June 2017

It’s the last Thursday in June, which means it’s time for your free July 2017 desktop wallpapers! This month, I wanted to experiment with a new technique for creating watercolor textures. I picked up these small spray bottles, filled one with regular water and used it, along with this no.4 round brush to create the texture. Each new layer, I let *almost* dry before adding a little extra color to create more depth/vibrancy. It was created using this pan set – I was on the fence when I originally bought it since it’s a little pricey, but it has hands down become my favorite watercolor set (even beating out liquid concentrated!). I scanned the final texture in, made a few minor color enhancements in Photoshop, added July which I hand lettered, and typeset the dates using Miss Magnolia.

The download includes the wallpapers in two common resolutions: 1280x1024px and 1920x1080px, with and without dates. I’ve left the year off of the ‘no-dates’ versions, so you can use it for any July in the future, too!

Almost two years ago, I created some freelance lettering for a ‘spicy’ greeting card company called Get Feisty. One of the styles requested was what I call wave lettering, or lettering that looked like waves from far away. I hadn’t lettered in that layout style before, but it was a fun challenge figuring out my process for it. After a few (or 20+) tries, I had a solid process and it has become one of my favorite layout styles. In this week’s video, I’m sharing the exact process I use to create wave lettering. Read on for the simple materials and full video below!

A few weeks ago, I shared how to create this effect using an iPad with Procreate. This week, I wanted to share how easy it is to create typographic floating shadows in Adobe Illustrator, too! The method I use utilizes the blend tool and pathfinder palette and a few simple steps. This effect is perfect for headlines, special art projects or even signage. Read on to see it in action!

Happy Thursday, friends! Earlier this week (on Tuesday, as fate would have it), my youtube channel hit 100,000 subscribers, so I wanted to make it extra special by celebrating with a free font!

I’ve been posting a new tutorial/video every single Tuesday for nearly three years now. Your support over that time – whether you are a new follower or have been along for the full ride, has meant more to me than I can possibly express. Each tutorial takes a minimum of 4-6 hours to complete. From concept, to figuring out the best possible process for it (*making it before teaching it* time), recording, editing, tagging, uploading, writing the accompanying blog post, creating images and announcing it on various social channels. It’s a labor of love I’m happy to continue each week because of all of you.

To celebrate properly, today I’m giving away my new font, Corner Bakery, which is all yours to pick up below 🙂

This week, I thought I’d go completely analog with a DIY watercolor ribbon Father’s Day card. I love taking handmade creations digital, but every now and then – especially for sentimental holidays, you can’t really beat 100% handmade 😉 With Father’s Day coming in less than a week, you’ll still have time to seal this in an envelope, stamp it up and get it in a mailbox in time. So, let’s get this card going; all the instructions, materials and full video are below!

First off, I want to tell you this isn’t the sexiest tutorial you’ll ever watch, but it can be a giant time saver and really make you look like you know your stuff. So, stick with me, because this is pretty handy to know: list format data merge in InDesign (sorry if that was a little eek-worthy to read, but you were warned 😉 ) To accompany our save the date postcard from last week, this week we’ll create a wedding seating chart to go with the big day. Traditionally, data merge is used to automate large amounts of data into multiple pages, but it’s different here: we’re placing lists of data onto one page, so there are a couple small tweaks that need to be made. I promise this is super simple and you’ll be glad to have this in your designer arsenal when you see what it can do.

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