Sketch Crawl at the Zoo

So, although I live just three blocks from the zoo, this past Saturday was only my third visit and my first time actually drawing there. I find it difficult to sketch from life because I'm either in a rush to see more, and I can't draw fast enough to capture anything -- and I'm a perfectionist, I focus on details, so it's very hard for me to draw fast and loose. When I do, I feel I'm just drawing badly, and reinforcing the experience of drawing badly by continuing the practice. But I know there is something to it, and I was happily rewarded for my efforts on Saturday.

I'm quite happy with a few of the sketches I got. I particularly like my loose expressive gorilla (although I really have no idea if it was a lady gorilla or if she was actually pregnant - it could have just been a very fat bellied gorilla!), it is just SO hard for me to work that fast and actually have it look like something. And I actually made myself pull out the watercolors as well, something I always hesitate to do while out and about - in my head, before I start it feels like so much 'work' up set up, so I usually stop myself before I begin. But this really wasn't all that bad. Very quick set up and clean up, and most time spent painting!

It was a really fun day - and bonus: it was FREE. And not just because I'm a member of the zoo - they were closing at noon for a charity gala, so they were letting everyone in for free in the morning. I was also thankful that I had the time limit (we arrived at 10am) to help focus on sketching.

New Work: Bella Sara ROYALTY

Bella Sara has just released their new card series called "Royalty". This was my second time working on Bella Sara with Hidden City Games. I only did one card this series, but what a card?! This is Anemone, Queen of House Airistos! I was so happy with how this turned out, I feel I'm finally nailing down & getting comfortable with this digital style.

Illustration Friday: CRACKED

Meant to post this days ago. Just a little drawing I did, inspired by this week's theme. :)

Illustration Friday: CONTAGIOUS

It would be nice if I could post to my blog everyday, but I'm lucky if I get something new up once a week. Thankfully, I've been getting better with free-time doodling, due in part to the inspiring Dani Jones and her amazing ability to record and share almost everything she does.

Today she posted to her own doodle blog, Dani 's Doodles, which gave me the bug… and since i would never draw a robot of my own accord, I thought it a pretty appropriate post for this week's theme. :) Of course, my little robot doesn't seem to be invading anything - he seems more curious than anything else.

Illustration Friday: PARADE

You ever notice that parades are a lot of standing around and creating a big mess? They're no fun unless you're actually IN one, doing something... in my opinion. And maybe for the ants and insects that reap the garbage benefits.

In an effort just to doodle and draw more, just cuz, I post my image for Parade: a rough sketch, with pen & gouache. I'm not really paying attention to quality yet, I'm just trying to draw more. I mean, I draw almost everyday for work. But that's work. I find that I'm losing the ability to create anything of my own, out of my head - which used to be my strong suit, and it's really been getting me down. Haven't really painted in years - so this is just to experiment and try something a little different for a change.

I also journaled a little parade memory above this image in my sketchbook, it's actually kind of a good one - something I had completely forgotten about until I went to write something. Ironically, this picture doesn't really go with it.

Illustration Friday: IMPOSSIBILITY

I've drawn a lot of impossibilities - in fact I'm pretty sure it's my favorite thing to do. This is just one... that I don't think I've shared before. I imagined a unicorn from Madagascar (one of those unique and amazing places I would really love to visit in my lifetime). I think I may have pushed him a little too far in to the lemur side, but I've always thought he was an interesting hybrid. :)

Illustration Friday: SUBTRACT

Simple Sauce
art 3.375" sq., frame 6" sq
colored pencil
©2009

So, this is a little bit of cheat, but I needed to do a miniature piece for a show (deadline was this morning), so I'm posting my entry for Masterworks as well as submitting it for this week's IF theme. The idea here is there were several other tomatoes on the vine that have been subtracted to make sauce. Am I stretching it a bit? Yeah, I thought so.

There are all kinds of rules for miniature works - the general one being 1/6th scale (if the actual tomato is roughly 3" in diameter, it can't be more than 1/2" in the miniature artwork. But sometimes that's not enough! If the artwork doesn't portray a 'sense of miniature' it can be deemed a small picture, as opposed to a miniature. It's baffling, I know. Anyway, I do have that concern with this piece... but I'll keep you posted if I make it into the show. -m.