Adele sketch

I drew this sketch yesterday while listening to some of Adele's music. My husband came over and asked, "who's that?"

Man, last week was a busy week for me. The craziness has now subsided, and I've spent the last few days lying around feeling tired. I'm so worn out that I can't even write an interesting blog post about anything.

Concept art fail

My husband has dreams about me becoming a great video game concept artist. The kind of person who can make things like this:

 From the game Fable II

My husband wants to become a video game programmer, and thinks that if I developed my concept art skills, we could be a great team. Although I agree that's a cool idea, I don't know if I'm cut out to be a video game artist. I like to draw cute animals and girls in pretty dresses. I don't know if I could draw huge mecha robots, decaying zombie enemies or, as my Dad put it, "warrior babes in chain mail G-strings."

Still, Mr. Drawworm had been dropping hints for, well, months. I could tell he wanted me to take a shot at drawing some of the mythological gods from the video game he's currently developing. So last weekend I picked out the ice goddess "Lacies" and got out my pencils.

"Lacies has a higher constitution than other gods because of the harsh environment she creates. Not many gods choose her as pleasant company since she naturally has ice build up around her. With so much discomfort brought simply by her presence, Lacies resides in her domain of Forem Hiberna, her mountain of ice."

Several hours later, here's what I had:

Cute illustration? Sure. Edgy, hip concept art? ".....not what I was expecting," my husband said, valiantly trying to hide his disappointment. And I can't blame him. I mean, she's holding a bunny for crying out loud. A bunny! What was I thinking? Yeah, it's an arctic bunny, but still.

"Just keep practicing," Mr. Drawworm encouraged me. He's not going to give up on his dream of being a husband-and-wife video game-making team.

Demon possessed puppy and other animals

 

I want to get more practice drawing animals, so yesterday I pulled up Cute Overload (always fun) and started sketching.

Believe it or not, in the original photo this little guy is even poofier.

 

So far rabbits are definitely my favorite animal to draw. This one was on a swing! Awwwww!

 

Ohmygosh demon possessed puppy! His eyes came out kinda freaky...dogs are difficult!

Wanna help me practice? If you would like me to sketch your pet and make them look all demon possessed, send me a link to a nice photo and I'll do it for free. I'll even mail you the original, if you like. (Just small sketches, though - not full portraits like in my Etsy shop.)

Zoe from Firefly drawing

I dunno what "real" artists are supposed to draw, but I doubt they draw a lot of characters from movies and tv shows. But I've always enjoyed drawing my favorite characters - maybe the fact that there's a story behind them makes them more interesting to draw.

 

This is Zoe from the most excellent but short-lived tv show Firefly. I like her because she doesn't say much, but when she speaks up she usually has a very dry sense of humor that she delivers with an absolutely straight face. She is also happily married - which is unusual for any character on any tv show.

I'm still working on my portfolio for the Academy of Art. I think it's getting near to being done!

Spartan drawing - and an announcement

I love how this came out, if I do say so myself. Usually I find drawing clothing to be very boring, but all of the little folds made it fun.

I found this stock photo on Tw1stedTruth-stock's Deviantart page. The model, the costume, the lighting and pose are all superb - especially since I was  looking for something where the feet and legs were showing.

In other news, I've decided to apply to the graduate illustration program at the Academy of Art University. They have a lot of cool-sounding courses there, with some classes focusing on illustrating children's books, which I am interested in.

Image found here.

To enroll in the Fall semester, have to submit a portfolio of 15-20 drawings by the beginning of March. Of course, I have plenty of portraits I could submit, but the illustration department director also wants to see hand and figure drawings. So I've been working on some things, like the Spartan drawing above, to submit.

Unfortunately the only medium in which I am proficient is pencil, so my portfolio is going to be pretty colorless. Maybe I'll give colored pencils a shot; see if I can make anything decent.

Anyway, if the department director decides that I'm not ready for the master's program, I could always enter the bachelor's program. But that wouldn't be as cool. So if I don't get in, I'll probably try again next semester.

Feeling optimistic, though. :)

Drawing for Sally Jane

I decided that I needed to do some figure drawing, since I've been doing so many face close-ups lately. I went looking around the internet for some interesting poses and remembered this photo on one of my favorite blogs, Sally Jane Vintage.

 

From SallyJane Vintage.

Don't these photos make you wish it was spring already?

I sent my drawing to SallyJane and she liked it so much that she posted it on her blog! I'm very happy that she liked it. :)

I wish I hadn't been so lazy in drawing the feet, though! Oh well!

Valentine's Day: Pretzels and Robots

 

 Soft pretzels are my specialty. Today I used a bread machine to make the dough, then shaped them into hearts, dipped them in hot baking-soda-water mix, cooked them, and brushed on some melted butter. (Here's the recipe I used.)

For Mr. Drawworm: my heart on a plate. (Which he quickly devoured.)

This is Mr. Drawworm and my second Valentine's Day since we got married. This year I decided to give him an unusual valentine. Last month he fell in love with a computer game called Machinarium. It's a game involving a little robot searching for his robot love, solving lots of puzzles along the way.

So I drew him a valentine card with the two main characters from the game.

 

 

I started with a pencil sketch, then traced it onto a blank card. I drew the characters with pencil and colored pencil, trying to imitate the faded, rusty art style of the game. (Mr. Drawworm was impressed!)

Mr. Drawworm gave me a lightbox, for when I need to trace things for my art. It's a nice big one! I often talked about how nice it would be to have a lightbox, but for some reason I just never bought one for myself.

Photo from Amazon.

Over the years I've heard people say that they don't celebrate Valentine's Day because they don't believe in only showing your love on one officially approved day.

Personally, I don't see why it has to be either/or. To me, that's like saying "I don't celebrate Thanksgiving because I don't believe in only being thankful in November," or "I don't celebrate Mother's Day because I love my mom every day."

Holidays exist to shake us out of our everyday routines. They remind us to do something extra special, something we wouldn't normally do. There's nothing wrong with showing extra love on Valentine's Day - it doesn't lessen the love you show throughout the rest of the year.

What do you think?

More fun with midtone drawings

After looking around online for classical-style drawings, I noticed that many of them are made on mid-toned paper with a brown pencil instead of a grey one. So, I dug out my colored pencils and made this. It was fun to do, even though I know there's something wrong with the forehead. (And other things.) This also scanned better than the drawing I made using grey pencils.

By the way, one of my portraits was mentioned over at I Love Handmade blog! I am very happy. :)

First, nap. Then, draw.

Lately I've been feeling like I should brush up on the basics, so today I got out a book called "Drawing Dynamic Hands" by Burne Hogarth. I read it for about 5 minutes, then decided to take a nap instead.

Later I did actually get around to accomplishing something instead, though. I drew a hand from this photo reference I found on Deviantart, from Cobweb~stock. (Thanks!) Sometimes hands are fun to draw, and sometimes they can be a huge pain in the butt. Luckily, this one was a lot of fun. The pose reminds me of the famous "creation of Adam" scene in the Sistine Chapel.

Bunny Doodles

Just some quick doodles of my mom's four rabbits.

This photo cracks me up!