Joie de vivre

What a fun class! I don't often use florals in my work but I'm sure the techniques presented will work well with all kinds of different illustrations. I found the magnolia image in the NYPL Digital Archives (a fabulous resource) and worked from there.

My favorite part of the image is the subtle copper radial gradient I used as an overlay - I think it lends a cinematic quality to the lighting of the piece. The hardest part was coming up with an adequately pithy statement to go with all the florals! I'm realizing now that the composition would probably be better if the text was slightly lower (and more vertically centered) - next time.