Sunday Sketches

This has been an incredibly busy week.  I have not had time for any artwork until yesterday afternoon.  This was the first week of being on days which is always rough in the beginning.  By the time you get used to getting up early, you go back to afternoons.  We've also been searching for a new apartment.  It's one of those situations where we really can't afford to stay where we are but really can't afford to move right now either.  I've been feeling pretty much like the girl in my sketch.  It seems as though it is getting harder rather than easier as more time goes by since Jeff's passing.  I think once the stress of knowing where we will end up living is over, things will get better.  Thank you to all of my blogging friends for all of your kind words.  I'm usually a very easy going person and I hate dumping all of this on my unsuspecting readers but sometimes it helps to get things out.

For more wonderful Sunday Sketches hop over to Blue Chair Diary hosted by the lovely Sophia.

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Dreary Monday

 

I look outside and all I see is gray.  A very dreary Monday indeed.  It feels like Spring will never come.  So I decided to draw some Spring!  The image on the left is the unaltered image done with Prismacolor colored pencils.  The one on the right was brought into Photoshop and had a watercolor filter added to it.  I was having some trouble getting this to scan.  It was coming out so light that you can not see the highlights as I had hoped.  I broke out the camera to try to take photos only to find the battery is dead.  So I did what I could in Photoshop to try to get it as close as possible to the original.  I kinda like the filter effect.  Seems to give it more life.  This piece was one of the exercises in my Lee Hammond book.  I'm so new to the colored pencil media that I was having a hard time with highlights.  I love my Prismacolors (they came with a kit for my graphic design classes and I've noticed they're quite expensive to purchase in hobby stores so I really want to use them properly) but I think I may pick up some Col-Erase pencils as they may be easier to work with.

I loved looking at all of the Sunday Sketches and would like to thank Aquariann as her wonderful dragon piece gave me the inspiration to break out the colored pencils.  I'm still hoping to do a watercolor this week but I am in the process of rearranging two bedrooms which includes all of my craft supplies.  After my boyfriend passed away, my youngest son moved back home with me.  I used the spare room as a studio/computer room and am now trying to squeeze everything into my bedroom so he can officially move all of his things into his room.  It's been slow going as I have a hard time going through all of my boyfriend's things but I know life must go on and he would want me to continue with my artwork.  The only way to do that is to clear out some things and create a new studio space.  Luckily, I have a rather large bedroom and I should be able to cram all of my crafty things into the space I have available.

I hope you all have a good week and can't wait to see more Spring inspired artwork.  I'm so done with winter!

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A Few Disastrous Pieces

Well, I can tell I'm definitely rusty with my sketching.  I have done three sketches, one animal, one portrait and one still life and really don't like any of them.  This one was the only one worth posting.  I haven't even finished the portrait as I really didn't like how it was turning out.  I think part of it was due to the paper.  It was slightly rougher than what I had been drawing on and it's much harder for me to blend on rough paper. 

This image was taken from one of my Lee Hammond books.  I really love the life like quality of her work but they are very time consuming and sometimes I would just like to sketch quickly.  I have a book on sketching but I can't seem to  grasp it for some reason.  I think I need a more beginner style book than the one that I have.  I'm going to check out the library tomorrow to see if I can find something with basic quick sketching techniques.  I would really love to take some art classes at our local college. I think it would be great to have some input on what I might be doing wrong.

Well, that's about it for now.  Not a great comeback post like I had hoped it would be but it's something.  I know that with practice I'll get back on track in no time.  Hope you all have a good weekend.

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IF - Breakfast

Colored Pencil and Marker

I sketched this at work today for the Illustration Friday's word prompt of 'Breakfast'.  I haven't had a chance to participate in IF for a few weeks and I thought this one would be a quick and easy one.  Lot's of running around to do today.  Had to go grocery shopping, which I really don't mind as I love to cook.  Now I'm just waiting for our checks to be done today so I can go cash it and run to Walmart to pick up a few items.

Hope you're all having a happy Monday.  

Update on Sunny:  I was able to examine her a little better today.  Unfortunately it appears as though the break is higher up on her leg than we originally suspected.  I don't have much hope of her having even a partial recovery and use of the leg and claw.  She doesn't appear to be in any pain and she's learned that she has to fly pretty much everywhere but she's getting around and doesn't seem to be letting her new disability slow her down much.  Still breaks my heart every time I see her little leg kind of dangling but I'm grateful that she's hanging in there and not giving up.  Thank you so much for all of your well wishes and kind thoughts.  They are very much appreciated during this rough spot.

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Inspiration Avenue - Books

'Books'

Colored Pencil with Marker on Sketch Paper

I was really excited about this week's word prompt for Inspiration Avenue's Weekly Challenge.  As an avid reader I have lots books on my bookcase shelves, so much so that I've had to resort to stacking them two deep and on top of each other wherever possible.  I'm a huge fan of scary, gory, murder, mystery type novels and have the likes of Stephen King, Patricia Cromwell, Dean Koontz, John Saul, Michael Connelly and many more author's adorning my shelves.  In fact, I am reading a new Dean Koontz book titled, "Relentless" but have only just begun the first chapter.

I love working with colored pencils and marker.  If you've never tried this technique, I really urge you to give it a whirl.  You can use any brand of colored pencil, I happen to have a very nice set of Prisma Color  Premier colored pencils and Markers.  I use the colorless blender marker all over and use varying shades of gray for shadows.  I need a new 10% gray though, didn't get the cap on all the way and it dried out.  The colorless blender is awesome though.  It removes the waxiness of the pencil and makes it look more like a pigment ink or something.  Pretty cool effect with little effort.  I have some colored markers but have not tried those with the pencils yet.  The best part is, you can use ordinary sketch paper as long as you don't overdo the marker.  

That's my art lesson for the day.  lol  Hope you are having a good week.  Only one more day and I get a day off!  Not sure why I'm excited, I'm going to be on call for ers as my boss is going to a Toby Keith concert this weekend, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed I won't have to go in.

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Happy Hump Day!

"Study of the Eyes II"

Pencil on Sketch Paper

You may or may not have noticed I changed my thumbnail image.  Not because I like to make changes like I do to my blog every few weeks, but because Blogger in it's infinite quirkiness lost my previous one.  Not quite sure what happened but I went to post a comment one day and it showed up with no image.  So I chose this sketch as it was readily available on my computer.  I have been working out of the two Lee Hammond books I have and really love doing some of the smaller sketches while I'm at work.  They're quick and I don't need quite as many supplies as I do with some of the larger pieces.  I still need lots of work on my eyelashes but I'm relatively satisfied with the overall outcome of this image.

I have just gotten Lee's book called Lifelike Drawing in Colored Pencil.  I haven't started anything yet, but it looks to be as intriguing as the first two books I bought of hers.  Hopefully I'll have something ready to post soon.  I really love working in graphite, but I do wonder, should I ever decide to sell my artwork, is there really a desire for this type of medium?  If so, are people willing to pay for the time vested in each image?  Is it better to sell reproductions or originals?  I have so many questions.  I have always been able to sell handmade items, but I'm so new to this aspect of my creativity that I'm unsure of where to go from here.

As artists, how do you decide what to sell and how much to charge?  Ah, too many questions, not enough room on my blog.  Not to mention, boring my readers.  lol.  Anyway, hope you are all having a good week.  I have decided to pick up some extra hours at work so I won't be off at 10 am like I planned.  But I will have some overtime on my next check.  More cash for my art supplies!  Shhh, don't tell my boyfriend.  He already thinks I need to pare down my quilting, sewing, crochet, knitting and artwork supplies.

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Inspiration Avenue - Circus

For this week's Inspiration Avenue challenge, the theme was Circus.  I immediately thought of elephants, trapeze artists and a lion tamer, but decided to go with a clown.

I wanted to show emotion with my clown so I made him a sad clown.  Why is he sad?  Because he gets such a bad reputation.  Raise your hands, how many of you readers are afraid of clowns?  I thought so!  lol.  I'm not sure why so many people are afraid of clowns.  Sure, there was John Wayne Gacy (for those of you that are too young or not from Illinois, click here to find out who he was.)  There's also 'It' from Stephen King.  But outside of those two, I really don't see what's so scary about them.

What do you think?  Clowns: scary or not?

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Inspiration Avenue

'Wish'

Marker and Colored Pencil on Sketch Paper

This is my first submission for Inspiration Avenue.  It's a weekly challenge that anyone can enter in any medium and you can even win prizes!  How fun!  My boyfriend said she looked a little sad and I told him that not all wishes come true, maybe she's wishing for the impossible.

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Creativity Boot Camp - Day 10

'Full Bodied'

Colored Pencil and Marker on Sketch Paper

Today's Prompt - 'Full Bodied'.  I went with hair as I wish I had full bodied hair instead of baby fine and straight!  lol.

Don't forget to check out my post below about Illustration Friday and Ripple.  Thanks!  XOXOXOXO

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Creativity Boot Camp - Day 7

'Fly'

Marker with Colored Pencil on Sketch Paper

This prompt was a lot of fun fore me.  I knew immediately what I wanted to do when I saw it.  We have six parakeets and have had most of them since they were only 8 weeks old and couldn't fly very well.  One pet shop clipped the wings so short on one of the birds the poor thing couldn't even flutter to the floor.  He would drop like a rock, so this illustration means a lot to me.

In case you were wondering, I decided to separate my blogs.  Just in case I ever decide to start selling my artwork ( I already got a gmail and Etsy account with the same name...lol ) I thought it would be best to keep them separate and apart.  Thank you Retta for your insight on the subject, I really appreciate it.  I also thought it might be easier for those that only want to read about my weight loss journey or just my artwork escapades.

You can find my other blog here if you would like to see my other Creativity Boot Camp exercises.

If you're wondering how I got the eyeball on my banner, scroll down to the bottom of the page to see the original sketch.  Photoshop has some fantastic little tricks you can do to enhance your images.  I'm off to bed now, I'm exhausted but it was just too hot to sleep tonight.  Hopefully I'll fall asleep fast and hard.  LOL.  Can't wait to start on tomorrow's prompt: ornament!

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