#Inktober Giraffe

So, I'm not going to do ALL of my inktober posts.  You can check out my instagram if you want to see them.  I am, just going to blog my favorites.  Probably.  I make no guarantees.   Though I really should blog more consistently.  I'm working on it.  Be patient.  And if you want more, comment!  It helps motivate me.

So, this is my giraffe before digital coloring, with just ink and some orange col-erase pencil. (it scanned in a bit brigher than real life)  The scan looks much better than the dark grainy picture I snapped with my iPod late at night when I finished it though.

and after digital color and cleanup

 I initially didn't mean to put as bright of a background color behind him and was going to tone it down, but it just didn't look as good.  It works really well with him, and it is now one of my favorites.  He's also up in my zazzle shop as prints and bags and tee-shirts and purses and magnets and pillows and a sketchbook and all.  Ok, shameless plug over.  :)  I really do love zazzle though, they have great coupon codes regularly, they have great quality products and they have amazing customer service.  I am my biggest customer, seriously.  I buy more stuff for me than anybody else does.  lol!  It is just so much easier than when I was trying to make etsy work for me.  I may only make a percentage, but it is waaaaay less work and less risk. 

So, how do you like the background?  Too bright?  Too distracting?  Who knows because your monitor is different than mine?  Comment away, I love to have other insight.  I'm still learning with color...

#Inktober Owl

I have been trying to blog more often, with more of my artistic content.  So, have you heard of #inktober?  It was started by Jake Parker as a way to polish up inking skills.  (He also started the #artdropday).  I took a week long illustration class from Jake at a Writing and Illustrating For Young Readers a few years ago and soaked up some of his genius, at least that was the hope.  He's one of those ridiculously talented/practised artists that can draw so effortlessly that he makes the rest of us look bad.  But anyway, I digress. This is inktober day 1.  With many more to follow.

owl

 This owl is a sort of compilation of a couple of cute owls, and as such is not a specific breed of owl.  He was fun to draw and has a different look then my other Owl that I did in pencil.  (he is very specifically a barn owl)

Ironically an owl was the first thing I drew with that last hashtag media bandwagon I jumped on.  Weird.  Either way, that #365drawing frenzy gave me great fodder to digitally color and turn into nice finished polished pieces later.  And as I seem to sometimes need a push to produce artistic content in quantity, it seemed like a great idea to participate in this one too.  And goes along with my newly defined outlook and identity as artist first, and illustrator of books as an extension of that.  As opposed to primarily and almost solely identifying as a writer/illustrator of children's books.  Of which I have worked on for a long time, but have not published or even tried to publish any thing as yet.  Which was getting really discouraging.  Also since I had an almost single handed focus of working on my dummy book, I was taking hardly any work to a final polish.  I think I was too narrowly focused on a long term goal with very long term payoffs.  So although I will continue to eventually finish and then submit my dummy book, I am going to play at being an artist just for the sheer joy of creating content that I personally like to create and look at and polish my skills in the process. And not limit myself to other possibilities. 

Vote for your favorite, and enter a giveaway for a free magnet!

So I thought I'd combine both a giveaway as well as a survey. Let me know your first and second choice for a background (even more helpful if you can tell me why you chose them) and you'll be entered in a drawing to win a free big magnet from my zazzle shop. http://www.zazzle.com/lieselsartstudio You may vote once, but you can enter the drawing multiple times as long as you follow or like me on that site. Sites are as follows: Instagram (http://instagram.com/lieselbendiopotter), Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/LieselsArtStudio), tumblr (http://lieselbendiopotter.tumblr.com/), and my blog (http://rampanteclecticism.blogspot.com/). Shares, reblogs or other social network shoutouts also count for an additional entry, just mention which you did. If you prefer being contacted by e-mail (if you don't plan on checking if you won) leave that, but it is not required, otherwise I will just tag the winner in all the ways I am able. If unclaimed after 72 hours, I will do a second drawing. Contest will be closed on Monday, September 29th at midnight MST. Thanks for your input! This will help me decide which image to upload to zazzle.

edited:

So, after getting lots of great feedback on facebook and instagram, I have edited and made some changes to reflect new and improved options.

 

the all diamond option

and the duo tone (less contrast) and bigger (less busy) chevron

Also, you may notice (after I have uploaded these everywhere else) that the original soft blue and aqua blue have been switched in the new collage pictures...  oh well.  Also the teal and the "new" aqua blue next to each other makes me realize they are nearly the same shade of color, just different values.  Oh well.  The perfectionist in me is squirming, but not enough to go back and fix it EVERYWHERE.  I am drawing far too much attention to myself already.

Anyway, thank you for any and all of your input.  My brain gets stuck in a rut sometimes and so its nice to have a piece of your mind to shake things up a little.  I will probably put up a few different ones on zazzle (including plain backgrounds)...  

(edited) CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED  Three different backgrounds are up in my zazzle shop.  The teal diamond pattern, the duo tone sage green chevron, and a new one a soft blue with white polka dots as backgrounds to this bunny.

 The winner of the drawing was my friend Julie Olson who is an amazing illustrator.   Check out her blog here.

On the golden section, or when artists get nerdy.

actual Golden Section

Did you know you can get all sorts of nerdy about art?  I mean using ugh, math and all.  I had a class in college that introduced me to the mathematically ideal ratio or the Golden section.  The Fibonacci sequence.  Apparently you can find it in music too, but that is not my forte, so I don't know the first thing about how that works.  I do know you can find it in art.  Leonardo Da Vinci was a big proponent, as was Albrecht Duhrer and you can find it in classical architecture too.  (like the pantheon and stuff..)  And I know there are more, but I'm too lazy to google it right now.

I had an art professor that was pretty enamored of it too, and thus introduced yours truly to the enigma of the golden section.  It was pretty hard to implement though when the only way I had of knowing the ratio was to draw out a fairly complicated geometric drawing.  (I am not describing it here, mostly because I don't know if I remember how to draw it.  It involved a ruler, a compass and a T square.)  A while ago (it was actually waaaaay too long ago to be blogging about it now, don't worry about it!)  I randomly found an obscure site that sold Fibonacci gages that would hold the ratio as you moved it, taking all of the hard work away.  And I had to have one.  I first bought a far too expensive and unexpectedly flimsy one.  After much disappointment I returned it and upon further research I stumbled across an etsy shop that also sold fibonacci gages.  They were smaller, but the owner very sweetly agreed to custom make me a larger one.  Not only did I have a vastly superior and sturdy tool, but it is gorgeous too!

even though its gorgeousness is masked by a grainy picture in poor light..

This is the origin of the 'rule of thirds'.  The rule of thirds is just easier to estimate and describe and thus encoporate.  But really it is just a dummed down version of the Golden Ratio.  Now I just need to incorporate it into my art more.  On purpose instead of accidentally. 

this is an accident.  a happy one of course.

#365 Drawings: Squirrel 19/365

So.. here is the little bird replacement...

I am trying to whip my dummy book into presentable shape for the writing/illustrating conference I'm going to next month...  I'll share some of them here.  Probably.

#365 drawings: 18/365 little bird

I guess I am sort of still doing this... It just started being too stressful instead of fun, and I had to back off.  I really do need to draw just for fun more though.  This bird I actually did a while ago for my Perfect Pet book, and I just cut it out... (to be replaced by as un-yet drawn squirrel or chipmunk)  But I like him (simplistic as he is) so I thought I'd put him up here as a farewell gesture.

...and you know, to also indicate I am not dead.  Despite my recent hiatus from blogging.

#365 Drawings: just a bit of silliness 17/365

I mostly just dislike Politics

Please don't take this offensively.  I am just being silly and making fun of how BOTH sides are being silly, and aren't even arguing about the same things.  It is also EXAGGERATED for humor.  That is called hyperbole people.  It is meant to be funny.  Not offensive.  :)  I almost didn't post it because of the high political tension.. but I think I am hilarious, and haven't posted a drawing (even though this is VERY rough and unpolished) for a long time, so you lucked out.

#365 drawings: Penguin 16/365

I have a soft spot for monochromatic animals

Aaaah, it feels good to draw unrelated and less stress drawings!  I hunkered down lately and did some illustrations I've been avoiding because of their difficulty.  Which was much needed and good, but I haven't done play drawings in much too long.  (especially since I committed to it)  Also it is nice to use reference pictures that I took for once.  Who knows how many years ago at the zoo it was, but it was I who initially captured the image.  And also reminds me of my oldest sister...  She had (has?) a big stuffed penguin I loved when she was a teenager and I a little girl who hero worshiped her.  So penguins have always reminded me of my big sister who loves them (and who I don't see nearly enough at all).  #warmfuzzies  #loveyouSar

#365 drawings: hand study 15/365

sloppy hand sketch

So it is somewhat embarrassing to have such a public commitment that I am not being very consistent with.  I am feeling rather exposed with all of the posting, especially when I am not particularly proud of the finished sketch.  But I'm still going to do it, but try to be more accepting of my imperfection.  I also just might not post the ones I think are juvenile.  (or realize if I just do a drawing to get it over with and am in a hurry, of course I will hate it)  I also feel really protective of the illustrations for my book... and will still draw them (they are after all more important than this "fun" goal to stretch myself and break down the mental blocks to my drawing) but probably won't post them.  So.. bear with me, and be forgiving if I'm very publicly not upholding my end of the bargain.

This very messy sketch was done on awful scratch paper (remind self to cut nice papers to fit into my Sunday traveling sketching case) and whilst trying to wrangle four kids solo in church.  I am frankly amazed I was able to draw at all.  (helps that all of my kids also have drawing cases like mine to similarly occupy themselves)  Honestly it helped me transition to a place of peaceful focus for just a brief time, and helped change my negative mood into a positive one.

#365 drawings: dragonfly 14/365

Non specific dragonfly

#365 drawings: Chickadee 13/365

Black Capped Chickadee

#365 drawings: Fish 12/365

Boar Fish.  Not to be confused with Board or Bored Fish.

It turns out fish are fun to draw.  I love that they are practically two dimensional.  I will probably do more.  (Also because they are easy..)  I have a watercolor somewhere I did in high school that features a fish.. that was fun and as I recall the only other time I've drawn a fish.  The crazier the fish, the cooler.  I can't not think of James Christiansen when I think of fish and art though.  I love how so many paintings of his have fish juxtaposed in unnatural places.

I need to quit skipping days...

#365 drawings: Valentines and Orca 10&11/365

these count for at least a drawing.

I did heaps of valentine's the other day (though I used previous drawings for said valentine's) I did watercolor the frog and so since I make the rules anyway..  totally counts.

Didn't draw the next day.  Sat there and contemplated it, picked one from my book I was going to work on.  Surfed the internet instead, then it got too late and I went to bed.  Drawing fail day.  Oh well..

But who wants to have two drawing fail days in a row?  Not cool.  And thus it was decided by committee that an Orca in a wading pool was to be the drawing du jour.  So, there you go.

#365 drawings: boy and guinea pig 9/365

Yeah... I didn't get a drawing posted yesterday.  This drawing counts for both days.. because I worked on it both days.  Even if I only really started it last night, I was trying and psyching myself up for it before then.  It is going in the book.. and I'm close enough to finishing the dummy book that the last few drawings to go in it are the most intimidating ones (for one reason or another).  There is a reason I put them off.  Like not having good reference pictures... or a tricky composition/layout.  Anyway.. I gotta go make valentine's for my kids to hand out tomorrow.  I'm trying to decide if I just print out the same ones as last year, or get fancy and make up a new one.  Which actually was throwing me off yesterday, I was going to draw a new one and get my daily drawing in and kill two birds with one stone, but never decided on what to go on the valentines.  Hrmph.  But at least I got the drawing done today a lot earlier in the day, so I don't have it hanging over my head!

#365 drawings: 8/365 Lucy

I fiercely love my darling Lucy-goose.

One of the things I hope to get more practice with, is to get straight to drawing.. instead of thinking too much about it.  And stalling.  I'm not there yet.  But I am getting better at just doing it.  Lots of practice is good.  And lots of practice is what I'm getting.  Its like a second language, the more you use it, the easier it comes.  And when you don't use it, it gets rusty, but comes back with practice.  (Which is why I can't speak french worth beans right now, despite having taken some cumulative six years or more of it.)

And I think Lucy has the whole world wrapped around her darling be-dimpled little finger. Seriously.

#365 drawings: Bunny 7/365

This is for my friend Sharaya, who has lost too many bunnies recently.  I hate it when my pets die..  It breaks my heart.

#365 drawings: Frog 6/365

Some days are easier to come up with something to draw.  Today was not that sort of day.  I messed around with a bunch of ideas.. (lots of ideas for illustrations for my book) but couldn't settle on anything concrete.  Either serious or otherwise.  In boredom I threw out a query on FB and my friend Janelle suggested a frog.  So that is what I did.  He would be fun to watercolor...  later.  Would that count for a different day?  hmmm....  Who makes the rules anyway? 

#365 drawings: Max 5/365

This is my poika Max. 

I'm thinking I might stop posting (not drawing) everyday.  I think it is too much.  What do you think?

#365 drawings: Sloth 4/365

Once upon a time, there was going to be a sloth in my Perfect Pet book, and he was going to be hanging out in a closet.  Because that is where a tree sloth would go, of course!  But alas, it didn't quite work out for the story, and he was replaced.  But I still had this image in my head...   And this whole 365 drawing thing gave me the perfect opportunity to finally put him on paper.  Just for fun.  And also for my little sister Eve, who likes sloths.  There you go babe!

The end.

#365 drawings: girl and dog 3/365

I don't like "faking" it with figure drawing.  It goes against years of figure drawing classes from high school through college.  Because I have a degree in visual art and not illustration, I wasn't ever taught how to fake it, or draw a person without a model.  So as I've illustrated my book, I've used pictures of actual people as models.  That is how I draw, from life preferably (though not at all feasibly) and from pictures otherwise.  The main character is my daughter, so that is pretty easy, but her older siblings are modeled after some older cousins who live two states away.  That has been tricky.  But I am changing the layout of the first page with all of the siblings together.  And I have no new reference pictures of my niece (just of the dog).  So today I faked it.

very rough sketch!

 
I've got to get better at drawing people from my head if I want to get any faster with illustration.  I'm a little better than I give myself credit for, but a long way off from where I want to be.  I still think reference pictures are the best for complicated poses (and always for faces for me).  But they can also be a crutch and slow me down.  I'm still learning how to transition from fine artist to illustrator.  (While maintaining quality and being consistent with my style...  Not an easy task.)  It takes a lot of practice.

I don't think I'll use my illustrations for my book for my daily drawings much...  (not knowing the "rules" is a bad thing) but I might throw some in sometimes.  (especially when I get no other drawings in that day, because of all the work I did on an "official" illustration).