Hey everyone! I'm so excited to share my new Skillshare online class where I'll take you through my process and techniques for creating illustrations from which to build beautiful animations using Procreate and Photoshop. I hope that after taking this class you'll be able to create fun, little animations of your own. And Bonus! You can take the class free with this 2-month trial:
skl.sh/libby
Women's Equality Day!
Happy Women's Equality Day to all my fellow ladies! When we support equal opportunity for women from the day they're born on into their golden years, we foster healthier, more peaceful, and more sustainable societies.
Less than 100 years ago, a group of strong-willed, persistent (see: nasty) women succeeded in getting the 19th amendment certified, gaining women in the U.S. the right to vote. Obviously no small feat. In 1971, NY Congresswoman "Battling Bella" Abzug prompted congress to designate August 26 as Women's Equality Day, to commemorate the efforts of the suffragettes and the 1920 certification of the amendment. Feeling thankful for the advocacy of these women who were confident enough to speak up for their rights and strategic enough to secure their equality with legislation. Respect.
Don't forget the helmets, babes!
Been riding my bike a lot lately, as I just moved to a new city with new ground to discover. It's been a truly awesome way to learn the pathways of my new home, and to get out the stress of work and political rage. But I just gotta vent about one thing! Ladies and gents: please wear a helmet when you ride. No one cares how cute your hair looks as it lightly blows through the wind. It might be one less thing to pack, but it's the one thing you ought to pack! I've heard to many tragic stories to go without one. Hope you'll take to protecting your watermelon too! Here's some cool styles to check out if you're interested in something a little less conventional
Gif-talk with Brwn Paper Bag
Ever wonder how I got into gif-making? I gave a bit of insight into the topic on Brwn Paper Bag today.
You can read more here, and learn about some of my other favorite artists and illustrators on Sara's amazing blog!
Happy National Ice Cream Day
I hope you honor this special day in your own special way.
Equal Pay Day! Lean in with lyft
It's Equal Pay Day! I'd say let's celebrate, but the facts are kind of a bummer. LeanIn.org reports that women on average are paid 20% less than men—and this disparity is often even more pronounced for women of color. I worked with Lyft to create a gif to get the word out about this wage gap, and help inspire people to work together on closing it up. Lyft teamed up with LeanIn.Org for their #20PercentCounts campaign and is donating 20% of proceeds from rides taken today to organizations that serve women and families, including Dress for Success®, Feeding America, Boys & Girls Clubs of America, and AAUW. Just make sure you take those rides between 8 AM and 6 PM to make sure you're payment is included in the #20percentcounts donation pool.
For more on lyft's campaign, visit: https://blog.lyft.com/posts/equal-pay-day
For more on LeanIn's #20percentcounts campaign, visit: https://leanin.org/equalpay
Don't forget to spring forward!
It's US daylight saving time today. Do what you gotta do.
Happy New Year!
Cheers to a new year, a fresh start, and a steeled resolve. My resolutions are pretty standard: eat better, exercise more, drink more water, go for more walks, spend more time on my bike, dance more, bake more bread, spend more time with family, maybe get back into knitting, paint more, write more, read more, be a faster typer, brush my hair, etc, etc, say no more, say yes more, say more, hmmmm... and maybe don't be so hard on myself. That's all :)
So let's roll into the new year like...
Happy Halloween
Eat lots of candy!
United State of Women
This week marks the first United State of Women Summit in Washington DC! I recently worked with the Summit and Tumblr to create an animated gif of one of their six main talking points, Economic Empowerment. I know so many women who run small businesses (or dream of doing so), are new moms who want to be able to afford day care, or simply can't figure out how to achieve their career goals when confronted with economic hurdles. So this topic hits close to home. We want to be paid equally for the work we do. We want the chance to achieve our goals. We want to live in an economically healthy community, and we want to have the means to invest in that community so that it can continue to flourish. Going to college, being able to afford day care, starting small businesses, and supporting them — it all starts with economic empowerment.
To read more about the main topics of the The United State of Women Summit, check out their links:
- Economic Empowerment
- Health & Wellness
- Educational Opportunity
- Violence Against Women
- Entrepreneurship & Innovation
- Leadership & Civic Engagement
And can we talk about how awesome Michelle Obama is for bringing together so many amazing speakers for the event? President Barack Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, Vice President Joseph Biden, Valerie Jarrett, Connie Britton, Warren Buffett, Melissa Harris-Perry, Billie Jean King, Lilly Ledbetter, Cecile Richards, Shonda Rhimes, Eleanor Smeal, Gloria Steinem, Oprah Winfrey are just some of the inspiring folks who will be speaking at the summit. And you can watch the live stream here!
Full Disclosure, Episode #2: Big Data
Hello hello! The next in the Full Disclosure series that I've been working on with Chris Bruffee is up, and this time Big Data shares their crazy tour tale from Cannes. There is a mime. I hope you enjoy.
Full Disclosure: Episode #1 with Cults
Fun project announcement! For the past few weeks, I've been working with Chris Bruffee on a series of animated stories for spin.com. In the videos, band mates tell funny stories from the road, and I've illustrated them and worked with Chris to bring them to life. We had a lot of fun co-conceiving the storyboards and I hope you enjoy this first one in the series, featuring the band Cults: