Hello, the pocket change event is coming up in a little less than a month and my campaign for it will be various grotesques! All pins for this event will be 1 inch or less, so it's a great opportunity to get some smaller pins. And here are the grotesque pins for the campaign! Though you can get just 1 pin if you want they will be unlocking in themed pairs, so you can vote for your favorite pair here if you like. This does not include the collab pins and any other freebie pins, though you can see the collab freebies over on the launch page.
Here are the next three pins in my Dungeon Denizens line-up!
Except...I came up with a few colour alts with ✨glitter✨ and now I can't decide which ones to make! 😂 Here are the oooo glitter variants I'm considering:
Which versions are your favourites?
I've added polls for the Dragon and Beholder so you can vote on all them via the project page! :D
I want to share a little bit of my history with all of you, of how I came to love Botany and the natural world so much, and the formation of the Figura Botanica collection.
It's a bit of a read, but if you like stories and learning how things come to be, I invite you to come along.
My upcoming botany inspired campaign
I have drawn all my life. As a kid, I used to draw and paint in coloring books or anything I could get my hands on. But I also loved learning how things work and why they do what they do. Looking through encyclopedias and exploring the fields around my house were my favorite forms of entertainment.
After high school, I thought of pursuing a career in science. It was during my early college years, while taking Botany, Biology, and Zoology classes, that my brain exploded in a good way. Learning about the small world of fungi, how plants "breathe" (one of my fav things to learn) and circulate their food and water, how they work at the microscopic level, how Insects and animals live their lives, and the worlds within worlds that coexist among us. It is beyond alluring to me how all of this just goes on unnoticed and unknown to many.
I used to fill my lab notebooks with drawings of the things we were learning. Sometimes my professor would let me swap a dissection for a scientific study drawing since I hated cutting into the critters.
One of my favorite times was interning at a herbarium where my job was to mount previously preserved specimens on a large manila-type backing board and attach the informational label to the bottom corner of the board. I handled specimens dating back to the late 1800s and early 1900s, collected way before the formal establishment of the herbarium. I loved looking at the old labels written in beautiful handwriting, and the later-year ones created with typewriters. I had to carefully glue the specimens using archival glue and small strips of acid-free paper, as best I could, so that it would keep the dried figure and parts neat while trying to give it an artistic pose, if possible.
After graduation, with no luck finding open positions in botanical research, I decided to pursue my other passion: art and making things with it. And so I did my next degree in digital art and graphic design. Through many twists and turns, I built my career by working on various projects in children's books, branding, graphic design, and, later, web and app development.
During this time in my life, I mostly did charcoal or pencil drawing and only occasionally, since I was focused on work and building a career.
Then one day, I decided to create charcoal powder and use brushes to "paint" my lantern fish drawing. This experiment woke in me the idea to give painting a try, so I decided to really go all in and bought my first set of professional watercolor supplies for an online botanical watercolor tutorial.
I was seriously hooked! From here on, I consumed every online workshop or tutorial book I could get my hands on. I also started experimenting more with different colored materials and methods like gouache and charcoal pastels.
My first botanical watercolor from an Anna Mason online tutorial
Charcoal Pastels Man O' War drawing
Watercolor cupcake progression
Watercolor landscape tutorial from Geoff Kersey
This new thing electrified my brain and gave me a new north. So little by little, one thing led to another, and I created my personal space for all things colorful, magical, and wonderful, which I called Elm Tree Studio.
Sketching concepts for logo
Lil sign for inspo
My logo and website
Ever since I started on this journey, I have wanted to create a collection to express my love for the botanical and natural world, but I wanted to do something different from my scientifically accurate Botanical Watercolors. When I was presented with the challenge of creating pins for a 1" space, my brain started to connect experiences, scientific interests, and my love for doodling forms, and it was how Figura Botanica was born.
The idea is to create a collection that can keep growing over the years, where I can add my favorite plants and natural history elements while also sharing interesting bits of info about them.
First sketches of some designs for this collection and others to come
If you would like to check out the new collection, coming out on Aug 6 as part of the Pocket Change Event, click here or the banner link below 👇
Make sure to hit follow and stay tuned for more behind-the-scenes, sneak peeks, and updates to come.
With lots of love and appreciation ✨ Jen, Elm Tree Studio
I thought I'd do a quick intro post today to introduce you to my upcoming campaign: Dungeon Denizens (launching on 4th August)!
This is going to be part of thePocket Change group project: a collection of campaigns all featuring mini pins. All pins in Pocket Change need to be 1" or smaller, so this will be a great opportunity to stock up on some neat filler pins for your boards and banners!
I thought the challenge of working within 1 inch squares would be really good to push me to approach composition and details in a new way and I'm focusing on making some itty bitty critters for you all. I've been having a lot of fun seeing what I can do within the size limitation! :D
Here are the first three pin designs I have ready to share with you: Almiraj, Displacer Beast, and Owlbear:
So far I also I have sketches for a Beholder, Mimic, Dragon, Goblin, Grung, Kenku, Mindflayer, Griffin and Tabaxi.
I might also add some stretch goals inspired by either Dungeon Meshi or Dungeon Crawler Carl. Which would you choose? :D (Vote in the poll below!)
Oh and in case you didn't see it yet; I'm running a ready-to-ship Summer Sale campaign at the moment! If you missed any of my recent campaigns this is a good opportunity to grab some pins, stickers, prints etc.
I'm planning 12-15 base designs since these are mini pins, but I'd love to design some extras for later stretch goals. Would you prefer to see me reference Dungeon Meshi, or Dungeon Crawler Carl for later critters? :D
I was thinking about the upcoming launch (which is already less than a month away, wow!) and I got to wondering which one of these cute lil plant friends would be the favorites. So I figured I'd do a poll and see which one you guys like the most!
Vote below for which Bottled Botanical is your favorite! If you have multiple favorites, leave a comment!
Bottled Botanicals is launching on August 6th. Check out the pre-launch page for more about the project and sign up for updates if you haven't already!
