Rainbow Bisque

 

 

AKA, "The time I drew a dog way too many times". My concept for this one was, "what if a Dalmation, but with Zebra stripes?" I got to use a fun, new pen and test out some red ink - so I wouldn't call it a complete waste of time. I spent a lot of that time drawing and erasing the dog over and over again. I'm not completely satisfied with the end result - but I am happy I ended up with something. I want to keep drawing. I want to keep challenging myself. I want to get better.

Tried working with the blue ink that's been sitting on my art supply shelf for way too long. I actually like how this one turned out. In the bottom right corner, there's a big splotch where I accidentally dropped my brush. Luckily, it missed the rest of the drawing.

Old school pen and ink. I haven't used a crow quill pen since high school - and, even then, I remember struggling to get it to work. This time, I thought I would try to create something using only cross-hatching. The prompt word today is "bait". This word took me into a lot of different ideas, but the one I ultimately landed on is based on the will-o-wisp. In my head, I imagined glowing orbs in front of a copse of swamp trees all created with layers of cross-hatching. Things had to be scaled back a bit. There are still two trees in the background if you look hard enough. Success? Sort of. It forced me to use a different kind of pen and, in doing so, made me want to keep going and get better with it.

Experimenting with Illustrator's live paint tools. The original drawing was scanned, live-traced, and filled in with the live paint bucket.

Trying some new ways of picking colors for my digital pieces. I was not aware that Illustrator has a tint slider. I feel much more confident sticking to a very limited number of hues with a tint and shade for each. This illustration uses only three: blue, pink, and tan. Twinbee is one of my favorite video games - it perfectly captures the weird concepts and bright colors that find their way into my work. Not sure where this pose came from, but I didn't want it to waste away in my sketchbook.

Trying out a challenge to myself - to create "finished" pieces with a limited color palette on a consistent schedule. I am still working out the final guidelines. I think I would like to challenge myself to use a new texture in each piece as well. I've had this unfinished sketch in my sketchbook forever. Even though I'm not entirely happy with it - it feels great to finally have it done!

Water-soluble graphite on multimedia paper.

Earlier in the day, I sketched some blackberries. Their leaves were brown and curling in some interesting ways. The final sketch was a bit light, and didn't fill the page quite enough. I decided to layer a new sketch on top of the old one - ignoring the lines I made before and letting the two compositions overlap. I tried not to let my decisions in the previous sketch inform the look and decisions of the new sketch. The two unintentionally created something unique and better than the sum of its parts.

Attempting to incorporate different ways of seeing and sketching into my daily practice. This time, I focused on creating an outside skeleton shape that would allow me to draw the leaves of this plant at the correct lengths. Flair tip pen lines with warm grey marker for shadows.

Created in Illustrator from an earlier sketch. I was able to use a series of techniques I learned about brushes and live symmetry creation. I would like to try this again soon!

I am trying out a new set of travel watercolors. With the expanded range of colors available to me, I thought it would be a great idea to try mixing them together in different ways. It is pretty amazing how adding the tiniest drop of a color can dramatically change a mix in progress.