Learning to Create Repeating Patterns

     

What do you do when you’ve paid a lot of money to do an online design course that you love the sound of, then shelled out even more money on a computer with loads of capacity for your large images and a good quality monitor with a wide screen . . . and then you discover, days before the course is due to begin, that looking at the new monitor makes you feel quite ill?

If you’re anything like me, you PANIC! Which is exactly what I did.

And even after I’d used my faithful old laptop to search the net for solutions, and found that this is a really common problem, I was still faced with the conundrum: how can I adjust the monitor’s settings if just looking at the screen in its present state gives me a bad headache and makes me feel nauseous and dizzy? All my best laid plans, such as getting ahead with work to make time for the course, seemed to be in tatters!

But I’m pleased to say that, after taking the only route open to me – putting up with feeling ill for a short time while I adjusted the brightness settings down from 100% to 16% - things are much improved and I can’t wait for next Monday when the course begins!

     

It has made me think though, once again, about viewing art, craft  and design work and photographs – and anything where the colour matters - on the web. Given that monitor settings will vary, is it a good way to get a true picture? I still haven’t managed to get the saturation right on my new monitor – my profile photo (in the RH sidebar) looks as if I’ve spent far too long in the sun, whereas on my laptop it looks 'normal and on my old pc, a tad pale! Likewise, my designs are also too bright, to the point of garish, even after making all the adjustments possible.

So how do I know how they look to other people? The truth is, I don’t, and that’s something I’m not too happy about.

But I am getting excited about the course.

Do What You Love For Life

The Art and Business of Surface Pattern Design

It’s what I wanted to do more than 20 years ago but it didn’t fit with my life at the time.

Ever since Zazzle introduced Messenger Bags a few months ago, my interest in creating repeating patterns has been re-awakened and in various blog posts, I’ve expressed my frustration that I don’t know how to do that ‘properly’. Hopefully, the course will at least teach me to do that!

And I also hope that I will look back on the dozen or so repeating pattern designs that I’ve created the hard way this year and see how I could have made them much, much better!

   

I don't know how much time I'll have for blogging but I’ll keep you all posted as much as I can . . . .

PS - just as I was about to publish this post, an email arrived about the course, telling me that the 'virtual classroom' is now open! I've had a quick look and I've joined the flickr group and introduced myself but there is a lot to read and digest. 

So, as Captain Oates is purported to have said, 'I may be gone some time . . . '