Hello, my name is Ilga Jansons,
and I'm a doodle addict. Edgewood, Washington Plus

I’ve worked in the fashion industry, tested equipment for NASA, been a high school teacher and a program manager at Microsoft. I’ve also been a general contractor, an indie-dyer for wool and yarn, and designed architectural etched glass. I am currently semi-retired and rediscovering my artistic roots. I keep drawings on a Pinterest board. https://www.pinterest.com/EdgewoodGarden/ilgas-drawings/

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Ilga Jansons' Uploads

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There are many reference photos for iguanas on the internet. This drawing relies on three difference reference images. The drawing was done with a micron .005 pen and then coloring added with pencils. He was a lot of fun....I think there may be more iguanas or other lizards and reptiles in my future!

An ink octopus from a Getty photo reference.

I try to do a couple of birds a week (obviously don't post them all). This is based on an on-line photo reference drawn with a "soft" Palomino Blackwing pencil and a 4B Koh-I-Noor Hardtmuth Progress woodless pencil. Hence the dark velvety black.

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Drawing Prompt Submission

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My first ballpoint pen person. This was a lot more time consuming than I expected, but I'm glad I hung in there and finally finished it. The reference for the drawing was a Getty Image.

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I've been so impressed with the ball point pen art that I have seen on this site, that I decided to give it a try. This is a Betta fish (Siamese fighting fish) done in red, blue, and purple ball point pens. Obviously, I have much to learn....but it was great fun and I have ordered some more colors since I plan on experimenting more. I've enclosed a photo of the work in progress and the various reference photos I used. The colors are more true to the final scan than in the flash photo of my drawing table.

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Drawing Prompt Submission

More ballpoint pen experiments. This was trying to "blend" colors, using ball point pens in a similar way to colored pencils. I found Layering evenly to be pretty difficult, esp with the pens blotching and very very limited burnishing. The interesting thing is that the paper doesn't seem to get "tired" the way it does with pencils. This is just cheap printer card stock.

Drawing Prompt Submission

Pasha was a beloved German Shorthaired Pointer rescue dog. He came to us a bedraggled youngster and lived to become a "grand old man." This pencil drawing was done as a tribute after he "crossed the rainbow bridge."

After struggling with horse anatomy from photos, I finally decided to search for white horses, figuring that I would be able to see details more easily than on darker photos. It worked out well, the details were much more discernible.

Drawing Prompt Submission

This a ball-point pen drawing done with a black BIC-Stick pen. Based on a Pixel photo reference of a Harpy Eagle.

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BIC ballpoint stick pen drawing on Richeson bulk drawing paper. This started as a contour drawing and just got squiggly (not the original intent). This was clipped to my board for weeks and I would add a few squiggles from time to time when I wanted to make marks, but didn't have inspiration. It's just a bit under 15 inches (12x18 inch paper) and is probably about 25 hours of making little lines and squiggles. The reference was a Dreamstime royalty-free photo.

It's never been my practice to stick pins into insects and collect them that way, but drawing them is quite appealing. These are created with Prismacolor pencils and a Micron pen.

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This started as a line drawing based on a photo of peonies in the garden. It’s drawn with three different pens: Micron 005, Micron 03 and Faber Castell Pitt superfine (0.3) on 11x14 Strathmore Bristol Vellum. The paper isn’t terribly tolerant of wet media, so I played around with tinting it in Photoshop because I wasn't sure how it would go. But I liked it in color enough to chance painting the drawing with the nice and bright Dr Ph Martin Hydrus watercolors. It's photographed it on my drafting table with my glasses for scale. The lamp has a daylight bulb, so I think the color (at least where the light is more prominent) is fairly true.

Maia, one of two current German Shepherds was born here at our house ten years ago. She is a grand old lady with a big ears, a big ruff and a sweet personality. This drawing was done from a photo reference AND her sleeping at my feet. I used Pigma Micron Pens in black and brown with a little graphite smudging to add a bit of shadow.

A watercolor pencil drawing of a goldfish.

Drawn from a garden photograph. This took me much longer than expected. I kept stopping because I was getting discouraged. I still don't like the leaves, but there's not too much I can do about it at this point.

Drawing Prompt Submission

Pigma micron pen drawing of a hawk

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Ilga Jansons' Uploads