CamdenJam 2016 - Button Making Event

I partnered up with Connect The Lots in Camden again this weekend, this time instead of painting, I brought my trusty pinback button press to the city to teach kids how to make their own buttons at Camden Jam! It was a HUGE hit. 

First the children colored their designs, then we punched them out,
and they used the press (supervised) to create their finished button!

Since the event was at city hall, which is a Poke-stop, my contact requested that I make some Pokemon-themed designs. I took my Pokemon Go team buttons and turned them into simple black and white outlines, this way kids could color them in, as well as a generic Pokeball and a Pikachu design. (You can't leave out Pikachu!) Surprisingly, the biggest hit of the day was the paper I left blank! 

Upcycle Japanese Candy Wrappers into Pinback Buttons!

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WIP Wednesday

Not sure about these "stories"... so here's my first ever attempt in post-form. 🌙 #thermalreactive #sailormoon #space #pins #buttons #etsy #wipwednesday #wip

A video posted by M. Smith (@poison_and_antidote) on Aug 17, 2016 at 8:18am PDT

I got this neat thermal reactive paint and I'm trying to figure out how to use it on button designs. Here's one of last night's experiments. 

Right now it seems like 2 layers makes things milky and foggy looking, but maybe I just need to wait longer between coats. 

300 BUTTONS DONE!

Finished 300 Pokemon Go buttons last night for a custom order!! I'm counting this as my workout for the day. 👍 ▪ ▪ ▪ #pokemongo #etsy #customorder #buttons #teamvalor #teaminstinct #teammystic #mystic #valor #instinct

A photo posted by M. Smith (@poison_and_antidote) on Jul 28, 2016 at 7:51am PDT

Man, that was the biggest order I've ever filled and it only took me 2 days to finish it! (One for printing & cutting, and another for punching/production.) Not bad, not bad at all. Plus I'm counting it as an arm workout. Win-win!

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Pokemon GO - Awesome For Small Businesses

The game is here and it's having a much stronger effect than I had ever imagined. People are going outside, they're walking and exploring their neighborhoods, they're meeting new people, and small businesses are getting more foot traffic and sales thanks to being gyms and Pokestops. This is just...all around awesome. Sure there are a few naysayers and killjoys sprinkled in the mix with their negative articles, but overall, I think the positive benefits outweigh the few negative click-bait headlines.

I've only played up until Silver and Gold on the GameBoy Color (Silver was my last "new" Pokemon game), but my younger sister still plays and she keeps me hip to all the new Poke-happenings out there in the world. I know a lot of online shop owners JUMPED at the opportunity to make a buck off the trend, but with the market being so saturated...I figured I'd skip this one...but then the custom requests started rolling in....

Holographic Buttons & Stickers!!!

Buttons featuring designs from Old Skool Junk

That's right, I now offer HOLOGRAPHIC buttons! Yesterday the holographic paper I ordered came in the mail and I was dying to test it out. This weekend I got an order for buttons from the awesome Old Skool Junk, and what better design to test this holographic paper out on than a freaking unicorn?!

I gave it a shot and it turned out freaking awesome! I'm so excited! I'm currently working on listings for holographic sailor moon buttons and custom buttons in my shop. It should be up later this week! I'll post an announcement when they're up!

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More 365 Art Buttons

 I’m working on a little button-pack for Otakon with some of my 365 art. These images aren’t final, they have a bleed to allow the images to wrap seamlessly around the button. I’ll have to print them out and give them a press to see if they need some tweaking before I commit. I’m really digging evil-cat-monster-thing as a button, I hope he turns out nicely.

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The Space set is now complete!

Finally! A matching set! So I made the outer senshi in space set of 5 pins...a few months ago. I think. Maybe 2? Since I sleep so poorly I really am losing track of time so maybe it wasn't that long ago after all. Any-who, I got a request in my etsy shop for a few matching inner senshi buttons for the set, so this is what I came up with.

Outer-Belly-Buttons! New Buttons on the way!

I wanted to make some button designs using the sailor moon items I vectored, but I didn't want them to look thrown together, so I whipped up some faux space scenes in Photoshop and came up with these.

I'm pretty happy with them, but I am not too sure how the spacey background will look when it's printed. I'll find out sometime this week when I print up a few sheets for a test run. (I hope the stars show up, if not I'll go back into the files and make them more exaggerated so that they do. I think the stars really make these designs POP.)

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More Sailor Moon Buttons COMING SOON

New button designs will be available next week.

Oh man, the new Sailor Moon is almost here! To be honest, I'm a little more anxious than I am excited. The new look is supposed to be more like the manga, which I have read and still have several copies of, but it just doesn't look right. Sailor Moon's head is freaking HUGE and the shading used for the series looks lazy.

I'm still re-watching the original Anime series in anticipation of the new series, but I am trying not to get my hopes up.

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Sorry, I thought you were cheese...

Working on some more button designs for Otakon, of course I have to have my favorite witch of sweets represented! To be honest this is my favorite form of Charlotte. The design reminds me of Sid and Marty Krofft.

Buttons Coming VERY Soon!

After finishing two characters I figured I would take a mini break before starting the next one. (Just a day or two off.) I want to try and work on some other projects that don't use digital media. In the meantime, I'll be printing both twewy poster designs up as buttons and they'll be available in my Etsy shop later this week!

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