Sketches, PiBoIdMo final

Well, it is official. I made it thru PiBoIdMo with 30 ideas! It was a lot of fun and it kept me focused not only on written ideas, but gave me another reason to stick with practicing my illustration skills. If you are an illustrator, I encourage you to participate next year, even if you never intend to write. Many of the posts offer insight that could easily apply to illustration.

Below are some of my recent sketches. I think I mentioned this before, but I have found that the less I focus on getting things perfect, the better my drawings turn out. I also found a really good video tutorial on drawing children at this link. Was a big help! You can see how I used some of his methods in the sketches in the first image.

Cobbler

One of my all time favorite stories is Leo Tolstoy's "Where Love is, God Is". The first time I heard it was Reba McIntire's version on the radio. Much shorter than the original, but still had impact. There are other versions, and it was even made into a claymation movie many years ago. Publishing a picture book version of this story, or perhaps a bit longer book, has been my goal for many years, and will most likely be on the radar until it happens.

Below are 2 attempts at character sketches. The first is my "blind" attempt (using no reference). Not good, but I think it is fun to see how someone develops their art, so I am sharing as well. The other is my second attempt after looking at some men sitting, and studying older men briefly. I also used Photoshops 3D primitives to work out his posture, which you can tell I was having trouble with in the first image. Overall I like how it turned out,but the face and hair need work as it does not have the "old troubled cobbler" look I envision. But a good first (second) attempt.

Geese

As I have been working on this for the past fews days, I cannot recall the inspiration for the sketch below. It comes from an idea I had for PiBoIdMo. For reference, I drew the goose below the sketch. Came out a lot better than I thought it would as I was working.

I wanted to add an antagonist to the geese sketch, but I need to do a bit more research on them as all my attempts looked weird. I am excited about how well my sketches are turning out. My fear is that I will not be able to take any to final product in my effort to develop a portfolio. However, the self-defeating, complaining blogger of the past is no more. With God's help, I will have a portfolio done in the next year, hopefully sooner.

 

PiBoIdMo & SkADaMo & ballerina's, oh my!

Life has a funny way of tripping you up when you establish a goal for yourself. While I have managed to keep up with my output of ideas for PiBoIdMo, my sketching of those ideas, along with doing a daily sketch has been a bit harder. With running my son to rehearsals, my daughter's science project (shudder), and my work obligations, finding time to draw has been hard this weekend. I did get the below sketches done while waiting during one of the rehearsals, but that was Sat. :P Anyway, I am not necessarily complaining as I have done more drawing in the past couple months than I have over the past 2 years since I went "offline" from this blog.

I have a request... if you find yourself here looking around, leave me a comment. This is 1. a test to make sure that the page views I see in my stats are not just bots, but humans; and 2. to hopefully begin to develop new connections thru this blog. I miss the community of illustrator (and writer) friends that passed by. Where has everyone gone?

PiBoIdMo - Day 10

Took some time off from the day job to get a few things done around the house that I keep having to put off. As a result, that left little time to draw. Winding down now and took a few minutes to sketch this.

No one in my immediate family has seen snow. My wife and I experienced a small bit back in 1989, but nothing like covers the ground up north. My daughter's comments about wanting to see "real" snow prompted this sketch, and an idea for a picture book.

PiBoIdMo - Day 6

Not sure why, but ducks were on my mind to draw tonight. Added mama duck, but she needs a tad more work.

PiBoIdMo ~ Day 4 sketches

So far, being a part of the PiBoIdMo group is proving fruitful, at least as far as ideas go. Only day 4 and I have 6 ideas down. Granted, the first 2 have been in my head for quite a while. Below are some sketches of 2 of the ideas I wrote down yesterday and today.

I have always had a love of trains, and these two ideas spring from that love.

It is quite amazing how your brain works when you have committed to something. Enjoying the ride so far.

PiBoIdMo

PiBoIdMo (Picture Book Idea Month) officially started this past Saturday. I joined for a few reasons: 1. to give myself a needed reason to think outside the box/get my creative juices flowing, 2. to get the ideas in my head down on paper finally, and 3. just because it seemed like fun. While I am not actively pursuing becoming an author, there is that "bucket list" goal of publishing a book at some point in my life.

To help keep me on track with both PiBoIdMo and my daily drawing goal, I am going to do my best to draw an illustration that goes along with each idea I put down. My first idea is already illustrated here (second one) and Sunday's idea was illustrated a while back (third one down). The challenge is on!