As you may know I've been creating patterns for my other site Patterns for Colouring for some time now. These have been mostly free colouring pages for people of all ages to download and colour in. Just recently I've been creating more complex and sophisticated patterns that will make excellent fine art prints. The thumbnail shows just one of these patterns - click it to see more. I've chosen to market these through Imagekind as they have an excellent variety of options. I'm working on a series of these patterns so please check the store regularly for updates and feel free to make suggestions for any new ones you'd like to see.

I've just added a new illustration to my portfolio section. It's a piece I created for the SFX Dr Who Special. The feature was about an ardent fan of the series who decided to watch every Dr who episode available. That's right back to the original Dr played by William Hartnell. That's a real marathon of televisual delights. As you can see from the thumbnail I included some villians old and new and drew the fan in a Tom Baker costume. I put him behind the sofa because that's where all our best memories of seeing Dr Who come from.

It's been a long time since I've updated the site properly. So I've given the whole site a refresh to make everything a bit more streamlined. I hope everything is where its supposed to be.

I've had to import the old blog into this new design so it'll take me a while to run through the archives and iron out all of the kinks. So enjoy the new site.

My side project Patterns for Colouring has started to feature patterns from specially invited illustrators and designers. So far Ben the Illustrator, Matt Lyon and David Lyttleton have been added to the library, with more to come. I think the concept is working really well and would like to extend the invitation to the wider creative community. If you feel you'd like to produce colouring pages for children then please check out the sites submission page.

As a result of being side lined by other things I've neglected to post links to illustrators that have either contacted me or I've found. This is to redress the situation...

Alex Mathers contacted me recently after I found him on twitter. Thankfully I'd already earmarked him for inclusion in the blog. Ape on the Moon is another illustration blog, much like this one, looking for fresh talent to post about. Alex is also rather talented too, which helps!

Scott Nellis is a Brighton based graduate that also emailed me. I was struck by his powerful pen and ink image work. The illustrations are wonderfully twisted and Scott should be inundated with commissions in my opinion.

Assim Hetun also has an eye for the bizarre and capturing it in black and white. Luckily he doesn't limit himself to monotones. However his Escher inspired repeating pattern obviously caught my attention. Its good to see that he also featured in Computer Arts 2007 graduate showcase.

Jonathan Edwards is a hardworking illustrator that has been plying his trade since 1993. Published in Deadline (my favourite read of the era) he went on to appear regularly in The Guardian. Now he's set up a collaborative blog dedicated to illustration and, another love of mine, Serge Gainsbourg - Draw Serge!. Bliss. I might have to have a stab at a Serge myself - watch this space!

Niki Lopez is next on the list if only for this great image of Sting and The Police. Hailing from Puerto Rico, Niki has a great portfolio and also runs her own blog. She draws very interesting noses, and should probably tackle Serge too. She has a variety of styles but this one (left) reminds me of Aaron Minier's work (another favourite of mine).

Well that wraps up my list, I hope you enjoyed it. Let me know if you think I should mention anybody else in future posts. This post brought to you by the power of ManFlu!

The word is getting around about Patterns for Colouring and its getting featured on other sites like Creative Boom (pictured), Parent Dish (which is where I found the link to Marshall Alexander, below) and even Holy Moly - quite a broad audience footprint there! I've also seen it mentioned on a few parenting forums and moneysavingexpert.com. Design sites that have featured it include ColourLovers and Ideafixa. If you have any ideas of what sites I should target please let me know.
I'm currently planning to add guest-generated patterns by leading designers/illustrators to the growing library. I've had some excellent feedback so far. If you are a talented creative and think you should be included in this project, get in touch and I'll give you more details.

I found this little gem of a site on a blog that also mentioned my pattern site (more of that in the next post...). Tying in nicely with the Speakerdog post this is another papercraft site and what a lovely piece of work it is too. With all of these treats you'll be spoiling us (ambassador). I especially like the one pictured, "Ape, not a monkey".

I'm loving what Ben the Illustrator has done with his speakerdog creation. I've been spotting it appear in all sorts of places over the last few years. Its a great little brand he has created, but I was unaware that he was allowing other creatives to have fun with it too. Its now a paper toy and series 6 has a whole host of talent customising the little fella. So get your PVA and scissors ready and get busy. The 'dog shown is by Jamie Smart.

I've been on twitter for a while now but I've only just updated the sidebar to show the link. If you'd like to see my arts, illustration, design and general nonsense tweets go ahead and follow me...

Its update time in the land of patterns. My free CC pattern site now has over 100 high resolution images. I'm getting some great feedback from sites like Geekdad, Colourlovers, and Ideafixa who have all linked to the pattern blog recently. It would be great to spread the word even further so that children and adults can all get experimenting and learning about colour.