scared kiddos

Recently, I've been trying to participate in the Bi-weekly Challenge (I say "try" because this is my first, official, complete piece). I was excited to do the Grimm's Fairy Tale challenge. We just had to create a piece based on one of the stories.

I based my piece on "The Water Nix" (quick read here). I liked the idea of drawing terrified children. A "Nix" is basically a sprite. That creeping dark thing in the upper left corner is the Nix.

This is my first complete vector illustration in a long time. The last time I made one was back when I was a student at Miami Ad School. Adobe Illustrator and I haven't had the long relationship that Photoshop and I have had, so any and all work in the program is a great learning experience!

I think my favorite thing about working in Illustrator is the ease of replicating elements. For example, I created the boy's body, and then just copied and pasted it for the girl.

Here are some preliminary sketches.

redheaded kiddos

I'm still obsessed with drawing ginger kiddos. I probably will always be obsessed with drawing them since my nephew & niece are cute little gingers. They both have beautiful red hair, fair skin, and "blueberry eyes" as my nephew says.

I posted these kids before - they were drawn with markers. I decided to digitize them (vectorize, to be more exact). Not quite sure what I'm going to do with them...I've toyed with the idea of turning them into a repeating pattern. However, I'd like to have more of them, instead of just these two. I'm also not sure they're done yet. I may push them further.

Thursday Throwbacks: Photoshop files

Photoshop and I have had a relationship since high school. But we didn't get really serious until college. My school didn't offer a robust digital imaging major, but there was one class on Photoshop. One of my favorite professors taught the class, so I made sure to take it before I graduated.

I was rifling through some old hard drives, and I found all of the projects I created for that Photoshop class. Here are a select few:

Ahh, the paper cutout filter. I think this is a phase every Photoshop user goes through: abusing the crap out of the filters. This assignment was open - just create something in Photoshop. I converted the cover design of a Bath & Bodyworks lotion tub into Rising Buddha Butter.

For this assignment, we were tasked to create different design compositions (i.e. all-over pattern, visual weight, symmetry, etc.). The prof encouraged us to use things we scanned on our own, hence the tampons and strange sequin fruit.

Aside: As a female plagued with menstruation, I will always have a strange fascination with incorporating menstruation into art (C'mon, how bizarre is it? You bleed like the dickens once a month and it's completely "normal"?). Especially since it's so "taboo" in the man's world. In fact, the prof who taught this class created a whole series of embroidered pieces around bloody pads. It's pretty awesome.

Playing with using a variety of textures. I drew this on the screen, using a mouse and it was a pain. I don't condone that method unless you're a sadist. Looks like I attempted to use a wee bit of atmospheric perspective...my art history profs would be proud. Overall, I was going for some sort of children's book type illustration.

I think it's interesting to look back and see your own personal improvement, be it in technique, color choices, style, or all of the above. These were from during a time when I created things just to create things. Now, I am a cynical adult with bills whose main motivation for creating is to make money.

Also:

I've added some new links on my tutorial page. They're at the top of their respective sections.

I launched my own, hand-coded site, to which this blog will eventually move.

Thursday Throwback: Bunny Comic

This is some pre-Photoshop goodness with each panel drawn by hand. If I made this today, I'd draw the key frames and then copy & paste the rest (lazy...or efficient?). The bunny reminds of a Peep for some reason.

Reads left to right, top to bottom.

red & blue doodles

I bought some new red and blue pens, and based on their colors alone, was inspired to doodle:

(FYI: Blogger has been compressing the shit out my images lately...they don't look nearly as pixelated IRL)

Some red & blue lettering. I have an active vector file open for making that last "wonder" design into a display type. It's taking much longer than expected.

Despicable Me 2 fan art

 

"EWWW! Gru touched Lisa! Gru touched Lisa! Lisa's got GRUDIES!!"

A fan art of a funny/sad moment from Despicable Me 2 (isn't little kid Gru adorable?). I LOVE THIS MOVIE! I got the DVD for Christmas, so now I can watch it over and over and over again.

I saw it in the theatre with a friend, and we laughed ourselves silly. We were the only ones there without kids and we were loud (and probably obnoxious), but it was so much fun. I also love Despicable Me. Both movies are so great.

I think Illumination Entertainment is really going to give (or is giving?) Pixar a run for their money. Awesome graphics aside, the story and characters and humorous moments are just perfect in both movies. I'm lookin' forward to seeing more of work from them.

flower doodles

Puppy drawing evolution

I thought I'd draw the poochies in the style of Sanrio characters (you know, Hello Kitty). As with most things, it was a process. Third try was what worked...or rather, I gave up after the third try.

It's amazing...I live with these dudes and see them everyday, but I'm still not sure what their coloring looks like. I can tell you that Louie is black and tan, but I'm not sure where all of his spots are. And Dexter is a whole other story. That dog is like 10 ridiculous shades of brown.

I've been drawing a lot of "cute" stuff lately. I think perhaps my limited, bright color palette is having an effect on my subject matter (I've been strictly using Copic markers and since they're so expensive, I'm stuck with what I have). That, or I'm turning into a big softy. I used to love to make more quietly menacing & subversive work. Now, it's all puppies and flowers...odd.

redheads

I'm very drawn to drawing redheads. :)  My brother and sister-in-law have two redheaded kiddos, so that might be why.

Some little redhead kiddos.

She is based on a model from the BHLDN site, but I think she looks like
a cross between Julianne Moore and Drew Barrymore.

corgi drawings moved

I moved all of my corgi drawings to a tumblr account here. Thought I'd join that bandwagon.

handlettering & illustration

I've been playing around with putting decorative stuff around some handlettering.

stamps & drawings

I've always admired Geninne Zlatkis's amazing stamp carving skills. I've tried my hand at making a few over the last couple years, and I've learned that you definitely have to have a steady hand. One false move and you wreck your entire design! I've only made a few, and I like doing it - I find it relaxing.

I recently carved some hexagons and thought I'd experiment with drawing over them. This is what happened:

Based this gal off a model from an old Anthropologie catalogue.

A corgi, of course.

I think I prefer when the stamp doesn't interfere directly with the drawing. Anyway, I'm not overly pleased with how they turned out, but I was just experimenting. I think this idea could be more interesting if I spent more time on it.

light grey art lab holiday art exchange

I signed up to participate in the Light Grey Art Lab "Make My Holiday 2013" art exchange. After swapping some info about ourselves, Dominique and I created drawings for each other.  Here is the awesome drawing she made for me (I love dinosaurs!). I really like her style & color choices. Also love the subtle "10" on the hat. :)

This is what I drew for her. Ever since picking up some gold acrylic paint this summer, I've been attempting to use it in everything! I used some to embellish various parts of the drawing.

Marker and gold paint on bristol board.

Closer detail.

Lou & Dex doodle

Louie & Dexter in marker. Because I can. <3

that sepia gal

I was perusing the September issue of Vogue from 2012 and came across the photo shoot inspired by Edith Wharton. It was chocked full of beautiful period clothing couture created just for the shoot. I am a sucker for period costumes, so I was a goner. I had to draw the Edith Wharton model in one of her lush costumes. This particular outfit was a puffy striped skirt, a black vest (early peplum, perhaps?), and a gauzy, frilly white blouse. Bingo.

I had intended for the line work to be looser, but it kept getting tighter and tighter. I'd like to get away from having "a style" but old habits are hard to break. She isn't exactly what I envisioned, but I suppose that is what practice is for. Someday, my technical skills will catch up to my mind's eye.

Brown India ink and white acrylic ink on brown cardstock paper.

doodle-a-day november

While browsing illustrations on Instagram, I came upon the Doodle-a-Day trend. Rhianna Wurman (@ellolovey) creates a monthly Doodle-a-Day for people to follow. I thought I'd give it a try for the month of November. I also signed up for NaNoWriMo, but that's a different story...

I was determined to draw something related to each day's subject. However, I started off in failure as I completely missed the first day's doodle. I gave myself the deadline of midnight of each day to create a doodle & upload it to Instagram. I realized that if I didn't have an idea for a doodle that came to me rather easily, then I wasn't interested. And it's not that I couldn't come up with ideas, but it's that I wanted to come up with clever a/o unique ideas.

Anyway, I failed. After I got a few days behind, I kind of gave up.

The Doodle a Day November list created by Rhianna.

Day 2 - "Classic"
Classy redhead in a little black dress.

Detail.She reminds me of Elizabeth McGovern.

Day 3 - "Medieval"
Little friar with his severely-angled halo.

Day 4 - "Roots"
Happy [creepy] baby carrots on brown paper.

truth

Sometimes, I think even the little Zoloft mascot has a bad day.

dog doodles

I've been drawing a lot of dogs lately. They don't require too much brain power, so they're a relaxing subject to render. Drawn with Copic markers.

flower illustration

Once in a while, I draw flowers. It's rare because I don't like flower art and it's already been done extremely well by others (such as those created by Robert Mapplethorpe and Rachel Ruysch). I decided to go this route for this illustration, which was for my cousin's bridal shower invitation, because it seemed appropriate for the shower and because I was partially inspired by the lovely work of Anna Rifle Bond of Rifle Paper Co. I looked online for bridal shower invitations and most of them had cakes and stylized brides and wedding dresses on them (Puke - we already know the bride is getting married, don't we?).

I had also decided that I was going to save the original illustration and give it to my cousin as my bridal shower gift, along with a frame for it. So, in summation, it had to be really special.

After taking a trip to the crafty/art supply store, I made a concept sketch:

From my Instagram feed. Copic markers & gold acrylic paint.

The concept sketch above is more loose without the outlines. True to my personal style, I decided to make everything relatively tight. This is the final design I came up with:

Copic markers on bristol.

Detail.

Another detail.

The final illustration that I gave my cousin had some gold paint embellished on it, and I wrote her name and her fiance's name in the center. And of course, smarty here forgot to take a photo of that.

Thursday Throwback: Feminist Comic

A tampon comic created as a teenager, for the high school newspaper. This comic caused such a raucous that from then on, the principal had to approve all content for the newspaper before it was printed. It was a very proud moment for me. :) Seriously.