The Attic Artist

Heading Out to my First Ever Book Signing

2011-09-30T08:18:00.000-05:00

I'm pretty excited and weirded out. :)
First of all, it's not a solo book signing, it's simply all of the published alums of my college congregating at the college book store. Which really makes it the perfect intro into book signings for noob author like me. :)

But, as usual, I'm still in a rushed mess, trying to pack and do the dishes and finish printing off the things that need printing.

Like this, for example. :)

For the unlikely yet fantastic occurrence that I should sell out.

Or, simply to hoodwink bystanders into thinking about a purchase even if they don't make one tomorrow.

To be completely honest, I'm also simply excited to see several of my college friends. It's going to be an awesome weekend for several reasons!

Playing With Watercolors

2011-09-20T09:49:00.000-05:00

I'm woefully out of practice with watercolors. What does this mean? More watercolors!

Just a picture of a pretty lady to warm up my watercolor skills. I'll post the finished version soon.

:)

Guess What Came in the Mail....!!!

2011-09-15T19:19:00.000-05:00

I'll give you a hint: it came in a box and contained many copies of something I've been working hard to polish this last month! :D

If you guessed the first ever official copies of my self published illustrated children's book, you were right!

Ferris Wheels and Faraway Places: Adventures at the 1893 Chicago Worlds Fair

The blurb on the back cover reads:
"Explore the 1893 Chicago Worlds fair! See the first ever Ferris Wheel, a wooly mammoth, and learn where some of the objects in Beloit’s museums came from."

Look! A cover!

And look! Inside pages!

Please ignore my chapped hands. Also, both the books and my hands are much less grainy in person. ;)

The books got here, they look fantastic, and I'm super excited to have them finished and tangible in my hands.

If you are interested in a copy of your own, check out the lulu.com page where they are sold

Each paperback copy is $15.

I don't even know what to do with myself now.

I'm obviously going to have to find another huge project to throw myself into. ;)

Drawing in the Fresh Air

2011-09-14T18:51:00.000-05:00

Lately I've taken to drawing outside as much as possible. Now that I'm working, I just don't get outside as much as I would like, so I found that forcing myself to do art outdoors kills two birds with one stone.
I'm not sure how much longer this lovely trend can continue, what with the weather turning colder already, but for the moment at least I'm enjoying it. (Although I now have a set of sunburned shoulders...)

This is my favorite spot of all. It's a picnic table on the far side of the lake near where I live, tucked a bit away from the path. It's beautiful and partly shaded -- you can't get much more perfect than this spot.

So far most of what I've been drawing has been the Mad Jack project (which I can't share with you juuuust yet -- spoilers!) and just warm up drawings to get myself back in the habit of drawing for fun.

But tomorrow I have some exciting news to share, so check back!
Hint: something is coming in the mail. Something I've been working on for a long, long time.

I'm Back!

2011-09-10T17:46:00.000-05:00

It's been a long while since I've updated this blog. I've since found a home in a new town and found a job to pay the rent. :) My life has gotten exciting!

But I've also been busily working away on several art projects, including ones you might be familiar with from past posts!

One of the projects that is near and dear to my heart is Mad Jack, a joint comic written by my good friend Amber and drawn by me. It's still very much in the works, but we're both very excited about not only where it's at, but what it has the potential to be.

This morning I roughed out the first two pages of our prologue. Luckily, they don't contain any spoilers and so I'm going to give you folks a sneak peak!

The Maze Pg. 8

2011-05-07T15:20:00.001-05:00

And finally, the end has come. What you see today is the final and last page of The Maze.

The Maze

Written by Kaitlin and illustrated by me

Pg. 1, Pg. 2, Pg. 3, Pg. 4, Pg. 5, Pg. 6, Pg. 7

Pg. 8

The end.

Thanks to everyone who read!

Next up, I'm gonna finally put gobs of effort into my other comic project, Mad Jack, and get back into working on the Chicago Worlds Fair children's book!

P.S.

The blog is undergoing some design changes, so don't be too weirded out if things look a little different as it gets settled.

The Maze Pg. 7

2011-05-06T14:02:00.002-05:00

We're almost through the Maze, folks! Just one more page after this one and we'll be at the end.
:)

The Maze

Written by Kaitlin and illustrated by me

Pg. 1, Pg. 2, Pg. 3, Pg. 4, Pg. 5, Pg. 6

Pg. 7

The Maze Pg. 6

2011-05-05T12:32:00.002-05:00

If you guessed today I would post page 6... you were right!
;)

The Maze
Written by Kaitlin and illustrated by me

Previous pages
Pg. 1, Pg. 2, Pg. 3, Pg. 4, Pg. 5

Pg. 6

The Maze Pg. 5

2011-05-04T08:07:00.001-05:00

We're over half way there, folks, and things are getting exciting!

The Maze
Written by Kaitlin and illustrated by me.

Previous pages
Pg. 1
Pg. 2
Pg. 3
Pg. 4

Pg. 5

The Maze Pg. 4

2011-05-03T16:11:00.001-05:00

And now for my favorite page of the bunch...
This page took by far the most time to do, but I think it really turned out well. :)

The Maze
Written by Kaitlin and illustrated by me

Previous pages
Pg. 1
Pg. 2
Pg. 3

Pg. 4

The Maze Pg. 3

2011-05-03T11:56:00.000-05:00

Whopse! I meant to put this up yesterday. Guess that means today will be double the Maze. :D

The Maze

Written by Kaitlin and illustrated by me.

Pg. 1

Pg. 2

Pg. 3

The Maze Pg. 2

2011-05-01T13:33:00.000-05:00

Here's page 2 of The Maze, the comic drawn by me and written by the amazing Kaitlin for our Graphic Novel class. You can find the first page here or by scrolling down to the earlier post.

The Maze Pg. 1

2011-04-30T13:22:00.000-05:00

This semester one of the classes I'm taking is a graphic novel class. My half of the class does the art, while the other half writes it. Luckily for me I got paired up with my friend Kaitlin who is a fantastic writer and we set to work. :)

This comic is a short, 8 page story. I will be uploading it one page at a time over the course of the next week. It was drawn in blue pencil on 11x14 inch bristol board and then inked by brush with india ink and (rather disappointing) sharpie pens.

The Maze Pg. 1

Ferris Wheels and Faraway Places: Adventures at the 1893 Chicago Worlds Fair

2011-04-14T10:11:00.000-05:00

After a too-long absence from the blog-sphere, I return!
And guess what I have news about...

Later today (when I finish cutting and cropping and resizing my huge folder of images) my illustrated children's book will be sent off to Lulu.com for its rough draft printing!

And even more exciting than the draft printing, my book now has a title. "Ferris Wheels and Faraway Places: Adventures at the 1893 Chicago Worlds Fair"

For months I've been calling it "the book" and "the worlds fair thing" so a title was a much needed addition for this little project. The title is all in thanks of professors who were able to think of titles less corny (and silly) than my initial idea of "ferris wheels and lightbulbs!" XD

Blue Doodles and Noodle Arms

2011-03-06T23:14:00.000-06:00

Remember that blue sharpie I nabbed from the SEA conference? It got used quite a bit. :)

So I drew this lady, stealing this kid. And decided, despite it's similarities to Tangled, it was awesome and there had to be at least two more drawings of them.

I really enjoyed using this bendy people style. It was liberating and oodles of fun. These are going in my "do more with these" pile to develop further. Along with a whole slew of other doodles... *sigh*

Character Sketch: Sheena

2011-03-05T14:03:00.000-06:00

Surprise! I've got a blog update and it's using real media (what a shocker, I know!) I'm trying to use up the last few pages of my notebook so I have an excuse to buy a new sketchbook. ;)

My friend Kaitlin is working on a young adult novel and let me draw her main character, Sheena. It's rough and not quite the character, but it's ... close.

I'm going to try and re-work it in Photoshop. One of the first things I'm going to do is to make that afro bigger! (It kinda looks like a deflated beach ball... and that's just not right.) :D

Doodle: Hippo Illustration!

2011-03-03T09:38:00.000-06:00

I doodled a hippo last night. He is pretty flat as far as illustrations go, so I'll probably leave him alone and move on to more exciting drawings.
:)

I'm always looking for prompts to draw, so if you have an idea feel free to blurt it out in the comments section. I can't promise I'll draw it, but chances are high!

Speed Paint: Bird Illustration

2011-02-28T21:36:00.002-06:00

I've been in artistic overdrive lately! I'm getting a lot of work done on my book project and even moving onto new projects on the side.

Now that I've been thinking more seriously about doing illustration professionally in the future, I've been working hard to amp up my portfolio. And that means more drawing, more painting, more illustration! And then more after that!

Speed Paint/Drawing
Time elapsed: 1 hour (plus change)
Medium: Photoshop

Not particularly pretty, but I'll be going back into it later. Feel free to critique! There's already a lot I'm looking forward to changing. You'll see this guy again.
:)

Worlds Fair: Pages 9 & 10

2011-02-27T09:42:00.001-06:00

One of the big projects I'm working on this semester is an illustrated children's book about the Chicago worlds fair of 1893. I've posted about it before, and I'll probably post about it many more times. It's a project I'm hugely excited about, but to go with that huge excitement is a huge amount of work. When I say huge amount of work, I mean it. Lots. Of. Work. I'm getting faster and faster at the painting process (it's in Photoshop) but it still takes me hours upon hours to finish a page. And the level of "finish" I get isn't quite high enough, even when I get there.

It's wonderful because I'm focusing so much of my energy on a cool project, which isn't something I usually get to do. But at the same time, I really can't do anything else...

Here's a peak at spread pages 9 and 10:

There are a couple of kinks to work out of it, but it's pretty well set. :)
Just have to finish one today and one tomorrow and I won't be behind! (o__o)

Back to work for me!

Self Employment in the Arts (SEA) Conference

2011-02-26T18:55:00.001-06:00

This weekend I was lucky enough to attend the SEA (Self Employment in the Arts) conference in Napervile Il. It was pretty cool and full of stories of success (and failures) and tips on how not to be a starving artist (but still be an artist). The thing that was the most valuable to me was realizing that as long as you are able to support yourself (either through your art or not), your level of "success" is yours and yours alone. Not the NY artist across the way. Not what your friend/brother/aunt things it should be.

Now, I don't plan on being able to use my art for my full time career, at least not at this point in my life. But I'd be lying if I said making a living off of my skills and the things I love doing wasn't very, very appealing. So I'll be honing my talents and building my portfolio and keeping my little dream lit. And maybe someday, maybe someday soon, I can take that step.

In the mean time: art!

(They gave away fine tip blue sharpies from Blick Art. Score!)

A doodle during one of the conference sessions. It was a lecture on copyright law and very informative!

The Mural is Complete!

2011-02-23T18:40:00.002-06:00

Remember that mural I was working on? Well, after a lot of work, a lot of time, and a lot of paint, it is complete!

From left to right:
Ben, Sara, me

(Photo credit goes to Ben)

It was a blast. I really enjoyed watching the whole thing transform from a design on a piece of paper to... a mural. A really big mural. That's not to say it wasn't a fair bit of work, but with all three of us working it wasn't as bad as we originally feared. (And swirls are fun!)

Now that the mural is complete I have 6 extra hours a week to spend on other things... like that book project...

I've Been Featured!

2011-02-21T11:30:00.001-06:00

Good friend and housemate Jenny has featured me and a fashion illustration I did for her on her blog. I posted an earlier draft of it here, but the final is now up! Please go check it out on her blog, Fickle Kitsch.

Jenny's series "Fashionably Artistic" features artists who incorporate fashion (in any sense of the word) into their work. She's looking for new entries, so if you're an artist who is interested, feel free to draw something for her! I know she would be delighted.

Jenny is an amazing blogger and a prolific writer. If you have any interest in Fashion (and Women's and Gender studies, and Nerdiness) make sure you check out her other posts too.

:D

Da Vinci Room: Mural Update

2011-02-18T10:09:00.000-06:00

As you may or may not know, I'm working on a mural with two classmates for a local elementary school. We're nearing completion after a pretty long haul. The mural is for their new "Da Vinci Room," a place for dance, art, and theater. It's all pretty cool and makes me wish I could go back to elementary school. ;)

Ben designed the mural and Sara and I did the majority of the painting. I handled the girl, she handled the boy, and it all turned out pretty darned well!

Ben made a pretty cool video of the mural in progress. Check it out!

We're going back in next week to put on the finishing touches. And then... we will be finished~!

Book: Sneak Preview

2011-02-17T11:16:00.000-06:00

Oh hey blog...

I've been doing a million creative things this semester. That's horribly exciting because I love doing creative things, however it's turning out to be gobs of work.

One of the major, major projects I've been working on is my illustrated children's book about the Chicago Worlds Fair of 1893.

Here's a peek at the first page. :) Still needs some tweaking but it's pretty much set. Photoshop (and my tablet) and I have become fast friends again. If you ever need to find me in the next two months, I'll be pressed against my computer screen scribbling.

Also, the blog is undergoing some cosmetic surgery. I apologize if things look awful for the time being.

Mad Jack: Poison Maker

2010-12-19T12:23:00.002-06:00

I promised a Mad Jack update, and (shockingly) I bring one.
This is a minor character whom I shall tell you nothing about. ;)

This picture isn't "polished" but I actually kinda like that about it. It's rough... and that seems sorta right. (I think I'm going to go back later today and alter the speech bubble. It's too perfect and it feels out of place against the rest of the picture.)

This is once again 100% Photoshop. I'm getting much better at sketching within the program instead of on paper and then scanning it in. It saves a bit of time to do, and I don't feel like I'm losing out on too much quality by doing it.

The Mad Jack comic is getting closer and closer to reality with every day. I'm pretty damn excited about it, and with any luck, some other people will be too. ;)

Ace Detective Doodles... Now in Color!

2010-12-18T19:10:00.000-06:00

Remember how I was gonna prioritize and work on Mad Jack because that's what needed doing?
Yeah. That update will be tomorrow.
Today I messed further with the Ace Detectives idea CarnivorousGiraffe dreamed up.
:D

Just some loose doodles and slapped on color, all 100% Photoshop. I had to do something between baking obscene amounts of ginger bread.
;)

Doodle Update: Ace Detectives

2010-12-17T14:11:00.000-06:00

The semester is finally over, which means I finally have doodle time. Rather, I have time to draw and I don't feel guilty about it. :)

The prelude to this (hopeful) deluge of drawings, paintings and doodles is a little doodle I churned out in preparation for a maybe-comic idea CarnivorousGiraffe and I have on the back burner called Ace Detectives!
(Actually, that's an exaggeration. It would have to have more than a title to be on the back burner. It's on the back burner of the back burner. But it's fun to think about anyhow.)
:)

Ace Detectives!
Detectives who are asexual. Get it, "ace!" ;)
There really isn't more going on here than that. Yet. Someday, maybe more. I hope so, because it's already fun in my head, and making it would be a blast.

But got to prioritize. First things first: Mad Jack.

WIP: Piano Woman

2010-12-12T10:18:00.000-06:00

This is a work in progress I'm doing for my friend Jenny. (She runs a super awesome fashion blog)
It's still coming out of the doodle phase of life, but it should evolve into something cool down the road.
Telling you any more would spoil the fun!
;D

Progressing Mural

2010-12-07T16:43:00.000-06:00

One the projects I'm working on right now is a mural for a local elementary school. It's been an educational and fun experience so far, but we have a long way to go.
So far... we've sanded the wall and primed the door. We have a long way to go, but the road looks good. Soon this blank wall will be filled with gorgeous blocks of color, children's faces, and exploding creativity!
I'm working on the project with two friends: Sara (over at sketchgarden.blogspot.com) and Ben.

Look, it's me!
(very dusty and pretty tired)

I've never been so happy to wear glasses in my life. The face masks were a lung saver, but it was only my poor vision that saved my eyes from being as coated in dust as my pants.
Also, power sanders are fun... ;D

Spiked Heads and Horses Called Blue

2010-12-04T11:09:00.001-06:00

Last night my housemate Elise and I poped in Hot Fuzz and doodled the whole way through. It was an absolute blast. (If you haven't seen it, Hot Fuzz is a hilarious movie.)

There is something incredibly cathartic about drawing tiny crosshatched lines. I just couldn't stop. If my pen hadn't been running out of ink, I might have filled up the whole page.

No idea what a horse called Blue has to do with Hot Fuzz. But I like him. He might return.

Both done in some unknown black pen I found in the bottom of my bag, with the harder outlines done in a fine tip sharpie that I might have accidentally nicked from someone. ;D Anyone missing a sharpie?

Long Necks and Moons

2010-12-02T10:14:00.001-06:00

I'm alive!
I've finished my major presentation on dualism within contemporary millenarian movements, rocked an orchestra concert, and survived to scan a doodle.
Life is pretty busy in college-land - I've still got an exhibit to install, a mural to paint, four papers to write, a final to take, and a children's book to edit.

Drawn in pencil, sloppy photoshop shading thrown on afterwards.

Old Man Faces, Pencils, and Watercolors

2010-11-17T11:28:00.000-06:00

The bic pen got put aside today - just a rest, not a permanent retirement - and I returned to roots of old: pencils and watercolors.

These two mediums are classic and will always be there for you, even in rough times.
You may notice this man looks vaguely similar to a certain Top Gear presenter. (You would be correct.) I was doodling this morning while watching an episode and, what can I say? His wrinkles were fascinating.

I'm not particularly happy with it, but it is what it is. I couldn't do too much with the watercolors since I was working on ordinary cheap paper (any more water on that and it would have tore right apart). Next time I'll start right on watercolor paper. :)

In other news, I'm going to start doing prompts for illustration friday! ~> http://www.illustrationfriday.com/
It seems like a fabulous way to keep up the drawing and to create finished pieces instead simply doodles, which I suffer chronically from.

NaNoWriMo Illustrations

2010-11-15T15:28:00.000-06:00

The blue bic pen returns...

As I mentioned a few posts ago, November has been consumed by the beast that is NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). These drawings come from my current story writing endeavor. These characters are minor to the story, but fun to draw.

The first is the light keeper, the sole producer of light. The second is one of the running men who populate the entirely dark world that exists beyond the edge of the world. They can only travel in groups since their scope of vision is limited to the bulbs stuck to their heads.

Both are examples of how it's possible to go too far with a drawing and would have been much better if I had just stopped earlier. But I just couldn't help myself. It was too fun. :)

After this I promise I'll stop posting blue bic drawings.
(But they're just so much fun!)

Ink Bird

2010-11-13T17:16:00.000-06:00

I've got very little to say about this, other than it was a joy to draw and it actually turned out pretty well.

Drawn in between troubleshooting during the computer art class I T.A. with a blue bic pen over a period of an hour and a half. (I'm a slow drawer, what can I say.) I threw on a textured background in Photoshop afterwards, but since its a bit sloppy I might fix it up later.

Photoshop Painting: To Smudge or Not to Smudge...

2010-11-11T11:26:00.001-06:00

...that is the question.

Painting in Photoshop is loads of fun. The undo feature lets you step up to 15 paces backwards in time, which can be epically useful when you make as many mistakes as I do. You are limitless in materials, you can spread endless digital paint (of any color imaginable) and have as large (or small) a canvass as you'd like. You can literally do anything.

And you can also fall into the Photoshop traps like I did yesterday. Particularly easy to slide into is the smudge trap. It's a nasty one. You're short on time, things aren't blending the way you'd like them too -15% opacity is too low and 20% is too high, and you don't want to find the right spongy brush that would solve your problems because you don't want to download anything new... So you send your cursor over to the smudge tool button and click it.

IT'S A TRAP!

Unless you're really good, your painting will look like it was dumped in smudge oil and any life it had will die. Bummer.

This:

Turns into this:

It's definitely salvageable, but it is always depressing to realize that something you've spent hours on is too smooth. It's just freaky! She looks like she's plastic.

So I caution you, smarter-than-I viewer, do not fall into the smudge trap. Use the tools given to you wisely and do not depend on the smudge tool to fix your inability to paint (as I did).

Children's Book Project: The 1893 World's Fair

2010-11-09T11:39:00.000-06:00

One of my big projects this year is creating a children's book for the Logan Museum of Anthropology (the Beloit College Anthropology museum). It's going to focus on the Chicago World's Fair (The Columbian Exhibition) of 1893 and how the objects and exhibits helped create museums (like the Logan and the Field Museum).

The project is broken up into two parts. This semester I'm writing the book and scripting everything out, and next semester I'm illustrating everything and putting it together for print off of Lulu.com With any luck there should be a finished, buyable book come May. With lots of luck it will be for sale in the Logan Museum's gift shop. :)

Although I'm not allowed to start actually drawing it yet, as that is next semester's task, I've gotten a couple of little concept drawings done here and there.
(I'm changing her hat in the final so she looks a little less like the Madeline character)

The project should actually be pretty cool when it gets rolling. Non-fiction children's books are something I'm interested in getting into more and more. (One of my long term goals is to create one for William Marshal and Eleanor of Aquitaine! When I'm better at it.)

(Also, wow. I used a lot of parenthesis in this post.)

Photoshop Anne Marie + NaNoWriMo

2010-11-07T13:43:00.000-06:00

Today I realized I hadn't posted in over two weeks and so I looked around my desk frantically for something interesting I'd drawn or painted between the last post and this one. What I found was that I hadn't actually done anything interesting since then. o___o
Between that realization and now, however, I sketched Anne Marie from CarnivorousGiraffe's and my Mad Jack project, just so I felt like I had done something.

Done quickly and entirely in photoshop. (Anne Marie's had a few drinks, and you're about to have a few bullets lodged in you...)

Blog posts are bound to be a little more scarce this November. Classes have deadlines and NaNoWriMo is an integral part of my being. Yeiks!

Oh Silver Tongue

2010-10-21T21:23:00.000-05:00

(Warning: disturbing context)

We've been watching and listening to Jim Jones in one of my anthropology classes, and it's been getting to me more than I anticipated. I knew how to react to the Waco tragedy, but the People's Temple tragedy in Guyana is harder to understand, harder to conceptualize, and harder to rationalize. More than 900 people died in one day, most of them committed suicide, some of them didn't. And the Jim Jones character, a man who started out as a Saint and ended up as a Devil, became villainized in American culture.

I started this sketch while listening to the hour in which those 900 people died as recorded on Jone's loudspeaker; listening to Jones preach, listening to dissenters, listening to the majority of his congregation concur, and listening to people line children up to drink poisoned cool aide.

Please don't interpret this too far. It's just a reaction. I do not mean to imply that the members of People's Temple who died were brainwashed or swindled of their autonomy. Nor do I mean to absolve Jim Jones of guit. I'm simply fascinated (and horrified) by the power of words and fear and things that come in pairs.

Ecstatic Joy and Simple Sketches

2010-10-19T20:19:00.001-05:00

You may have noticed that I haven't posted in a little while. You have deduced this correctly, you smart reader! The reason being that I managed to spill a quarter of a bottle of beer across my laptop while attempting to swat a gnat. Very dramatic, very tragic. The computer looked to be a relic of the past, refusing to turn on and making frightening flashy lights at me. But, amazingly, after letting the poor thing dry out for a couple of days (in more ways than one) it... is fine.
o__o
That was not something I had been expecting.
And needless to say I am completely ecstatic!

So I share with you, dear viewer, a random doodle that is not particularly ecstatic and is actually rather staid and just a little boring. It does, however, reflect my new found love for suspenders. ;)
(Done, as usual, with a beloved blue bic pen and over zealous scribbling.)

Dynamic Scenes, Church Doors, and Knives

2010-10-15T11:13:00.001-05:00

In addition to yesterday's post of character designs, CarnivorousGiraffe and I worked on dynamic scenes! Monumentally more interesting and much more fun to do, dynamic scenes are characterized by character interaction and stuff happening! And in addition to always being italicized, dynamic scenes must always end with an exclamation point!

[There was a picture here. Now there is not. Rest assured, it was removed for very important plot reasons]

I can't tell you what's happening in these (that would be a serious spoiler!) but I can say that this crazy project of ours is getting more and more interesting and exciting every day. :)

A question for the lovely audience:
I know how I like to read things, but I don't know about the rest of the world. :)
Given the choice, how do you prefer to read your online comics?
  a) Page updates (once every week etc.)
  b) Chapter updates (considerably less often)
  c) Other

Sketches and Couches and Hotels, Oh My!

2010-10-14T17:21:00.000-05:00

I spent this weekend (and part of this week) holed up with CarnivorousGiraffe working on Mad Jack character designs and dynamic scenes. (It is a new grammatical rule that dynamic scenes must always be italicized.) This post will show the first. Thanks to her generosity and a number of lucky casino factors, we even got to chill for a night in a fancy hotel (for free!) I also drew on the ridiculously comfortable couches provided in the mess hall of her university. I am quite envious of a large uni's couch power.

I had planned to have this post up on Tuesday (camera would not recognize computer). And then on Wednesday (computer would not recognize scanner). But then finally the fates aligned and I was able to digitize my sketchbook!

Anyhow - on with the art!
(Warning: nudity)

I present to you, oh gracious reader, a collection of doodles and character designs, inspired by Sara's brilliant compilation at her blog, the SketchGarden.

Some of you may remember a couple of doodles I've done for the Mad Jack comic in previous posts. There have been a few character design changes, but mostly I've been working on making sure I know how the characters react, how they move, and just practicing drawing them. (Fun fact: Jack has at least 8 knives on her person (or people in her vicinity) at all times.)

Stuck In the Mud, Verbatim Lines

2010-10-07T20:00:00.009-05:00

Being a college student has it's perks. Today marks the first day of our fall break, a week long reprieve from class. I say class rather than college because it is also the period that many professors decide is perfect for big projects. To make things even more interesting, I'm taking the GRE's tomorrow. ( O_O )

But all that aside, I plan to spend a great part of this break working on Mad Jack plans and panels with my good friend CarnivorousGiraffe, who is the fabulous writer of this crazy creation of ours. Expect oodles of sketches, environments, and more in the coming week!

But until break technically starts I'm still going to classes. And going to classes means occasionally doodling in them. This doodle started out yesterday during an extremely depressing film on the Jonestown tragedy we watched in my Contemporary Millenarian Movements class. (...It doesn't get much more depressing than that.)

This time I actually tracked down my scanner and inked directly over my original sketch in photoshop instead of redrawing from scratch. It was faster, but I actually prefer the redrawing process over the "verbatim" method of traditional ink tracing, as it allows me a chance to catch mistakes and actually improve the drawing.

Case in point: her shoulder. I don't even know what's going on there, just that there's something seriously not right. :) Thank goodness it's just a doodle!

Art Process: Under the Wire (Photoshop & Textures)

2010-10-06T12:19:00.016-05:00

One of the things I hope to do with this blog is explain my process. In other words, how I get from idea, to, hey, that actually looks like something. What better place to start than the project I'm working on right now?

I started out with a grand and complicated comic idea. The protagonist, an ambiguous, amorphous, androgynous character living alone on the top of a hill finds a rope that leads upwards forever. Should she/he take it and climb it? Or not? The character is lost in the midst of indecision and stays there, thinking about the potential horrors of each option until she/he dies.

The idea was a bit too... soupy... for me in the long run, and I hardly have time to be entertaining the idea of another comic, even a little one. So, it turned into a single frame, which then turned into an ongoing photoshop exercise, tentatively titled Under the Wire.

(The imagery here is probably based off my current obsession with Myst V...*coughs*)

First I started with a sketch that I did on some scrap paper:

Then... (because my sanity is apparently in question) I redrew the whole thing in Photoshop... (Note: redrawing the entire thing is not faster than going to the trouble of finding your scanner) Redrawing things from scratch may take longer, but it's also a really great way to make sure your tablet drawing skills are up to snuff. :)
I had my lines, a basic idea of what this was going to be... and then I did something I don't normally do: play! :)

I have no idea how this is going to turn out. It's not finished and it probably won't be for a while. There is no "plan" here. I can say one thing for certain, though: I'm having a blast incorporating textures and weird visual elements that don't normally show up in my drawings or paintings. I actually like running around in Photoshop like a headless chicken. It's very cathartic. :)

Next up:

A quick and dirty tutorial.

Is there anything you would like to see explained? Let me know in a comment!

5 Things Busy Artists Can't Live Without

2010-10-04T10:16:00.000-05:00

(The Title of this post is a fallacy. It ought to be "5 Things Busy Artists Would Bite Off Their Fingers If They Didn't Have," but that was just too cumbersome.)

There are thousands of tools, programs, supplies, and products out there for artist. And it is possible to spend a truly overwhelming amount of time and money reading about them and trying them out. These are 5 things I use on a regular basis and are invaluable to me. Some of them were expensive, others were cheap, and there are a dozen other things I love working with too that just didn't make the list.

1) Photoshop

Let's get real. This program is the mother of all programs. It doesn't matter whether you do photography, graphic design, digital painting, photomanipulation, comic making... Photoshop will do it all, and do it with flying colors. There are other programs out there, and a lot of them are really good, but for me nothing will ever replace photoshop. The major downfall of Photoshop is, of course, its price. This program is not cheap, and for a good reason - it is basically god.

2) 2B Pencil

Yes, its a simple one, but paired with 3) these two buddies are the key to artistic bliss. Pencils come in all sorts of numbers, from 6H to 6B (and beyond!) but nothing beats the plain old simplicity of a 2B pencil. It's pervasive because it will do everything you ask of it. Basically, it's a station wagon.

3) Kneaded Eraser

Kneaded erasers! These guys make my life so much easier. If you've never worked with one before, prepare yourself for a little surprise after you unwrap its clear plastic wrapper. It's squishy, and that's okay! Kneaded erasers can be moulded into any shape you want, making erasing small areas a breeze, but can be re-flattened out to deal with large areas too. My favorite aspect of kneaded erasers is that you can 'dab' away at lines without completely erasing them. Talk about a lifesaver!

(One tip though: don't let them get lost in the bottom of your bag or purse. Crumbs and bits of things stick to them something awful and you'll never get all the grit out of them. And that makes for a sad day.)

4) Digital Tablet

My most recent, frivolous and expensive purchase was Wacom's medium digital Intuos 4 tablet. It took a dip out of my savings, but it was worth it. Wacom is one of the leading brands intablets, and there's a reason for it. Everything Wacom makes is impeccably designed and lasts for years. Although it's hardly a necessity, tablets just make life easier. If you plan on putting good use to your computer programs (such as Photoshop) and unless you are uncommonly dexterous with a mouse (or patient and not liable to tear your hair out) a tablet is a stable for computer art making.

5) Watercolors and India Ink

Okay, I kinda cheated here by including two different mediums, but since I use them interchangeably sometimes, I decided a little cheating was alright. ;)

As much as I love digital mediums, there are plenty of times that I just need to 'make' things that are tangible, and for me that includes scribbling like mad over extra paper and slopping color everywhere. Sometimes the digital world just doesn't cut it when it comes to artistic catharsis. For that there are two things I would die without: plain old India Ink and a nice set of watercolors (no, that Winnie the Poo set just won't do.)

And lastly, because I'm a sap, I'm including a numberless addition to this list. It doesn't have a number because it's the sort of thing that couldn't have one. Supplies are wonderful, tools are fun, but they are all mediums, replaceable ways by which we do things. The process of creation is what's so enticing, making something beautiful, making something that means something (or nothing) and watching it grow. You can do this with a tube of lipstick and some rocks if you're really talented (I'm not that talented). In other words, this last thing is simply the drive to make.

Ink Scribbles and the Wonders of Crosshatching

2010-10-03T13:13:00.017-05:00

I've found that drawing with pens, particularly thick lined and cheap pens, is incredibly liberating and rewarding. Something about the fact that there is no "undo" button, that no eraser in the world could take away your mistakes, actually produces more confident lines rather than the logical reverse.

My favorite pens are those that run out quickly and come in packs of 15+ ... good ol' Bic is my scribble-friend for life. :) No, it's not "artist quality," and it probably isn't even really black (most cheap pens have a red or blue undertone) but if all you're doing is practicing and freeing up your hands, you hardly need to be spending over $2 a pen anyhow. (Unless your independently wealthy, and in that case, good on you.)

As you may have noticed, I am a major fan of crosshatching, as well as crosshatching's lazy cousin, scribbling. It's a nice way of breaching the gap between gesture drawing and a firmer, more traditional drawing while staying loose.

Unfinished Self Portrait

2010-10-02T21:10:00.000-05:00

Although it's unfinished, this is actually the most accurate self portrait I've ever done. Granted, I've only done a handful. ;) Having oneself always on call as a model can be quite convenient, though. Colored pencils (and a regular one) on the back of a shopping bag, done in dreary Ireland last fall.

Mad Jack Sketches

2010-10-01T23:12:00.000-05:00

Oh hey. This blog. That I should be updating...

My current project is a comic that a friend is writing and I'm doing the art for. It's not very far in the process yet, but it's looking to be a blast.

Our characters are Mad Jack (woman with the hat and the crazy hair), Gan (man with the bruises), and Ann Marie (drunk woman who looks like she's going to kill you). They live in the wild west, kick some butt, and fight bad guys. Except for when they are bad guys. That happens too.

Cranium

2010-01-18T19:29:00.000-06:00

A friend of mine has a replica of the A. Boisei cranium just sitting innocently on her desk...
I couldn't resist a little sketch.
:)

Suns and Tongues

2009-12-23T17:15:00.000-06:00

Suns and Tongues

I've gotten my scanner up and running (yay!), but there are a few kinks left to work out. Namely, a disturbing dulling of my colors. :(

But while I fiddle with DPI and other settings I don't quite understand, here's two pictures I painted yesterday! While the colors and quality on both are greatly diminished, the ideas are at least there.

:)

Art in the Attic

2009-12-18T15:14:00.000-06:00

Okay. So here's the deal. This shiny new blog is going to be where I keep and upload old and new art that I've done. It will hopefully force me to keep drawing and painting and not to slump into laziness, which I am prone to do.

These first few posts will consist of mainly older drawings, paintings, and doodles. As I catch up with myself newer and newer thing should appear. :)

All of these sketches, drawings, and paintings come out of my beloved moleskin notebook. That notebook (and its successor) have traveled with me just about everywhere I've gone. And I love them for it. :) The fact that those pages take all types of paint and a heavy dose of abuse just adds to the love.

All of these drawings are bordering on "old," and I've learned a lot since each of them... but I like them anyhow. They still mean something to me. :)