“Dream, dream, dream! Conduct these dreams into thought, and then transform them into action.” These words by the former President of India APJ Abdul Kalam inspire and motivate Jothi to transform her dreams into reality. She believes that achievement is not easy unless you’re determined and focused to convert your dream into reality.

Currently working as a 3D modeler for Disney TV series and EA FIFA games in technicolor, Bangalore. Jothi takes this opportunity to share her experiences and thoughts about her successful contribution to Studio as an artist since 2008. Coincidentally, it’s her Studio profile that helped her bag her dream job at Disney!

Jothi draws inspiration from famous characters of Disney such as Tom & Jerry and Cinderella. Even though failures crossed her path, she was never dejected as she felt that failures were her first steps to success! “Never give up”, says Jothi. Today her work through ecards is loved by people all around the world.

When Jothi started as an artist in Studio, expressions made by her caught our user’s attention with right use of images, messages, colors and music. Today, she is sharing with us some of the tips and tricks to make great ecards and achieve high sends.

Images: The main image of the card should be catchy and clear for view. “Even if you are not good at animation, a clean image with an effective ‘me to you’ message can acquire high sends. Flowers, hearts, butterflies and teddy bears attract more user attention and one should use them effectively in their design,” says Jothi.

Good Morning Ecard by Jothi

Me to you messages: Jothi suggests that lengthy poetic messages are better viewed in post cards while designing a multi-frame card, short and striking messages should be used in every scene of the card. She tries to put words that go well with the background music in her ecards.

Have a Great Day Ecard by Jothi

Choice of background and color combination: Jothi recommends warm colors such as red, yellow, gold and orange to describe emotions like love and care, daytime, sunshine and festive occasions like New Year and Christmas. She suggests bright flowers and candles for Birthday cards. Cool colors such as blue, green and cyan describe fun and freshness; she recommends these colors for friendship and Everyday Cards to say “Good Morning” and “Good Day”. These colors are also great to describe winter and Season’s greetings with snowfall. Deep blue colors are best to describe emotions at night with a suitable incorporation of moonlight suggests Jothi. The text color should be of contrast to the background design and images.

Love Ecard by Jothi

Animation tips: Studying flash in her leisure time during childhood helped her master the art of animation and helped her to embark on her journey as an artist. Jothi imparts the following techniques to add more beauty to your creation – Masking using Guide layer, Blur and sparkle effects to add more attraction to cards. She recommends taking simple tutorials and lessons available on the internet such as using symbols, how to make falling stars, how to add sparkle effect and how to create a snowfall using action script. She believes that there is always something new to learn every day and improve oneself as a great designer.

Christmas Ecard by Jothi

She recommends the following software/tools to the visualizers to better themselves and create high quality ecards:

Photoshop: One can create good background images for their card with this software. You can export them as an image and upload as a post card.

Flash: Flash enables one to create animated cards with more techniques like masking, using symbols, guide layers and using script for your animation and to create video cards

Image ready: This enables you to create great thumbnails and animated GIF cards.

These were some of the tips which Jothi wanted to share with all the visualizers, to conclude she wants to convey to all the artists to never get demotivated even when their cards don’t perform well. Jothi shares that even when her cards faced low conversions, her keen interest in designing kept her going. Low conversions to her were only an indication of her mistakes that she was making in her ecards. She only improved from the errors that she made. Her final tip is, “Before uploading a card in a particular category, go through the popular cards in that category. Don’t just imitate the popular card! Try to make a design that is equivalent to popular design in that category with a different thought!”

Jothi wishes all her fellow visualizers all the best and a Happy and Prosperous New Year! In her words, “May every visualizer in Studio explore the world artistically with his/ her creative talent!”

We hope Jothi’s experiences and tips motivate you to go out there and achieve more, as from us, all we would like to say is, DREAM ON! And you too can achieve the impossible!