Super Mario Brother Door Decs!

Hello! I figured it was time for another blog post since I've been back from school for over a week now. I am an RA at my college, and each semester we make signs for the front of our residents doors with their names on them. These signs are more commonly known as "Door Decorations", or "Door Decs". Seeing as I like to torture myself and take on super large complicated projects, I chose to make Super Mario Brother door decs ENTIRELY out of construction paper. I only got a total of 6 hours of sleep between the two nights I spent working on them, but they turned out pretty awesome. I was very satisfied. I thought I'd use this opportunity to show everyone how I made the door decs, with pictures of all of the doors after I hung them!

First, I found a picture of the character that I wanted, and resized it on Microsoft word. Then I took a Micron pen and outlined the character to make a stencil.

Next, I placed the stencil ontop of a black piece of construction paper. Then I cut out the character and paper together with an exacto knife. I used the black paper as the base for all of my characters.

Next, I took different colors of construction paper, and started cutting out shapes from the stencil with the construction paper behind it.I tried to match the color of construction paper as close to the original picture as possible.

Then, I glued the pieces of cut construction paper to the black construction paper that I cut out. I generally worked from the outside of the character in. I found it easier to place the shapes in the right place by doing this. I did this until I cut and glued all of the shapes in the stencil. Then I had a finnished character!

Here is a picture of all 15 characters when they were complete!

And here is a picture of my apartment at 5:30 in the morning the day I finnished. There were A TON of paper scraps. Don't worry. I cleaned it all up the next day.

Here are some picture of all of the doors! I also made cut outs of objects pertaining to the characters I made with my residents names on them.

Birdo

Princess Peach

Yoda (I had one room beg me for Star Wars. I had to)

Mario

Bowser (My door!)

Toadsworth

Luigi

Waluigi

Toad

Wario

Koopa

Princess Daisy

Goomba

Yoshi

Toadette

Hope you enjoyed!



Self Portraits!

Hi everyone! I'm posting again, with only two more days left in snowy Syracuse. I finally go back to school on Tuesday. You know it's time for Allie to go back to art school when she stays up until 3 a.m. sketching! Last night, I opened up my sketch book again, and decided to draw a self portrait. Keeping in mind that I didn't start sketching until 1 a.m., I am pretty proud of what I produced...

Coincidentally, I was revisited by a self portrait that I completed senior year of high school today. I was over at my friend Shannon's house, and she gave me the piece, which I had accidentally left in my high school's art room. Shannon visited the art room sometime last year, and was kind enough to pick up the painting, but kept forgetting to give it to me. Finally I got the painting back! And here it is!

If is very funny seeing this painting again, especially after drawing a self portrait of myself last night. When comparing the two portraits there are quite a few similarities.

 Both portraits are looking straight on, with very little expression on the face. Both portraits emphasize the face, while cutting off below the neck line for the most part. I feel like I was a little more afraid of drawing/painting my hair back then though. I'm happy to say that since entering college, I have been a little less reluctant about drawing detailed things, and I am a whole lot quicker at it too. It's amazing that the painting on the left probably took me a month, when the drawing on the right only took me 2 hours.

In the spirit of self portraits, I have to show you something that Shannon gave me! We joked one time about wearing shirts with each other's heads on them, so as a funny holiday gift, she actually made me one!

Here is the design that Shannon printed. She said that she made a stencil to create the image. I think it is hilarious and awesome:) And here is a picture of me wearing the shirt!

I will wear this everywhere of course:) Shannon also gave me some Sons of Admirals songs, because we all know how much I love my dorky YouTube bands. Now I will have to take a screen printing class so that I can top this amazing gift!

New Blog and Sketches from Florida

Hi all! Welcome to my new blog! I decided that with the start of the new year, it would be a good idea to start documenting my artwork more consistently. Having a blog will just give me a place to show my work, and more of an incentive to photograph it in the first place.

I recently came back from Florida, and while I was there I bought a brand new sketch book. I am not one to normally keep sketch books, but I fell in love with this one when I saw it at Michaels.



 I worked on a few quick sketches while I was in Florida, but the ones that I seemed the most happy with were the ones I did of people. It has been a while since I have sketched people, so it was very refreshing to do so once again. I started by sketching my sister as she was laying out by the pool. She only complained a little. I was very proud.

A couple of days later, I asked my grandmother if I could sketch her while she was sitting on her couch. Unfortunately, she kept falling asleep, changing the position her head was in. Over the years, I have grown a stronger tolerance for models moving, but it can still be frustrating. When I showed the sketch to my grandmother, her only response was that I made her look old. Every one's a critic.

 Hopefully I can get a few more sketches in my sketchbook before the end of winter break. It will be hard for me to casually sketch like this when I get back to school, because I will be very busy with other projects.

That's all! Hope you enjoyed!