COMMUNITY TRAIL ART GUIDE
HELP US CREATE UNIQUE ART BANNERS FOR THE TRAIL IN YOUR BACKYARD!!
1. Create a Banner Design!
Banner designs fall into FIVE categories that are color-coded:
Green: Trail Flora, including trees and leaves, wildflowers, indigenous grasses
Yellow: Trail Fauna, including insects, reptiles, birds, rodents, mammals
Blue: Geography, including river landscapes, and river and trail maps
Orange: History, including historic persons, and industrial artifacts and sites along the trail
Purple: Present/Future, including current and future uses of the trail, bicycle riders and walkers, trail scenes, trail towns
Design your own banner from scratch, or combine images from our online databases of plants, animals, and river and trail landscapes. Some of these databases are line drawings, others are photographs. The designs are intended to be educational, so the plants, animals, and historic places should reflect Western Pennsylvania and what someone might actually see on or near the trail. Please add to our databases by submitting your own line art drawings via email to the contact below!
The banner size is 2.5 x 4 feet. When you create your design, be sure this aspect ratio is the same as the banner dimensions (such as: 5" x 8"). All banners have a vertical orientation!
Your final design should be a line art drawing using dark pencil or marking pen that can easily be copied or scanned and printed onto a transparency, which will then be projected onto a banner using an overhead projector.
COPYRIGHT NOTIFICATION: All images (photos and line art) in our databases have been created by students and local artists and are ONLY to be used for this project! Any other uses constitute copyright infringement unless prior permission is granted for non-profit and educational uses only and with correct credits given.
2. Transfer the Design to a Banner
Once you have created the design as a line drawing, photocopy or digitally print it onto a transparency. Using an overhead projector, trace the design onto a banner using a permanent ink marking pen. Banners are free and supplied through our free banner workshops!
3. Paint the Banner!
Once the design is transferred, you can paint it! We use latex water-base house paint in bright Disney colors from Home Depot. All banner painting supplies are free and supplied through our banner workshops!
Schedule your FREE banner painting workshop! All materials provided: 412-688-0417 or email: art4trails [at] earthlink.net
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