Congrats to anyone else who took part in inktober this year! I focused on combining witches inspired by different types of teas and I had so much fun! I’m conquering my irrational fear of side profiles and I think it’s working, I’ve been really liking side profiles lately and finding them easier to do. I experimented on this piece with adding freckles (they’re a feature in all of my inktober sketches but I haven’t liked how freckles have looked when I’ve dotted them in with a pen or brush) and uh, I guess it was kind of a success? Next time I’ll use my lighter shading colour for them, as I used the ink I use for my lines and it turned out really dark and concentrated, but I think they’re cute! (and I have ink sprays everywhere)
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.
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.
Really enjoying experimenting with soft pastels. This piece was the first time I used Pastelmat. It's an amazing surface to use with pastels as it takes loads of pastel, the colour stays vibrant, and there's minimal dust
Ink on watercolor paper. I am experimenting with different color combinations. I think the distribution of different sized monsters is acceptable, but i am not quite happy with the colors of them. Suggestions are appreciated!
Experimenting today with an oil transfer drawing technique. The red and purple lines are oil drawn/transferred to hot press 140 pound watercolor paper with watercolor applied. The oil resists the watercolor.
More ballpoint pen experiments. This is with a Bic Round Stic (12 for $1.49 at Staples!) on just a bond paper. Making progress with this medium, methinks!
A working page for a book i am developing about vampires. i starts with a raw ink sketch, gets scanned and i work them up on a xp pen tablet - but this is just experimental - and not final.
I've been experimenting with colour pallets and line width. Also trying to do LESS - my natural tendency is to add everything so cutting back is quite hard, but I think works better.
I’m often asked about my Bic pen drawings and how I do them. It starts with a good foundational drawing, the ballpoint pen part is just trying to colour within the lines. I try to do my best to explain the process, but the best way to show my progress is by posting my efforts to master pen drawings over the span of 3 or so years. I have been doodling/drawing with ballpoint pens as far back as I can remember - they were cheap, readily available and always lying around the house. It wasn’t until I was bored during a particularly long team meeting-conference call (around 2016-17) that I started to think about the possibilities of ballpoint pens as serious portrait illustration tools. My first experiments with full colour ink portrait drawings were rather crude, but that’s the point of learning new techniques—as long as the curiosity and the love of drawing is there, you can transfer that skill and passion into any medium. Remember, the most exquisite drawings and paintings you see didn’t materialise fully formed, they started out as failed experiments. Failure after failure after failure. It’s important to remember this when you get discouraged (I've failed spectacularly over the years). The only difference between the accomplished artist and the beginner is hundreds of hours of practice. Talent can only get you so far. It’s the hard work that you do behind the scenes that makes your work look effortless. Keep doodling. Keep learning. Stay curious.
This is another drawing i'm really proud of creating on my tablet and thankfully I recorded the progress (I will be uploading the speedpaint next week) I drew an Octopus because I really love Octopuses since they are one of my favorite animals in the entire world.coloring was quite fun as well as experimenting which led me to create this.
A motif I having been enjoying in my sketchbooks lately but this time experimenting with positive and negative space. Watercolor and Posca pen in 8.25x11.75 Moleskine sketchbook.
This is the centre section of a cartoon I did back in my university days for the student newspaper. It was fun to do, but took a lot of time. I hope to put it into a collection of comics.
This is a mashup of art styles. I'm not even sure how to describe it. Started with the main mushroom that is outlined and then went crazy around it. Also experimented with water reflections a bit.
I like to take my iPad out and experiment with no clear aim sometimes. Tonight's doodles led me to this glowing alien catlike creature. Used jingsketch's round render for most of it. If you think this is weird you should have seen the hippo. Enjoy!
