little red

Another redhead because I can. Because she is in profile, she kind of reminds me of those custom silhouettes that were popular. They were in profile, and your silhouette was cut from black paper with white paper for the background. My mother took me to get one done when I was a little kid at some little shop at the local mall (which is long gone now). I remember that sitting still there was torture.

Anyway, no torture here, since she's completely made up.

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.

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.

Dumb and Dumber fan art

An iconic scene from the movie.

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.

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.

bridal shower flowers

For the past month or so, most of my free time was spent creating decorations for my cousin's bridal shower. One of my projects included creating handmade fabric flowers. Using this tutorial, I made about 29 flower pins that doubled as decorations & take-home favors for the guests.

Cutting out petals before starting any flowers. Sounds like a simple step to do, but it took
me several flowers into the project to realize that I should have all the petals cut out before starting.

I used pearly beads for the centers of the flowers.

The bar pins were sewed onto felt pieces, that were then glued onto the backs of the flowers
to cover up the stitching.

Finished product. These little lovelies are ready to adorn ladies' chests.

Here are a few photos of the other shower decorations.

The yummy fruit & candy-filled cupcakes that my other cousin (the bride's sister) made.

The bride's seat.

Flowers (from Cub Foods!).

Here are the flowers in context. They were bunched across the front of a table for the gifts.

The ginormous, silly fake engagement rings used in a scavenger hunt. The little girls
at the shower loved these.

The shower went smoothly. We kept it to about 2 hours and only made the ladies suffer through two games. :) True to my family's planning skills, we had a lot of leftover food (some of which is now in my fridge - hello, weekday lunches!). I think the bride really enjoyed herself and appreciated all of the support we showed. I'm glad that I could help give her a nice little pre-wedding celebration.

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.

sketches

A while back I had some artist's block and I couldn't make myself create anything original. Original, to me, means sitting down and drawing from my mind and not looking at photo references (I used to do it all the time before life drawing/anatomy classes ruined me).

To make myself draw something, I looked though an old issue of Vogue and flipped through the designer ads until I found some interesting poses/clothing.

A Ralph Lauren model and a Dolce & Gabanna model.

Close up. Drawn in my grey-papered sketchbook with the pulpy (hairy?) paper.

The Executioner's Beautiful Daughter

I recently read Fireworks: Nine Profane Pieces by Angela Carter. It's a collections of some of Carter's short stories.

The story that resonated the most with me was The Executioner's Beautiful Daughter. It opens with the town executioner about to kill his own son. Oddly, the town executioner never takes off his mask. And there are chicken embryos mentioned. I think it's an original little bit of dark fiction, yet the true story behind it is nothing new at all.

I drew the daughter. Because of the color scheme I chose she looks albino, but she wasn't intended to be. I wanted to have the limited red/black/white palette.

My drawing is actually only one girl with an egg shape full of blobby chicken babies in it. While tweaking the scan in Photoshop, I experimented with making it a diptych.

Close up. I used a black Copic marker to outline her. I apparently didin't wait long enough for it to dry since it bled a little bit.

Patternized!

lady drawings in the style of John Currin

Well, more like an attempt to draw in the painting style of John Currin. I've been a drooling fangirl of Currin's since I happened upon his work in college. I love his technique and his cheeky subject matter.

I based these pencil drawings off of Currin's "Heartless" painting. I couldn't find a super reputable site that had the painting on it (and the rights to show it, I assume), but you can search for it here. ;)

I have a sketchbook with grey paper, so when modeling a figure, I have to try to boost the contrast a lot, for my own personal taste. I could go back in with a white colored pencil. But I don't wanna. I don't think these scans & tweaking in Photoshop do the original drawing justice. There is too much contrast in the dark areas.

This lady kinda freaks me out. Her stare is very vacant.

Close up. The grey paper has a lot of pulp (hairy fibers?) in it.

Thursday Throwback: Oekaki Drawings 2

Last week, I posted some old oekaki drawings. Here is another round of them. Oekaki applications got more sophisticated when they added more painterly tools, so everything didn't have to look like it was done in Microsoft Paint.

At the time, making dark/violent/suicidal references in my art wasn't a big deal in high school. But looking back, sometimes I wonder what I was thinking.

Thursday Throwback: Oekaki Drawings

I used to frequent oekaki boards as a teenager. What is an oekaki board, you ask? Wikipedia has a page dedicated to it here. Basically, they were message boards but with a drawing application (like Microsoft Paint, but a little more robust). You'd create a small drawing, post it on the boards, and people would comment on it. Back then, comments were fairly benign and along the lines of: "This is really good!" They were fun, especially if you had a Wacom tablet - it's so hard to draw well with a mouse.

I was sifting through some old art files tonight, looking for self-portraits for a project, and I came across some of my old oekakis. Oh, they take me back. :)

plotting girls

These ladies were created based on a spread from an Anthropologie catalog, circa 2008. There was a period where their catalogs actually had interesting looking models in it. These two women were on a grassy plain in the wind. They looked like they had some story to tell. Yet another attempt at trying to draw in a different style. I find that their anatomy is a bit wonky, but it's not so inaccurate that it bothers me that much. And obviously, the grassy plain didn't interest me.

Closer view of their torsos. I love that silly, frilly yellow sweater on the girl on the left. It's fun, but really only practical for B cups and below. I love that Copic markers bleed so well, and I also hate that Copic markers bleed so well. You can create some cool washes and bleeds, but sometimes you get bleeding when you don't want it. Using markers is definitely a learning experience.

And here is a process photo (I'm going to try to show more process photos):

princess characters

I'm working on a project that involves some children's illustration-like princess characters. I want to get away from the drawing style that watching too many Disney movies has instilled in me. I also want to get away from creating characters that look too much like anime. However, I don't think I'll ever get away from drawing large eyes, because drawing eyes is fun.

Princess Blondie. Tried some different shading and tried to be looser (notice how her elbow doesn't bend as it should, and she has no linear division between her neck and chin). 

Princess Redhead. She's getting closer back to my drawing comfort zone. Not sure it gets across that well, but her hair is different brown/red shades. Ever since feasting my eyes on Italian Renaissance paintings with high-necked women, I've unconsciously been drawing ladies with unrealistic swan necks.

Princess #3. Aaaand we're kind of back to my normal drawing style. Funny how the evolution of a series of drawings works out. I'm a lover of crosshatching and linear textures, I just wish I could use it as well as some people (like Ken Garduno).

The scan & color "correction" in Photoshop doesn't do the original colors of these drawings justice. The first two princesses seem reminiscent of old children's book illustration from the 70's. Anyway, must keep making until I figure out what I wanna do with some final character designs.

marker kids

I went back to the art store to widen my Copic marker color palette. It's a shame they're so damn expensive. And it's also a shame I don't have more self control when it comes to buying art supplies.

This is a drawing of India Stoker from the movie "Stoker." It was so dark & creepy & incesty. Yes, incesty. Visually, it was beautiful. You could tell a lot of thought went into the composition of each frame. I loved Mia Wasikowska's wardrobe. It was contemporary yet vintage. I don't actually recall any Peter Pan collars...but I love Peter Pan collars. Plot-wise, I think there were some issues, but ah well. Still a good movie in my book.

A little drawing based on the character of Donald, the beat boxing, hip hoping Treblemaker from "Pitch Perfect."

Still getting used to blending colors. They do make a colorless blender - but who wants to waste money on that when you need to buy more colors and have a limited amount of money?

Copics on bristol board.

Portrait WIP

Portrait of a friend in the newish style started below.

It started loosely, but ended up getting tighter and tighter as I wanted to be more strict in recreating her likeness. I had to stop myself or I'd be creating a photorealistic portrayal. And I didn't intend to go that far with this.

I'm not really calling this one finished yet. More like "Attempt #1." More to come!