30 Day Art Challenge, Day 14!

Day 14: Draw your favorite book character.

5.5" x 8.5" ballpoint pen on sketchbook paper

The Hunchback of Notre Dame is the most depressing work of fiction I've ever read - but it's also one of my all-time favorite stories. Quasimodo is among my favorite characters, whether portrayed by Tom Hulce, Lon Chaney, Charles Laughton, or Anthony Hopkins.

I wanted to tidy up an older design I'd made in 2011 for my Costumed Figure Drawing class, based heavily on Hugo's description from the book. 

Technical pen on sketchbook paper.

Photoshop vectors with stock photo for background.

This 'final' illustration is something I want to push myself with, but I'd prefer to draw the background when I recreate it.

Postcard: Bound to Earth!

^ "Bound to Earth" bird-guy. He works nicely on a postcard.

Costumed Figure Drawing Final: Freefall

_{13" h x 17" w
cold-pressed watercolor paper
Speedball Super Pigmented Acrylic (Super Black)
#1 round brush for outlines
2.5" hake brush and 1" stroke for wash and coverage
M. Graham Artists' Watercolor (mixtures of Permanent Alizarin Crimson / Azo Yellow and Permanent Alizarin Crimson / Ultramarine Blue)
salt}

One of my favorite projects thus far.

Costumed Figure Drawing: Freefall template, inks and background!

^ Figure at top is the template (photocopied from sketchbook studies at 200%), and figure at bottom is the finished lineart, inked with a #1 round brush.


^ The background, done separately with M. Graham watercolors and salt.

Costumed Figure Drawing: Week 7 home studies!

^ A study using one of my new Koh-I-Noor Rapidograph technical pens - these things are amazing! I used Fritz Schider's An Atlas of Anatomy for Artists as reference for the muscle study.

Costumed Figure Drawing: Week 7 in-class work!

Costumed Figure Drawing Final: Chestan Crufts

_{17" h x 11" w
smooth bristol paper
Speedball Super Black India Ink
Derwent Sketching Dark Wash 8B watersoluble graphite
Hunt Globe 513EF Bowl-Pointed nib for skin and boot outlines
#6 round brush for coat outlines
1/2" angular shader brush for washes / coverage}

While it's not my strongest piece for Costumed Figure Drawing, I am very happy with this as a representation of my character.

Costumed Figure Drawing: Week 6 final preparations!

^ These first three photos show my sketchbook study / final sketch layout. I used drawn plumb lines to translate the study's proportions onto the final piece.





^ Next four photos show progress shots of my inking.



^ Photoshop composites, just for fun. Auto-Align and Auto-Blend are indispensable tools.


^ The result of the photomontage; obviously skewed, but decent.


^ Full-body photograph with camera shading intact.


^ Cleaned up photographed lineart! The blotches on the inside of Chestan's coat are personal reminders of where I would need to use solid black.

Costumed Figure Drawing: Week 6 home studies!

^ For week 6's assignment, Lee allowed us to choose any subject we wanted. I saw it as an opportunity to use one of my characters as the subject; had a lot of fun with the studies.

Costumed Figure Drawing Final: Bound to Earth

_{11" h x 17" w
smooth bristol paper
Speedball Super Black India Ink
Derwent Sketching Dark Wash 8B watersoluble graphite
Winsor & Newton White Gouache for minor corrections
#1 round brush for outlines
1/2" angular shader brush for washes / coverage}

Another belated post, this time for Bound to Earth.

Costumed Figure Drawing: Bound to Earth lineart!

^ Photo montage assembled in Photoshop showing the lineart for Bound to Earth.

Not the best quality - alas, 'twere only a point-and-shoot I used t' capture it.

_{...Yes, I just watched Treasure Planet again. Ahem.}

Costumed Figure Drawing: Week 5 catch-up!

I have a couple more studies to show based off of week 5's model:





^ Both are done with a Tombow Dual Brush Pen and a water brush (the former is watersoluble). The blood is also from a Tombow.

Costumed Figure Drawing: week 6 in-class work, plus bonus!

The model that was supposed to show up this day called in "sick" (yeah, on Valentine's Day), so Lee taught us how to draw clothing folds and later had us draw from photos. I used my beloved 513EF nib for the studies.

My second 7" x 10" watercolor sketchbook is officially done! The horse skull study and simple cat were drawn at The Original Hotcake and Steak House; same night I introduced Allyson to the restaurant.

Costumed Figure Drawing: week 5's home studies!

Here are some drawings I'm eager to share. Rather than continue the 'painterly' fad, I decided to go back to what I feel is one of my core strengths: pen and ink drawing.



^ Drawn in my 6" x 9" Canson watercolor block with Speedball Super Pigmented Acrylic Ink and a 513EF nib; light wash added with a water brush. I went off of my personal notes and tried to emulate Peter Chung's (Aeon Flux) work a bit.

As much as I disliked the single line technique in the beginning drawing classes way back when, I incorporated some almost-single-line drawing in this study. I like the effect.


^ A repeat study, this time in my 7" x 10" watercolor pad (second one!). I used the 513EF nib again, but the ink is Higgins Calligraphy Waterproof Black Ink. It's far more subtle than the Speedball ink. Speedball is the best ink I've used.


^ Back to Speedball. For inspiration, I looked through my books on Eugene Delacroix and Henrich Kley. Their draftsmanship is unparalleled - particularly Kley's, if you want my biased opinion. These two studies were a lot of fun!


^ Final study for the day (now yesterday; I need to stop feeding my night owl habits). I think I'll turn this guy into an angel-type figure with a broken wing.

THIS is the direction I want to push forward in, something more illustrative and catered to my strengths. I had fun with the first few projects, but I want to use the inker's approach for more of my projects.

Costumed Figure Drawing: week 5 in-class work!

Warming up took a while, but I'm pretty happy most of these pages, and I'm fond of the last seven. They were done with a Tombow Dual Brush Pen and an Aubergine Derwent Graphitint pencil; both are watersoluble, so mixing them produced interesting results.

We had our first male model this night. He was dressed as a waiter, though that's barely discernible from my sketches.