Exploring new lands...
After college, I originally pursued a career in the business world.  Several years later, I met my husband and we relocated to South Florida to escape the horrible New York winters and have enjoyed being Floridians since!  Florida has a wonderful abundance of nature and with the weather being beautiful all year long, it is an artist and photographer's dream!  Shortly after moving to Florida, I began working for STFB Inc., a commercial software development company as their graphic designer.   Using Microsoft Photodraw and Image Composer, (the only graphic programs I had available to me at the time), I created the corporate logo and website graphics for the company which worked out well for a while until...

The turning point...
STFB Inc. grew to the size where it was branching into print advertising and product packaging for the software and most publishing houses and magazines required artwork submitted in formats incompatible with Microsoft Photodraw.  I had no choice but to learn Adobe Illustrator.  It was a tough road with a steep learning curve, but after spending many hours learning the program, I recreated the STFB Inc. logo entirely in Illustrator.  It was a great accomplishment for both I and the company, since it opened up new marketing avenues with the availability and ease of submitting graphics for print.

Most of my work revolves around creating corporate and professional graphics for STFB Inc.'s website and software interfaces.  Illustrator has now become my software of choice since I use it most often and have adapted to the way it works, though I often use Photoshop as well.  I have always been amazed at the ability to create an image on the computer that looks "exactly" like a photograph and have tried to emulate that same quality of detail and look in my own personal images.  I find that creating a purely photorealistic image isn't quite as easy as it may seem.  There is little room for "artistic license" and such a style calls for close attention to detail.  It for those reasons, and the challenge it presents, that I set out to create most of my images as photorealistic as possible.

Everything else...
In my free time, I try to get out to enjoy the Florida nature as much as I can in search of inspiration for new artwork.  I also enjoy having fun with my camera capturing all that Mother Nature has to offer.  When I'm not creating artwork or taking photographs of nature, I am usually taking pictures of my 5 cats and 5 dogs.  You can see their pictures by visiting The Hollywood Zoo Photography Gallery.

I love taking pictures and creating new art for the challenges it presents.  There is nothing like the feeling of sitting down to review the latest batch of pictures I took or watching a new artwork creation come to life.

Contact Information...

If you would like to contact me with questions about my creations, suggestions/requests for tutorials, or just to drop a line, you can email me at christine@magicalbutterfly.com.  Thank you for visiting and I hope you visit again soon!