Re-vamping Artwork

The past week or so I've been on a bit of a bender re-vamping and 

re-working older artworks of mine. Cos that's the kind of bender I go on. That and chocolate ones. 

Basically, over the past year or so I've been working more and more on my graphics tablet, and finding it easier and easier to navigate my way through Photoshop CS3. You should have seen me when I first got Photoshop. I hated it. And complained loudly about how user-unfriendly it was to my husband on a daily basis. I like to think I've evolved slightly since those first dark days. Oh, complaints are still made, just on a less regular basis.

Anyway, I'm trying to update and add work to both my Redbubble gallery and my Etsy shop, so here's what I've managed so far:

Kind of terrifying, no?

This was my first attempt at my 'Homeless Orang-utan' t-shirt design on Redbubble. I did this before I had a graphics tablet. I drew the orang-utan by hand, scanned the image onto the computer, then coloured it in on Photoshop - using a mouse. I also had to go over the black outlines I'd drawn because quality was lost in the scanning. Doing that with a mouse is painstaking work. Believe me.

Unhappy with my original attempt, I ended up with this guy. Same deal - outlined by hand, scanned, coloured and re-outlined in Photoshop with the mouse. And I was happy with him. In fact, this has been the 'Homeless Orang-utan' t-shirt design on Redbubble for the past 2 years.

But then I got a graphics tablet, and a couple of days a go, this guy was created:

LOOK AT THE DETAIL!!! Or at least the fact that there's actually any detail at all!!! 

So this little guy is now the new face of my 'Homeless Orang-utan' 

t-shirt design.

Why use the concept of a homeless orang-utan as a t-shirt design at all, I hear you cry? To help raise awareness about the devastating effects unsustainable palm oil plantations are having on this incredible species.

Oh, and it gets better - us Australians are to blame. Without knowing. Unsustainable palm oil is the cheapest oil for us to buy, so many Aussie and international companies use it in their products, and it's in everything from soap and face cream to basically every packaged food known to humankind. But we don't know if we're buying it because last year the House of Economics Committee rejected the Truth in Labelling Palm Oil Bill. As such, palm oil does not need to be labelled ON ANYTHING, and is usually simply listed as 'vegetable oil' in food or crazy scientific names like 'glyceryl stearate' in cosmetics - so we as consumers have no idea what we're really buying or if our choices are aiding the extinction of an already critically endangered species.

Beyond comprehension, isn't it? :(

But there's hope for informed consumers yet - check out Zoos Victoria's Don't Palm Us Off campaign and download their Palm Oil Ingredient Card. It lists all the various other names for palm oil that are used so you know what to avoid :)

Of course, sometimes vegetable oil contains no palm oil at all - depending on the credibility and awesomeness of the company, so a really good site to check out is The Ethical Consumer Guide, where you can find out how goodly or how crappy your favourite brands are.

Anyway, back to the original point of this post, I also re-vamped my witch drawing. Here's the original I created when I first got my graphics tablet:

And the re-vamped version I finished up the other week:

Simply put - cats make everything better.

There are a few more bits and pieces I've been working on, but I think I'd better end it here. I think this is the longest post I've done... :P

Today I'm attempting to make rose cupcakes, so all going well I should have some very pretty pictures to post tomorrow :)