Author: khattakstudios

Happy Birthday, Molly!

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Birthday Cat!

Our sweet, senior cat Molly turns 17 this month. Not sure the exact day, so I mark the milestone around the middle of April.

She really is an amazing cat, although I am fully aware that every cat is amazing. She’s got her own distinctive personality, likes what she likes, and displays a lot of empathy and individualism for someone with a brain the size of a walnut.

I’m still friends with the person who I got her from, so I know her mother lived to be 16 and a sibling made it to just a few weeks ago. There’s still another sibling, Lucy, who is still kickin’ it in East Texas.

Happy Birthday, Molly. I love you to pieces.

Shine

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“You Shine, I Shine, She Shines, We Shine,” multimedia digital art on iPad Pro with Apple Pencil. Animation in Photoshop. By Stephanie Khattak

Travel Art Archives

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In the spirit of consolidating and simplifying my digital platforms, I’ve moved my “Have Paintbrush Will Travel” content to this site. Click here to see past posts, and stay tuned for new travel content as our travel season picks up again. We do most of our traveling from April – December, to coincide with James’ work travel schedule and tag on sightseeing to the places he goes. On the 2019 agenda so far: Houston, New York City, Palm Springs (Fingers Crossed!) and Washington, DC.

Demo: Brea Reese Watercolor Cream

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Trying some fun new supplies this week! They’re metallic Brea Reese Watercolor Creams, a water soluble medium similar to oil pastels. I found them at Target here in Dallas.

The first swatch is an opaque square that I colored in and then painted over. The middle square is an opaque frame that I painted over and used the remaining color on my brush to fill in the middle. The third square is just color that my brush picked up from the other swatches, for a watercolor effect.

The figure was painted by loading color onto a wet brush directly from the stick.

These are pretty cool and while there are higher end items that are similar (Caran D’ache Neocolor II) these are the first metallic options I’ve seen. This was just one of several new items I saw in Target’s art supply aisle. I love that cool supplies like these are becoming more accessible in price and location, and that the quality is good! The more people are able to make art, the more art we will have in the world!

Animation

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I’m interested in bringing my art to life in a way that has a different look from what is traditionally thought of as “animation.” I don’t have a formal background in animation, or even art for that matter, but I do have a technology and multimedia career and that has helped me test and figure out how to make interactive elements look and behave the way I want them to.

I’m also reading/editing a friend’s script for a cartoon about animals. I don’t come close to having the abilities to do visuals for her, but I’d love to be able to help storyboard, sketch and prototype to get her idea packaged. Plus, it’s an excuse to play and learn.

Here is a very rudimentary first look at animating my sketches, using Photoshop. Once I have my skills up to standard, I will post a tutorial.