christmas mixed media

What is the strongest area of your work?  Why?

The strongest area of my work is the gradients in the ornaments. At first the gradients didn't look good but once I figured out where to put the shiny white part I think its now clear what is being portrayed.  

What area of your work can be improved on? How?

I think the drawing aspect could be improved on. The original drawing isn't that great. The details can be worked on a little longer and the coloring could've been better and more emphasized, maybe by using oil pastels or something other than colored pencils. 

What was easy about this art activity? Explain.

The easiest thing about this art activity was running filters over the ornaments for more textures. 

What was difficult about this art activity? Explain.

The hardest thing about this art activity was creating the lines in Illustrator. Its hard to trace over drawn lines that weren't perfect and symmetrical to begin with. 

What mediums (materials) did you use? What tools in Photoshop/Illustrator did you use? How did you use them? Be specific.

All of the lines and curves were drawn in Illustrator after I scanned in my pencil drawing. In Photoshop, I pulled a bokeh picture for the background. I also used the filter gallery to put filters on the ornaments and leaves. I then ran a filter over the entire picture for some smoothness. I also added a lens flare in the top right corner. 

How did you demonstrate the objective (the goal) in this art activity?

I took a picture of a bowl of Christmas ornaments, I redrew it, I scanned it in and drew the lines in illustrator and also added gradients. I then put in Photoshop and ran filters on it to produce a mixed media image. 

If you could do this art activity again, what would you do differently?

I'd redo the drawing and choose a different subject matter.