19th January was Dexter‘s birthday, and unfortunately I didn’t have time to post about that. Yes, my little dog is 1 year old already, can you believe? He’s now an adolescent! Really! Well, one dog’s year, as I know, is something like 15 human years. But, I don’t care: he’s always my baby!

Then, I am posting some doodles of him that I did in my sketchbook. Drawing him and his toys is very cool. My house is a mess, a lot of toys scattered on the floor and I gave up of trying to organize them!

The weather here is very, very hot! I am not kidding!!! So, my husband and I decided to cut his fur. I know he’s a Shih Tzu, and has to have the Shih Tzu’s style… But, he’s feeling great, agile, running and jumping here and there! Even without all that fur, he’s still cute, looking like a large dog puppy. This picture above I took when he arrived from the Pet Shop. 4 days after (today), his fur is growing back a little and Dexter is looking prettier!
Dogs are so lovely! If you have a dog too, you can speak about your best friend on comments.

This one is my tiny painting, called My Balloon. Cute, eh? I think it’s cool for kids’ bedroom, specially little girls. I love this one! And you? It’s 14 x 22 x 1.3 cm (aprox. 5.5 x 8.6 x 0.5 inches) and cost $60 (plus $5 worldwide shipping).

And this is my favourite: Tooongue. Yeah, with three O’s. I like this “vector looking”… By the way, a friend of mine told me that I don’t paint actually; I create “illustrated paintings”, or “illustrations on canvas”. Well, that’s the idea! That’s Tati’s Art! Oh, price is $160 (plus $10 worldwide shipping), and size is 40 x 20 x 1.5 cm (aprox. 15.7 x 7.8 x 0.5 inches). I’m sorry for this closest measurement, but here, in Brazil, we use centimeters, meters, millimeters, kilometers, etc.

Just to let you know… my stuff are unique. I will not sell prints of my paintings (canvas and originals)… My prints are exclusively from digital art (vectors or digital paintings)! I want to keep the handmade art alive. Nothing against selling prints of everything… It’s just something that I want to do.

Yes, that’s right! Some of Boreal’s wallets are out of stock, including a couple of wallets designed by myself: Kisses and Voodoo Doll (this one is my favourite – I use it everywhere I go)!

So, if you’re interested… Hurry up! Those wallets are pieces of art, unique, limited edition… Reprint? I don’t know…
Check out: www.boreal.org.uk!

Hehehe… I guess you already have noticed that I’m a huge fan of Bruce Dickinson… Didn’t you understand the drawing? Click here, then.

This monday (11th january) an earthquake rocked Natal, RN (where I live). It’s just a little tremor… Good. But even so I’m worried, because… Never happened something like that here. When everything started to shake, the only thing I could think was “eita porra”, an interjection (and also bad language) that I use to say in those situations.
Well, it was a cool experience anyway. Now I know how is an earthquake, and I didn’t have to travel to USA to discover it!
The brazilian community on Twitter couldn’t stop to tweet about that. That’s great, because people kept me updated about what was going on. And I laughed loud reading they kidding about the earthquake. They said “Natal is asking for attention” (if you use MSN Messenger, you know what it means)! LOL
Remember… When you think about coming to Brazil, and the travel agent says that there’s no earthquake here, don’t believe him/her.
Okay… what’s next? Hurricane? XD

That’s the remake of Blue Sky, the sketch I posted here at the early days of this blog. Everything in this picture is digital: painting, drawing, etc. I really need to improve the control of my optical pen (my tablet is a Wacom Bamboo Fun), but I believe I’m doing good for a beginner.

One of my sketchbook’s doodles with a little of digital colors. Yeah, sometimes I have crazy ideas… Mainly when I am drinking coffee.
So, how about you? What do you do under the effects of caffeine?

Hello, there! Just stopping to share my portfolio. I am still uploading my illustrations, and organizing some stuff, but it’s online anyway. I hope you like. By the way… Did you like my cute ET?
Oh, if you’re looking for an illustrator, I am freelancer and available for commission!
Email me: tatirmaia[at]gmail.com

One of things I want to do is selling t-shirts painted or printed by myself. I just didn’t know how: hand-painted or screen-printed.
Then I researched about them on internet and watched great tutorials on YouTube – you can learn everything you want there! Paint tees is easy (it’s just paint a t-shirt with fabric paints), but it’s a hard work, you have to create unique pieces, and charge a little expensive price for it. Hand-painted t-shirts are good for commissions, I believe. Screen-printing is the best choice, but unfortunately there’s no space in my apartment for all those frames and equipments… So, googling more, I found something very interesting: Stencils!
This stenciling technique seems to work more with spray. However, I can’t use sprays on home, because of Dexter – he follows me everywhere (even my canvas paintings are protected with liquid varnish). Using paints on stencil is messy. The paint can’t be wet and there’s also an special brush for that. I bought this brush, but it didn’t work too – or I didn’t use it correctly. Then, I tried a roller and it worked perfectly! To make my stencils, I am using laser film – I had a job years ago in a Print Shop, and got some of those transparent paper -, and I cut my designs carefully with a craft knife. Don’t think it’s hard to do… actually it’s funny!

Stencils are recommendable for t-shirts and walls. I tried to paint with acrylic on paper, but… Ok, no more experiences! If you’re interested to learn, search on Google or YouTube for “Stencil Painting” or “Stencil Printing”. You’ll find a lot of how-to-do sites.
Well… It’s time to print some t-shirts! I can’t wait to post them here!
[edit] I just found this video that shows exactly the roller technique I am “blogging” about.