Alphabet of Thorn

I started this as a digital piece way back in January 2011.  (Has it really been 3 years already?  Really?)  I've been meaning to do some illustrations in coloured pencil and this seemed like a good candidate, since it had a simple design and the digital piece wasn't going anywhere.

Here is the last WIP of it I posted to this blog.

So this version has a few problems with it, but I like it quite a bit better than the digital.  The face turned out much better.  I'm not entirely sure about the texture.  I've been looking at the famous Drew Strouzan's work and wondering if I should experiment with pencil crayon over watercolour.  Apparently he used an airbrush with acrylics, but there's no way I am going to buy an airbrush.  But it seems to me that you could do something interesting and similar with watercolour.

Anyway, my plan is to do a collection of illustrations in pencil crayon.  Except that I am going to have to buy more pencil crayons because this drawing (painting?  This week someone said that people refer to pencil crayon works as "paintings" which I find very odd) has used up a good chunk of my frequently-used colours.  Now that I am replacing my Prismacolors with Polychromo pencil crayons I'm going to have a devil of a time matching the colours.  Apparently charts exist, but you have to pay for some of them.  Which means that I will be making my own (rather incomplete) charts.

Back to this picture.  It is loosely based on the fantasy book "The Alphabet of Thorn" by Patricia McKillip, which is not a children's book but it is a book I would have happily read as a teenager had I been one in 2004.  Right now I am trying to decide what book to do next.  Today I am leaning towards Bunnicula, but I may tackle something I haven't read before.

Inktober - Woman with Bun

No ref, just doodling.

Dancer

It feels like I did nothing in August/September except paint and make these little sketches.  Maybe October is going to be more productive.

Sketchcrawl - Dancer

I managed to catch one of the girls in ethnic dancing gear still for long enough for me to sketch her.  These were all done from life, no photos.  I believe this was one of the Croatian dancers.  They wore jingling coin vests for one of the dances.

Rock Like an Egyptian

Yeah, I don't know either.

Leap

Actioooon!  These poses are a ton of fun.  Good practice too.

Narwhal Hat

Rabbits are so 1930s.  Narwhals are the hat animal of the future.

Hair Vamp

I've been preparing for the local art fair and haven't really had the time to scan or photograph stuff for the past week or so.  Art is being accomplished though.  I'm going to try to use up some of my extra evening time to scan some sketches.

Can't remember if I posted a previous version of this, but I did the initial sketch back around May or April or something.  Today I was playing around with shape & shading a bit more.

Sketchcrawl - Steeps

Cyclops Boxer

Sketching.  I don't know what the story behind the cyclops boxer is, but she looks very determined.

Haturday - Valkyrie

Finally finished colouring this one up!  Phew!

Haturday - Valkyrie

I put together Haturday and Illustration Friday's topic "Wings" to get this fabulous opera valkyrie.  Who doesn't want a winged helmet?

Still working on colouring this one up.

Journal Sketch - Girl in Pub

Pub night is usually good for some sketching.  This girl had a fabulous bat-wing sweater and harlequin tights, but she left before I could draw the design on the tights.

Autumn Fairy

It's a job that requires concentration.

Goth Grrrl

Did some sketching in between watching students.  There was no one like this in the class.

Journal - Student

I was supervising some students to help a friend out, and I got a chance to do a bit of sketching.  Not much else to do while people are writing, really.

Journal - Waiting Room

Thank goodness for the University Health Centre waiting room, it's always full of people to draw.

Maman Brigitte

Well, not really Maman Brigitte.  More like Baron Samedi as a girl.  But hey, I wanted a female figure of Death inspired by the loas so please forgive the redesign.

Goldberry

A late Christmas present for a friend who is a Tolkien fan.  Pen & ink, 7.5x9.5".  Now that I have the new transfer technique down, I'll probably be doing more work like this to sell at Artwalk.

I'm pretty happy with it. :)

I used one of Faestock's gorgeous gown photos as reference for the folds.

Military Jacket

Something I started last January and finally finished up.