A chicken made of text by John LeMasney via 365sketches.org #Inkscape #design #typography
A chicken made of text by John LeMasney via 365sketches.org #Inkscape #design #typography
I got a recent comment from a design student on Flickr who said that while he liked my work, he was being asked in classes to do something similar, but without altering the letterforms. While I’m not sure how recognizability happens with those restrictions, I decided to try to do this chicken while keeping the original letterforms relatively unmodified. I really love the result, and will definitely try it again!
text, type, typography, chicken, made of text, lemasney, open source, creative commons, Inkscape, GIMP
This is a response to a Flickr group contest called Illustration Friday, and this week’s challenge just happens to be ‘giant’. Here’s my take on the idea, and I hope you liked it!
My very good friend Kelly Lake and her husband Ed were recently blessed with twins, and I can’t think of anyone more deserving of a shot at motherhood. I love the fact that she’s got a double shot, and I’m cheering them on. She is part of the 365 project over at http://www.facebook.com/365sketches and she knows I’m always looking for sketch ideas for this project. She said “So… Ed has this t-shirt idea that I think if anyone can make it possible YOU can… he said, ‘you should get a t-shirt with a window on it and two little baby faces pressed up against the glass’ I guess in a ‘window on the womb with twins’ what do you think?” I said I loved it and that as soon as my current queue ran out, I’d get on it. Here it is, and I hope she loves it! Hugs and kisses, Kelly!
Creative Commons Attribution for images used in this piece:
Phoenix Tattoo for autism awareness - lemasney.com
Phoenix Tattoo for autism awareness – lemasney.com
I often call suggestions from the Facebook group for this site “requests” because I like to think I’m providing a service, (join us at https://www.facebook.com/365sketches to help with the project) but in reality, most of my suggestions from friends are not so much requests as beneficial inspirations, little hits of creativity that had nothing to do with me. It’s one of the most amazing parts of this project for me, the way that people have helped me to grow with their suggestions, because they are often surprising concepts, sometimes quite difficult from a research and organization perspective, and always a learning experience. But this one here was an actual request, and likely one of my most challenging and interesting pieces.
Fred Housel, who has been a good friend of mine for about 10 years, asked me to do this sketch by submitting the following post to the 365 Sketches FB page.
I would like to see a sketch of a Phoenix contour to the shape of my back black n white with a colored ribbon of Autism in it’s mouth . Strong and powerful ,passionate ,wise , heroic,gentle compationate , & loving … This ink should show a three dementional layer of my muscle on my back on to the shape of the Phoenix …, wide at the top and tappered down at the bass of my back … Symetry is key … Thanks my friend …
And so, I did some research, finding a few great phoenix tattoos, looking at a few images of the musculature of the back, and studying how the often three quarter views of the fiery birds could be made into a symmetrical image. After a while, I had a good idea of what I wanted, but the design definitely evolved as I went. The Autism symbol is a puzzle piece, and as many ways as I tried, I had difficulty getting the ribbon to look right. I left it as a sort of halo for the phoenix. The pure symmetry that Fred is looking for wasn’t something that I stayed absolutely true to, but I think that enough symmetry exists there to satisfy him. We’ll find out!
Thanks for the inspiration Fred, you’re a great friend, and I only hope I can talk you out of the hundreds of dollars this work would likely cost. đŸ˜‰ I do have the image in a far larger size than this, and just black on transparent, if you’re interested. đŸ˜‰
So this is mostly dissected ellipses, with some shaped paths for hair, finished with a set of clipped rectangles for teeth, a shirt and a background. I was inspired by some graffiti I saw online, but this was much more straightforward than that. Related: Inkscape is coming out with a spraypaint tool in 0.48 — can’t wait to see how it works.
