Zoetica Ebb and Shakespeare

A few weeks ago, as part of my reward from the Secret Guide to Alternative Beijing Kickstarter, I had a Skype chat with the wonderful Zoetica Ebb about my work. It was incredibly helpful and ended the call with a list of things to try, work on, look up and some really cool artists - like Franz von Bayros.

So, when I started my assignment for the Bologna Book Fair, which probably won't be entered until next year, I kept artists like von Bayros, Beardsley, Clarke and Dame Darcy in mind. Basically, black and white, painful detail and crossed eyes by the end of this. I chose A Midsummer Night's Dream for my story which works perfectly with this style. This will definitely stay in my artist's arsenal.

Demetrius and Helena after Puck has made all right.

Still unfinished. I'm not 100% happy with it but I'll keep it as a back up.

"Ill met by moonlight, proud Titania"

*click photos to enlarge

Lou

I've been playing around with creating a new character for some adventures... and Lou was the result. 

I'm still working her out but I know enough to get to drawing and plotting and let her work herself out a bit. 

The opening I thought of is a bit odd but I think it'll be a good introduction to her.. err, I hope. I'm a little ramble-y today so I'll just post the first page and skedaddle. I have it with and without text. Once I get the printer back on my side I can post prettier versions. 

*click images to enlarge

26 Portraits : Update Three

It's been about a month between no' 8 and 9, but I'm back on track. Again, there's some links in their names.

Nine : Kat

Ten : Phil T Gorgeous

Eleven : Melissa

Twelve : Éanna

Monster Mommas

I've been wanting to do something like this for awhile. Yesterday I came into some A3 card (well... I bought it...) and began to plot. A bigger space to work with makes for some fun times. I do need to buy more black ink though, and a good watercolour set when money allows for it. 

Anyway, so far here's my monster mothers, Morticia Addams and Lily Munster. 

26 Portraits : Update Two

I was meant to put this one up a while ago. I had taken a break from this series to get stuff ready for ArcadeCon, then I got very distracted with other work. I will finish the last 18 before summer's over though.

I've included links in their names too so you admire their writing, art, feats of aerial wonder and other such accolades.

(These aren't in the order that they were done)

Five : Sylvia K

Six : Pádraig 

Seven : Brian

Eight : Emily

0.2 pigment liner (Sharpie, Promarker) on Letraset marker paper

Bhu-Tan Fan

This is fast becoming the strangest and most fun ways of learning about animals and other cultures... This lady is related to the Takin, the national animal of Bhutan. Also, Bhutan's flag has a dragon on it! And the king's crown has a skull... Learning is fun.

She'll do... but the next one is going big or going home.

0.05 pigment liner on A4 Letraset comic paper

Loki Maid

Another horned lady down. This one was based on a Horned Ibex, also called an Alpine Ibex.
Alpine...Switzerland...milk maid.
There was some logic used here.

She came out looking rather glum... Maybe I should choose some more upbeat drawing music.

0.05 pigment liner on Letraset comic paper

Adamantelope

I may have changed my initial idea of different animals in general to different horned animals because horned animals are just pretty. Plus the combo makes for some fierce looking women.

I couldn't not do the Bongo, or as I named then after a trip to the zoo, Adamantelopes because, well, they look like Adam Ant...

0.05 pigment liner on 300gsm card

Batgirl

I spent the other day rambling around the national gallery and museums. I honed in on the bats in the Natural History Museum for some reason and took some photos and a few sketches. Then yesterday I found a photo of a woman in this pose and thought I'd give it a bash to see if I could get it. Once I had that done, I remembered the attempt I made a few months ago at a painted/tattooed angel figure that failed. This was attempt two. The bat wings just kind of happened, more based on the stuffed bats from the museum than functional wings. The designs are based on henna tattoos. 

I'm less happy with this the more I look at it, mostly due to the background/sky. I was originally going to use a different medium but changed my mind, so the moon looks a bit...yeah.  I'm still happy with her and the rocks though (after 3hrs of stippling I'd better be!)

I'll stop rambling and post the picture now...

Pigment liner 0.05, polychromo pencils on A4 300gsm card

She's Her Own Worst Enemy

Since part of my summer research for college involves animals, patterns & design, and I love drawing beautiful women, this outcome seemed only natural. The series could pretty much be called Naked and Tattooed Animal Women of the World... the illustrations explain why.

This is the second I've done and she's my favourite thing I've done in ages. I thought my first one was, but there's little things that bother me with that one (I'll post her next).


My matador bull lady sporting some Mexican tattoo designs.

0.05 Pigment liner on A4 300gsm card.

26 Portraits : Update One

I love drawing portraits. So, when I saw that part of my summer work for college involved drawing portraits I started collecting images to work from. I wanted to draw people I knew rather than celebrities. Sure, I know what celebrities look like, but not as well as people I've met in person or see often even in an online capacity. I asked for people to offer photos or even just volunteer themselves if they particularly wanted to be drawn. Otherwise I'd be left to my own devices of drawing folks at will from Facebook. I've done a mixture of both so far. 

After the first two, I realized I was kind of doing my own version of Molly Crabapple's Sixty-six project by drawing my friends, peers, folks I know and like well enough. I decided to set myself a number, so I went to a random number generating website and set it to pick between 1 and 66. It picked 26. So that's my goal. I'm about 8 in now, but I've taken a short break from this to focus on getting work done for the convention in a few weeks. After the first two, a particular style emerged, so it's a little bit all over the place at the beginning but evens out. I'll add photos of the first few here.

One : Scarlett

Two : Robin

Three : Adam

Four : Sarah

Day of the Dead

I have been absent from the blog, but I've also been creating like a mad woman! I think, since finishing college nearly two months ago (oh my!), the longest I've gone without drawing has been about three days. Not too shabby. Except this past week I may have done myself some injury. That is the reason why today I'll be propped up with pillows and cushions galore while I do something less intense, like painting.

Part of the reason for my over-over-zealousness is a convention next month, ArcadeCon, at which I'll be selling my crafty wares. So far, not too bad on the having actual things to sell front. I'll post a few photos of what I've been making. I've started doing Day of the Dead style work last week and it's just a little bit fun!


DotD style Sally from Nightmare Before Christmas (inks, watercolour, pigment liner). I've one more of these planned to do.

DotD Geisha card (watercolour, inks, pigment liner). Sorry for the webcam shot, I was just grabbing quick snaps as I worked.

And there's a load of other bits and bobs, with other ideas and plans scribbled down that I still have to get to. I've also been working on a series of portraits, which I'll include in the next post. 

More Representational Work

This was a toughie to draw... Now, it only took just over an hour to do, but I was in a crowded classroom, on a warm day, with this poor lil plant guy in my hand. After the rough shape was sketched out, I started on the first leaf...when I looked back up a moment later the lil guy was wilted. And very muchly so! So I had to prop each leaf up with a finger, draw it, move on to the next one, and repeat... I got there in the end though!

Also, the thing on my thumb is my chipped nail varnish. People keep asking me. 

A3 piece, 2B pencil

*click images to enlarge

Mmmm, Ice-Cream (..Scoop)

These were for my final Representational Illustration assignment. I'm rather fond of these too actually (plus they god be an awesome grade). I used a fineliner pigment pen. The rendered ones are half scale and the line are to scale. 

      

    

                                                       

*click images to enlarge