For some reason the Dell laptop they are on is being super slow - make that "super duper." It takes about a 1/2 hour for it to get started and is really slow starting any operation. I think it might be the hard drive.

For the moment I'm just grateful it has decided to turn on for me one more time! I've slowly been transferring my files using jump drives. It's working very slowly, but it is working nonetheless.

Anyway, I have re-opened my shop and have already had 2 sales! I'll share my first project with you. Isn't she lovely?

I recently met a university professor who teaches Graphic design. We had a long conversation about geeky things like Photoshop, Illustrator, art styles and such. Actually I rather enjoyed myself since it was the first time since I left college that I got to have a work related conversation with a peer, I'm a STAHM (stay at home mom) remember? It was great to see my husband sitting there with nothing to say because for once the conversation was about "my" work and not "his" work.

Anyway, back to the point of the conversation. We got around to talking about my Etsy shop and I told him about all the silhouettes I have been creating for my lovely customers. He then asked a bunch of questions so I'll share my answers with you as well.

I use Illustrator to create all of the silhouettes. I use the basic pen tool and not the fancy outline tool that finds the edges of a subject, but from what the professor was telling me it's very choppy. I'm actually running Illustrator 11.0 so it doesn't have the fancy tool available, honestly I hadn't even heard of it. I just go in and use the pen tool to create lots of (sometimes hundreds) individual curves that then make up the entire image. Then I add in the desired text, transport it into Photoshop, create my jpgs and email the finished product to my customer.

That's my whole process. Now you know my trade secrets!