Sunset on Rbician

Was poking around on Flickr studying shapes in the thumbnails. Found one of some minarets, but that's not what my mind saw. I morphed the shapes into a kinda futuristic sci-fi landscape. Thought it came out kinda cool.

Dubbed the new planet "Rbician."

Achala, A Nomadic Herder

Tomorrow is the first "You Can Draw!" class. Required class materials are paper, pencil, and eraser.

Wow! Holy cow, I haven't drawn in pencil in eons...Oct. 21, 2008 to be exact. I discovered my scanner doesn't play nice with graphite and that was the end of that little experiment.

However, since I'm gonna have to draw in pencil, might as well dust one off and have a go at it. Discovered Rick Tulka does all his drawings in pencil, so that gave my soul a little encouragement too. Dug out an old General's drawing set which included an Extra Black layout pencil. Have no idea what a layout pencil is used for, but it was the blackest pencil in the box, so I sharpened it up.

Meh, that didn't melt my butter. There are tips and tricks to drawing an eye and they weren't in my brain at the moment.

Drawing from real life is better than drawing from my brain, but since nobody was up but the cat, a photo would have to suffice. Hello National Geographic.

This is a tiny piece of a much larger portrait of Achala, a nomadic herder in India (photo by Steve McCurry; Nat'l Geo, Feb 2010, p. 107).



Big sigh, got his nose turning left onto Route 66 just after the bridge.

I think when you draw a face, you're supposed to lay out the shape of the head and location of all the major parts. I don't do that obviously. I start at the feature that attracted me to draw, draw that, then draw outward from that point. Art teachers across the nation will gasp in horror at that statement I'm sure.

And my scanner still doesn't play well with graphite. I fiddled with the settings and never could get the blacks to be black. Oh well, visualize blackness in the appropriate places please. Thank you.

Polygamy in America

Dude on the cover of the latest National Geographic. He had an ancient face. Had to draw.

He was looking eerily similar to George W. Bush for a while. Kinda creeped me out. Squiggled on more lines to get rid of the likeness.

Dream Clouds & Chelsea

Decided to take a break from drawing and computer and just flomp on the couch watching TV all day. Dozed in and out. Had a weird half-waking dream of an image of clouds with lines. Thought about it all day and drew it this evening.


The part I dreamed was really just the upper left corner of this. I filled in the rest to fill the page.

I try to pay attention to my dreams. It could be valuable information the universe is trying to send me. Or I could just be a lunatic. Either way, I pay attention.

Also drew Chelsea sleeping in the middle of the living room rug. That's an odd place for her. Had to draw since she was still for once. Any other time I've tried to draw her she could feel me lookin' at her and would move.

January Doodles

Journaling:

My drawing mojo went to Tijuana for the weekend. Couldn't draw a straight line with a ruler.

Decided just to doodle but the doodles were even looking awful. Since they couldn't look any worse I slopped some paint on them. Hey! They don't look so terrible anymore. Amazing what a little paint can do.

Went back through all the less-than-stellar doodles in my square Hand*book and added paint. I was feeling the need to be creative even though I couldn't draw. Some came out kinda cute. Others not so much.

Sudden thought:The dude with the monocle looks just like Captain Peacock from the British sitcom "Are You Being Served?" That's kinda neat. Didn't intent it to be that way, it just happened.

Here's a larger version of the doodles on the page above:

Sunday Doodle

Doodling with Crayola Paint Brush Pens in square Hand*book while watching Vikings vs. Saints.

Picked up these Crayola Paint Brush Pens on a whim. I didn't have a lot of expectations for them since they are a children's paint product. They are FABULOUS. The paint flows evenly, doesn't blob or drip, and, best of all, you don't have to squeeze them to get the paint out. They are a dream to draw with. The only drawback is they only come in five colors: yellow, red, blue, green and purple.


Dear Crayola,
Love your Paint Brush Pens. Would you make them in more colors for us big kids please? I would like black, gray, tan, olive green, and cerulean blue. If you could make a black one with waterproof, archival, lightfast, permanent pigmented ink I would buy a dozen tomorrow and love you forever.

Hugs,
Speck

Brush Pen Doodles

Late-night doodles, drawn while watching a marathon of Barrett-Jackson car auction on TV, drawing whatever is in front of me, then whatever poops out of my brain.

Showed the first one to Hubby:

"Do you recognize it?"

"No, should I?"

"It's the coaster you sit your Pepsi can on every day."

"Oh."

(eye roll)

Daddy's Chair - Where he reigns supreme over the household. (snort) The hump in the seat is one of those cotton hull neck pillows.

The fringed wool blanket on the table is for Smudge the Cat. She likes to sit in Hubby's lap because he is warm and she is old and gets chilly. He won't get up if she's in his lap even if he has to pee. So the blanket was the solution. It was that or Depends.


Smudge on her blanket and other brain poop:

More Craptabulous Doodles

Chelsea Waits and Watches

My antique kitty Chelsea has become quite the Velcro cat lately. She follows me around like a puppydog. When I sit on the porch in the evening she sits by the door waiting and watching for my return. I don't know what's gotten into her lately. It's very uncatlike behavior.


Process notes:
I broke out my PITT brush pen on this one, trying to get to a good place with it. I'd say this was a Fail. I'm too heavy-handed with it. Must work on that.

As I watched Chelsea through the glass storm door I was struck by the play of the warm interior light framed by the stark blackness of the night. I wanted to try and capture that.

I don't think I got the frame of the "blackness of the night" quite black enough. I fiddled with the scanned image to see if darkening the border would help. It looked worse, so here it is as painted.

Posting the successes as well as the failures.

Rosemary

I adore my mother-in-law with all my heart and think of her whenever I see this little sprig of rosemary.

The text should read "The *only* one of four I've managed to keep alive." I have a garden but not a green thumb. I forget to water the plants. The only reason this sprig is still perky is that Hubby empties Cheezburger the Porch Cat's water dish into the tub each morning.

Mansion House 1 & 2

These are the first sketches in the new Hand*Book Journal. I was horrified to find that the watercolors bled through. Argghhhh! That doesn't happen with my cheapo daily journal.

These are details from a historic house here in Our Town. The fruit swag is one of a matching pair of plaques on the western wall. "Plaque" is probably not the correct architectural term for it, but it's the best I can do.

Next is a leadfree sketch of the western entrance. I'm having trouble finding the correct watercolor formula for the side of the building in the shade. Mine keep coming out waaaay too violet. Any suggestions?