Author: Michele B. Naquaiya

I'm an artist/illustrator living in Mexico. I'm exploring life through art and the art of the journal with pictures and a few words.
AI Art

Little sailor’s first day on ship

Michele B. Naquaiya

Here’s a little sketch that I like…even though it’s ink on paper, it has gone through lots of changes. I have been having success with masking lately and I love coloring my art and combining it with text. I hope what is coming through here is the feeling that we all have had from time to time in new situations. You meet new people, go to new places where there are new groups of people that you don’t know etc. How awkward it can feel to be out of the elements that you call home. This little guy is not ready for prime time players as we can see by the look of sheer terror on his face. OF COURSE, a lot if not most of my art is not commercial but I put it out there on products for people to have fun with. I call this on another not commercial art in commercial art forums. ha Just picture what kind of ship he just got onboard to.

alphabet, fantasy illustration, fonts, Illustrations, simple photoshop, whimsy

Original Nymph

Michele B. Naquaiya

Sometimes I see things that aren’t there. When I check and look again, they are gone. I see little creatures in the forest. Here is a little androgynous imp that I found in the cool forest. I have been playing with painting with light and this is a first attempt to use some overlay filters with different opacities. fun. The fonts are JellyBelly for nymph and StrokeDimension for the word original. In both fonts, I have used an additional 2 colors.
If you want to check it out, here’s a link on FineArtAmerica.

alphabet, Illustrations, Nature, t-shirt design

Be good to bugs and insects

Michele B. Naquaiya

Here are four bugs and some with wings. This is a simple design to draw and I’m not that crazy about some bugs but some are very beautiful. The text is simple Ariel font and each letter is outlined in a different color. The purpose of this exercise was twofold: how to make a design look good on medium range of background colors and 2: hide some of the text so that the viewer does not notice he can’t see the whole thing. enjoy and see it here on different colors

alphabet, endangered animals, fantasy illustration, fonts, whimsy

Exotic frog plays with his alphabet blocks

Michele B. Naquaiya

Herein lies an exotic south american frog who is colorful and has a sense of humor. He was asked by a famous news publication what his thoughts were on his inevitable extinction. Here’s what he said, “Don’t bother me I am busy playing with my alphabet jack in the box game. Worry about your own extinction.” Find him here on stuff. btw font is Pop Up Fontio

Illustrations, t-shirt design, thoughts behind the work

Retro couple romantic dancing and courting

Michele B. Naquaiya

I have redrawn and recolored a vintage comic book page in photoshop. The experiment took a long time and turned out very different than what I had pictured in my head. The line art was drawn in black and I thought I would play and make the shadows with line art as a design element. I colored the illustration using bright colors and brushes that mostly look like air brushes. The bubble texts shapes were done by hand as well. I love the dialog in the bubbles and it is circa 1940’s.
The font is “Hello Pencile” which is an art deco style. I think the most successful part of the drawing is the brilliance of her dress. The characters end up having the same hair color. I love her long yellow gloves and orange bracelet. Compositionally, the eye naturally goes to the bottom of the art where there is so much dark towards the activity of all the lines. This was fun. I have listed it on teepublic.