21 January, 2020

The Return of the Spoonflower Masterclass (kind of)

2020-01-21T14:50:27-06:00Spoonflower & Fabric Design, UpcomingClasses|Comments Off on The Return of the Spoonflower Masterclass (kind of)

In July 2020, I am teaching a 5-day class at the Touchstone Center for Craft in Farmington, PA. It is a masterclass in designing your own digitally printed fabrics with Spoonflower, with a focus on using Photoshop as your main digital design tool. I haven’t taught a class like this in more than a year, but not for lack of interest, just for lack of opportunity. It’s hard to put together a class like this without somewhere like Touchstone to help coordinate it.

You may have found my blog because of the Masterclasses that I used to teach at Spoonflower in Durham. We had to put those on hiatus, unfortunately, because the space we were using to teach in was needed for other things and we couldn’t make the budget stretch enough to be able to rent classroom space. (Space is always the biggest challenge I have in getting a class like this put together.) So I am really excited that Touchstone invited me to be there! I call it a masterclass because of the amount and depth of material we get to cover in class, but you can take the class even if you have never designed anything before. You don’t need to have any special skills and you don’t need to have ever used Photoshop.

This is a description of the class:

Learn to design your own fabrics with Spoonflower, working with Adobe Photoshop as a fabric design tool. Using photographs, paintings, drawings and cut paper textures as starting points for your designs, class time will be focused on practice with digital tools and techniques for creating seamless textures, learning how to work with layers, and understanding the techniques to accomplish specific effects. You will see hands-on samples of all of the Spoonflower fabrics and talk about optimizing your design for printing on different surfaces, troubleshooting color and scale, and choosing the right fabric for your project. You do not need drawing or painting skills; no experience with Photoshop or fabric design is necessary, although you should be comfortable with basic computer functions (copy/paste, saving and uploading files, working with a thumbdrive). You will leave class with several print-ready design files and will receive printed swatches of your designs mailed to you after class. Visit spoonflower.com to learn more about this platform.

And you can read about the technology requirements and some FAQs here.

If you are interested in taking the class, Touchstone has given me a couple of discount codes for half-price scholarships that I can give away to two students. Which is AWESOME. Send me an email if you are serious about the class and want to talk more about the scholarship details. I want to help you get there!

16 August, 2019

Design Your Own Fabric Inspired by Textile Traditions

2019-08-16T14:28:44-05:00|Comments Off on Design Your Own Fabric Inspired by Textile Traditions

The Museum of Russian Art is pleased to invite you to a hands-on workshop with Becka Rahn in conjunction with the exhibition Village Wardrobes: Traditional Dress from Western and Central Ukraine

Be inspired by the shapes and colors of the costumes in Village Wardrobes: Traditional Dress from Western and Central Ukraine and create your own digitally printed fabric design.  Artist Becka Rahn will help you to create your own pattern inspired by the exhibition, then show you how to manipulate it using simple software to help you make repeating shapes and textures that can be printed onto fabric or paper. You don’t have to know anything about sewing or computers to be able to create your own surface designs; beginners are welcome!  Each participant will get a swatch of their fabric design to keep and have the opportunity to contribute to a collaborative project that will be on display at the Museum.

This workshop will be available on both October 1 and October 2 at The Museum of Russian Art  |  6:30-8:30 pm

CLASS REGISTRATION:  TMORA Members  $20  |  General Admission  $25

Each workshop is limited to 12 participants.  Advance registration is encouraged.  The Museum of Russian Art features free parking directly across the street (Diamond Lake Road) in the Mayflower Church parking lot.

8 May, 2018

A weekend learning to design fabric with Spoonflower

2018-05-08T09:46:52-05:00Everything Else|Comments Off on A weekend learning to design fabric with Spoonflower

These fantastic ladies spent the weekend with me learning to design fabric with Spoonflower using Adobe Illustrator. I made them work hard. Illustrator is not intuitive and it isn’t easy, so I admire them so much for their great attitudes the whole weekend long. These are the designs they created the very first day, inspired by Ed Emberley drawing books. How many of you have heard of Ed Emberley? He was my favorite artist when I was a kid and I don’t think anyone in my class had heard of him. So it was very fun to make that introduction.

If you want to learn more about the fabric design classes I teach, check out my online classes and master class pages.

1 June, 2016

NEW Spoonflower Handbook Master Class in August 2016

2016-06-01T16:53:00-05:00Spoonflower & Fabric Design, UpcomingClasses|Comments Off on NEW Spoonflower Handbook Master Class in August 2016

Greenhouse-masterclass2-Register_BLOGThat’s right, we loved it so much, we are doing another one. It’s a summer session of the Spoonflower Handbook Master Class!  You can read all of the details here. This session will focus on working with Photoshop instead of Illustrator and I have a bunch of fun stuff planned for you. Registration is open and it is filling up. Let me know if you have questions and I hope to see YOU there.

9 May, 2016

HGA Convergence: Designing & Printing your own Fabric

2016-05-09T23:04:30-05:00, |Comments Off on HGA Convergence: Designing & Printing your own Fabric

This session is presented as a part of the Handweavers Guild of America Convergence Conference.  You can buy a day pass to the conference or tickets to individual sessions. See website for details.

In this introduction to digital fabric design, learn the basics of designing and printing your own fabrics based on photos or original artwork. Understand the vocabulary of digital art: pixels, resolution, RGB. We will complete several designs in class and talk about layout, repeating patterns, creating coordinates, and more. Completing the experience, we will talk about the kinds of fabric available, wash-fastness, and the durability of several different printing options.

A laptop with WIFI access will be required. (iPads and tablets will not work).

 

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