Time for a new theme… As chosen by The Random Word Generator, the theme for March is “Pelt”. It’s been a cold, grey, muddy winter thus far and I’d like to start working on some Spring-inspired pieces… green grass, blue sky, bare feet. However, the word ‘pelt’ brings images of fur-clad hunters trudging through snow to my mind. And, just to prove to me that Spring is still a time away, the sky let loose a fresh snow-storm on us this morning. At least it covered up the mud for awhile, I guess…
So, yeah, more winter sketches.
I’ll probably clean up and finish the reindeer one; I love illustrations with lots of movement and I need to learn how to incorporate that element into my own work more effectively. I’m still on my art-doll kick but I’ll make some time for drawing, too, and ink/color at least one of these before April.
If you’re participating in any of these challenges, please let me know- I’d love to see how other artists interpret these themes!
~Dalliann
I had great plans to turn a handful of sketches into finished illustrations this month… but everytime I’ve picked up a drawing instrument, all inspiration suddenly evaporates. Luckily, I’ve learned that when one medium is not being cooperative, you should simply try another!
So I am taking up a textile project- a bead-jointed doll for Art Doll Quarterly‘s “Shelf-Sitter” challenge. I’ve made dozens of dolls before but have never tried bead-jointing so this has been quite a learning experience. After finding a really great tutorial at Craft Tales, I was able to modify the basic joint idea by imbedding round, wooden beads inside the limbs and designed an original pattern based on my thick-limbed fairy illustrations (’cause frog-like legs flop so nice). And during that process I noticed that when I sketch people, I almost always start with the head and build the body to suit– but with this doll, none of my patterns turned out well until I reversed the process and worked from the feet up. Weird…
The prototype muslin doll is on the right and on the left is the 'finished' quilters' cotton doll (with acrylic painted face). My next artistic endeavor will be learning how to take decent photos... Argghhh- the light's so bad!
Anyway, I hand-stitched a prototype doll made of white muslin and stuffed it with poly-fiber but when I went to sew the final doll in a peach quilting cotton, the whole project turned into a mess. The fabric burned and shrank under a medium-heat iron (which I’ve never seen cotton do) and twisted, stretched, and pulled while I sewed. Upon stuffing it, the seems puckered and now look terribly uneven. Also, I tried partially filling the torso with plastic craft beads but that was a disaster- it gave her those cottage-cheese textured thighs we ladies just love…
Though not quite so well articulated as sculpted ball-jointed dolls, bead-jointed cloth dolls are still pretty spectacular for the amount of posing flexibility they offer. I'd like to revise this pattern's elbow joints a little and make their movement more natural but that will be a future project...
I’m not sure if I’ll have time to sew another body before the challenge deadline but I’ve decided that the next doll I make will be sewn from that lovely (and cheap!) muslin and simply tea-dyed to give it the right hue; no more of that frustrating (and expensive!) quilters’ cotton! Besides hair and ears, she still needs clothes and wings (she’s currently slated to be a fairy– but watch me change my mind hours before the deadline!) so I’ll be rushing to have this completed and submitted by March 15th. Still, despite the little irritations, I’m loving it! I will definitely be crafting more dolls this year…
~Dalliann
I’ve been browsing galleries, drooling over digital-watercolors and trying to figure out how to implement a similar style in my own work. PaintTool SAI has a watercolor tool (but no directions) so I decided to play around with it and see what sort of effects I could come up with.
Seems a little more ‘air-brush’ than ‘watercolor’ but I’m happy enough with it for a first attempt. And the completion time was so much shorter than my typical cel-shaded pieces, so that’s a bonus!
I think I’ll go dig around for a good SAI tutorial and experiment with a few more digital watercolors…
~Dalliann
A new month and a new theme! As chosen by The Random Word Generator, the theme for February is “Brother”. Having a brother of my own, this was the first sketch idea that came to mind:
If I had known that he’d someday grow into a gorilla, I SO wouldn’t have picked on him when we were little. As much. Probably.
I have a few ideas for kinder illustrations (we do occassionally get along) but I think I’m going to save those for later in the month; I’m currently doing concept art for a trio of siblings in my comic “Sink” and it’s way more fun to draw them being antagonistic than cooperative… ~_^
~Dalliann
Ha- it’s finally done! Honestly I didn’t think this one would take so long but shading and highlighting the berries and leaves was suprisingly time-consuming; not because they were particularly difficult to color- just so BORING. Every time I’d sit down to finish those awful twigs, I’d find something more interesting to do elsewhere… Like watching funny cat videos on Youtube…
Anyway, I’m pleased with how it turned out and even happier to be finished with it. On to new projects!
~Dalliann