Flyin' rats

A couple of pigeons. The first was done in watercolour:

 I spent an hour, maybe 2 (on and off) total on this one.

The second pigeon was a really quick pen sketch and coloured with grey pencil as I don't seem to have a grey pen handy... Oh wait, just as I finished typing that I realised I have a grey Alpha marker but that's alcohol-based and I used water-based ink and hey look, I'm going off on a tangent:

I spent maybe 5 minutes on this one. I didn't outline in pencil beforehand and I'm pointing this out because it's something I rarely do. It's scruffy as hell and I didn't finish colouring in the green-purple feathers because I didn't want to over colour it, even if I undercoloured it. But for some reason I prefer this scruffy, unfinished pidge over the planned out and full colour pidge.

Funny how that happens...

Braid

Just a quick 'n' dirty sketch. Haven't used plain pencil in a while, I'm rusty.

Back to painting, I think...

Just an idea...

I'm trying something different here, but with a familiar style. Hopefully this doesn't turn into another one of those pictures that I don't finish because the idea was too difficult for me to make a reality. I hate when that happens.

I am not a vandal (Happy birthday, Morgan)

I made this as a birthday present, not because I was raging against the system:

(spray paint on... a wall, derp)

The closest I'd ever gotten to writin' my name in graffiti on the wall was when I was a teen and did a few simple tags here and there, but that really isn't in the spirit of graffiti, or writing (if you're a graffiti snob). Plus that spirit involves hitting spots at crazy hours of the morning, hiding from the law and racking your paint, none of which I really fancied doing. I'm still a huge fan of graffiti and it's place in hip-hop culture, so for the most part my graff has been kept on paper, until yesterday.

My cousin and his partner pretty much asked me to draw a little something on their daughter's wall for her birthday, with the words "lil' star" incorporated into it. I normally do the usual greeting card but with an unusual design on the envelope (a la keeping it on paper). My cousin suggested that this would be an extension of that tradition but on a bigger - and vertical - surface. I'm pretty sure he wasn't thinking the whole wall but I already was.

from the paper to the wall

I ended up having to stack the words on top of each other as it would have been too long to fit on one line. The funny thing is that they will be rehoused in a few months as the council are supposed to be demolishing their building to make way for a new development, which means that this will also fall into a big pile of rubble. Kind of sad to do something like this only for it to disappear down the road. But I guess that's one of the things about graffiti, that it's never supposed to be permanent, even if this was legal and not going to be buffed out by anti-vandalism cleaners :)

I like that the time-and-tested combo of chrome and black really stands out. I did have a few problems with it though:

• I have NEVER drawn anything as big as this before, in any medium... ever, so I got a bit excited with the size of it. It's a little too big.
• The paint kept dripping. This was most likely due to the wallpaper not wanting to take the paint properly. Wallpaper isn't a very good surface to spray on unless it's matt and super absorbant, which this wasn't.
• My white spray can kept sticking and clogging. How annoying is a can that splatters instead of sprays? It also made adding the highlights harder, and made my fingers hurt from pressing down so hard.
• I got tired at the end and my fingers were starting to cramp, so the final simple details kind of went a bit wonky.

Fortunately the pictures hide most of the drips and smudges. It probably is best admired from afar. Maybe if I had more than a couple of hours, a better surface and much more practice it would have been cleaner and crisper. But for a first attempt at anything more than a tag in about 15 years I'm pleased with how it turned out.

clash

Yeah, I've been slacking on updates. Let's just say that I've been pretty uninspired as of late.

I did however finish my post for "Ariele* & Kinga's Awesome and Amazing Illustration Project". It doesn't really have a title as outrageous as that, after all we're only on the second word. My word of choice as well.

And here is that second word. I present to you "clash":

(soft pastel on paper, A3)

This started out as a random photo that I took in the Philippines last Christmas, of 2 fighting cocks squaring up against each other. I used it as a reference to draw a simple pencil sketch which in turn was used as a reference to draw this almost entirely freehand in soft pastel. I decided on pastel because of how messy and smudged it can get, which was useful in trying to capture the speed and chaos in which the birds moved.

Cockfighting, or sabong is a very popular pastime in the Philippines and probably pre-dates the Spaniard's colonisation of the islands. More about the history and traditions here.

I remember the first real cockfighting event I'd ever been to, about 5 or 6 years ago. I'd never seen anything like it. Organised chaos describes it best. Shouting and betting on the favourite (meron) and the underdog (wala). The absolute silence in the pit as the birds are dropped to their feet. The anticipation of the first slash. It was horrific and exciting at the same time.

In the drawing above neither of the birds had a cockspur as it wasn't a real cockfight, merely a conditioning test by the birds' sabungero. Both birds had a glove over their natural spur to prevent any unnecessary damage.

And now the customary WIP pics :)

Update: Complimentary link-back to Kinga's illustration here. Check it out!

*This is indeed my real name. Hello world

Illustration Friday: giant

My entry for Illustration Friday, this week's topic, "giant"

Yesterday I was at a school summer fair that my cousin was DJing for, with it's typical bouncy castle, face painting and tombola stands. One of the prizes at one tombola stand was a big panda bear holding a heart. The first thing I thought was "I don't have a teddy, OMG I want it", then I found out I couldn't have it because it was a kids-only tombola :(

Later that day I saw a little girl running around and playing with her friends, while carrying a giant blue shark plushie on her head. She'd won it from the same tombola stand where the panda was, which is weird because I didn't even see it at the stand.

It was hard to sketch because as with most little kids she wouldn't stay still, and I didn't bring my camera so I couldn't draw from a photo. So this was really rushed. My proportions and lack of skill at drawing human form really shows in the 10 or so minutes I did this in. But that's fine, at least it's something and it keeps me from thinking about what the hell I'm gonna paint.

So sharks, as well as being carnivorous toothy sea-beasts can also be fodder for cuddliness... Hmm, imagine that.

Think fast, sketch faster, part 2

More sketch practice. This time I brought my camera with me so I took photos, which meant that I could refer back to them and sketch people on the move. Again, no real detail, just shapes and lines.

Girl with a dog. It's supposed to be a boxer but it looks like a mutt :)

Boy feeding a swan

Think fast, sketch faster

I want to draw people. The problem is that I'm bad at drawing people, especially with proportions and foreshortening. So I took a walk through my local park and made myself sketch human form. Sitting on a bench I sketched people that sat on the bench opposite me.

The thing with drawing people on the move is that they are on the move. Fortunately sitting people don't move around as much but I still had to draw quickly. Drawing quickly also meant that I had to capture body lines instead of fine detail, and be more confident with the lines I draw (I didn't bring an eraser with me). I still have a long way to go but doing this was kind of fun, even if the weather was a bit breezy.

I was also going to take some photos around the park for my own reference, but it's difficult to do that when you forget to bring your camera XD

Meet Jimbo WIP

My current drawing, which I call "Meet Jimbo" :D

Jimbo was only a puppy when my mom took him into our house in the Philippines. He was found abandoned outside my aunt's house. When he first came to us he was really small, shy and very quiet, but after a few days he'd gotten big, boistrous and would chase anything and everything. He lived with us for about a year until he became sick and died. I suspect he'd eaten something that got tangled inside his stomach because, as with many puppies he was big on chewing things up.

He is a typical mongrel with a cheeky face. I just happened to snap a photograph of him sitting on the driveway, which is what I am referencing for this picture. And it was one of those rare moments that I was able to capture before he ran off to play.

To be finished in acrylic. I was going to watercolour him but seeing as I've never used watercolour before, practicing my (non) techniques on this would be a bit of a waste. Watercolour comes soon :)

UPDATE: see the final painting here.

"M"

I recently read The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break, and I really loved the way the author portrayed "M" as a strong but soft character, so I decided to draw him.

I am not good at drawing the human body. I'm OK if I draw from a reference picture but useless from memory. I still haven't mastered foreshortening and things just end up looking out of proportion. So this was a bit of a challenge.

I used a couple of reference pictures for this, namely a sitting man and a chef jacket. I looked at pictures of minotaurs and the majority of them were the typical monster version. So I made up the bull head, all the while trying not to copy the illustration on this version of the cover.

As you can see to the left I sketched a simple hand as a reference as I was going to erase his hands and redo them. I can't really tell if the hands are too small or if they just appear small because of his massive head. I decided not to fix them as I'm thinking this is more of a study than a main piece. I eventually want to do this in colour with M in front of the diner (medium undecided).