Happy Easter!

Happy Easter weekend!  I wanted to do a drawing for Easter, and I honestly tried to think of a less crass idea, but this image just stuck in my head and I couldn't get it out!  I also did an Easter themed drawing for one of my idioms (Don't Put All Your Eggs in One Basket).  Hope everyone has a great weekend!

How A Pug Welcomes Spring

This is how a pug welcomes spring.  Seriously.  I was walking her and admiring the beautiful recently bloomed trees and then looked down and realized she was peeing right at the base of the tree.

I've been doing a lot of pen work recently and so it was a nice welcome change to add some color this time.  I had a split second of disappointment when I first started where I was upset I couldn't accurately capture how the tree looks.  Don't you hate it when you can't convey on paper what's in your head?  But I kept at it and ended up relatively pleased with the result.  But man painting takes up way more time!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Lunar New Year (Dragon)!

Happy Lunar New Year!

Supposedly this year, they year of the dragon, is supposed to be a much better year for me than last year, the year of the rabbit.  Argh, curses to you rabbit!  Helloooo dragon!

And below is the ink drawing before I painted it.  I really need new paintbrushes.  I hate mine.

Keeping An Eye Out For Santa

Christmas is almost here!  Sunny and Bunny can't wait and are keeping an eye out for Santa.  They're a bit concerned as to how he's going to come down the chimney when the fire is blazing.  Sunny is also hoping Santa won't notice that she ate some of his cookies.  Tsk tsk Sunny.

Octopus Defeated!

I didn't want to leave Sunny and bunny in a lurch in my last post for Illustration Friday's "sink" theme, so I decided to make a happy ending for their octopus adventure.  Sunny is grilling up some octopus while bunny is relaxing with a cocktail.  I think bunny deserves it after being a bad ass and saving Sunny's large butt.  They're a little bruised and sore, but happy to be alive and about to eat a huge feast!

I'm also using this for an Illustration Friday post for the theme "grounded" since Sunny and bunny are grounded on the beach after their ocean adventures!

Sink

This is for the Illustration Friday topic "sink."  Sunny and bunny are sinking in the ocean as a result of an octopus-related adventure.  Sunny's tail is coveted by all, including a ginormous octopus.  Don't worry, bunny has her back and will rescue her!  At first I was going to have the octopus grabbing Sunny's leg, but I liked the image of her getting pulled down by her tail.  Makes for a much more roly poly posture too.

See the continuation of the octopus adventure in my next post here.

My Sister, The Little Spoon in Color and Block Print - Process

I decided to redo My Sister, The Little Spoon (original ink drawing here) in color.  I also did another block print, but I think I could've done this without it since I ended up tightening up lines and brushing over it.

First I sketched it out in pencil.  I tried tracing at first but I hate tracing paper.  I hated it as a kid, and now that I've tried it again I have renewed my hate.  So  I had to freehand it, which was fine for the most part but I had difficulty getting the face right.

I did a block print for just the blanket.  I contemplated doing it for the carpet and walls but decided to keep this one smaller and quicker.  I kinda like the look of the ink sketch with the stark single color print on the blanket.

Then I painted in the rest using my gouache paints.  I like watercolors better than gouache generally but when I'm doing the ink prints, I feel like gouache is safer for layering with the ink but to get the watercolor effect is tough since the gouache dries so quickly.

I decided the blanket looked too messy and so I smoothed out the ink using just water and a brush, and then added some outline to the blanket and pattern.

Looking at the finished product I realized that I probably wasted time doing the block print since I could have just painted this.  I think I might use the block prints in a different way going forward - like above with just the ink and the single color print.  It's a bit more stark and stylized so the imperfection in the print doesn't look so unusual like it does when it's juxtaposed with traditional paint.  I dunno - I'll just keep playing around with this and see...

Lurker at Sea in Color and Block Print - Process Post

So I decided to redo Lurker at Sea (original ink sketch here) in color and use a block print (my current obsession).  I thought the block print would work perfectly for the waves.  It was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be (even harder than the stamps!) but I learned a lot along the way.

First I traced my old Lurker at Sea on tracing paper after lining the shape of the linoleum block as the outer boundaries.

Then I tried transferring the drawing onto the linoleum block.  Uh that didn't go so well and most of the lines were too blurry to make out.  I redrew them on the block.

Next up was carving up the block.  This was my first time carving linoleum.  It's way harder to carve up than the Speedball Speedy-Cut Block I used for the pug stamps and at the end of the carving my right hand and wrist hurt so much!  Is there any way to do this without getting carpal?  On the other hand (hehe), in some ways linoleum was easier than the Speedy-Cut because it was easier to get some really thin and small cuts.  The Speedy-Cut is so soft it gives too easily sometimes.

I forgot to take process photos when carving (the throbbing in my hand must've made me forget), so I took some photos of the carved up block now.  It has a bit of ink residue on it.  I also included my muse in these photos.

Pug on pug

She's really sleepy and used to me putting objects on/around her and sticking my camera in her face.

It's a little curved now I think from the water after I rinsed off ink a few times.

It took several tests before I got the block to where I wanted it.  I had to carve a lot deeper than I thought.  After a test stamp I'd go back and carve some more and then do another test stamp.  I got a little impatient and decided to move forward after I got a semi-decent print.  I can always go back and clean it up more, and I was planning on painting over some of the ink anyways.

Those white dots bug me on the whale.  I think those were little linoleum nubbies that got stuck in the paint.  Argh!  Another lesson I learned is that you need the right paper to do a print.  I wanted to do it on watercolor paper since I planned on painting the whale and boat but the hot-pressed paper I had showed too much texture in the waves.  I had always planned on painting over the whale to add some dimension to it and distinguish it from the waves since I only have one blue-colored ink.  So I decided to paint over the waves too.  I may try another one on different paper and keep the waves strictly as a print, since I love the look of an ink print.

Next up I just used water and a brush to smooth out the whale.  I love ink.  It has such a great transparency to it.

Then I smoothed out the waves a bit and added some outlines using a 0.1 copic pen.

Then I used my gouache paints to paint the boat, pug and bunny.  I also added some layers of blue, green, and purple to the whale and waves. (Sorry for the crooked photos, for some reason I have real issues with making things straight.)

Here's a photo with the original ink sketch, the carved up linoleum block, and the finished product.

And here's the finished product.  The last thing I did was use a white gel pen to clean up the whale eye (I messed up the block print with that - I had carved out a piece for the white of the eye but I guess it wasn't deep enough) and the waves.

I really enjoy doing block printing but it's hard on the hand and more labor intensive than I'm used to.  I will definitely be doing more later on.

Lurker at Sea in Color (Plus Block Print)

I redid Lurker in Sea (original ink drawing here) using a block print and then layering some pen lines and gouache paints.  I also did a process post here

I'm also using this for an Illustration Friday theme of "fluid" since I'm traveling and I thought this fit nicely with the theme. I also really enjoyed doing this with a block print and trying to get the waves to look as fluid as possible in their stylized way.

Barber Shop Stripes

This week's Illustration Friday theme is "stripes."  I could not for the life of me think of anything to do with stripes all day.  Right before I was going to call it a day and just paint a normal drawing with stripes everywhere, I thought of the stripes on a barber shop pole.  And then one thing led to another and here is mustached bunny giving Sunny a mustache trim.

I love a good fancy mustache.  My childhood best friend and I used to shout out different kinds of mustaches as our moms drove us home.  I'm sure my neighbors thought it was freaky to hear us shouting "curly mustache!" and "rainbow mustache!"  It's especially impressive Sunny managed to grow this mustache considering she's a pug and a girl.  Billy and Emily are waiting outside on a bench, eating some ice cream.

I had fun with this one although I definitely need a better paintbrush for the finer details.  I want something with shorter hairs and less give.  My fingers were sore at the end.

Happy Friday!

C is for Crocodile

C is for Carnivorous Crocodile Caterers.  Like me, they enjoy their beef grass-fed and are ensuring that these cows are getting only the best quality grass.  Poor unsuspecting cows.  They're just happy to be getting their grass served to them.  I drew this in my moleskine sketchbook but then wanted to paint it.  Unfortunately, this paper does not do well with gouache.  Oh wells.  Drawing these cows totally made me think of Gary Larson's The Far Side.  I used to love his stuff when I was a kid.  And drawing the crocodiles' outfits made me think of Top Chef.

Mr. Octopus

I love/fear creatures of the sea.  Doesn't my octopus look so much nicer and cuter than in real life?  Its tentacles kinda remind me of ferns with their green leaves and (gross) spores underneath.  I wanted to try out my gouache paints without a pen or pencil outline first.  I love the pen since I hadn't used it as much in the past and it's what I started with when I began drawing again recently, but it's kinda freeing to just use the paint by itself.  I may try this out again some more.  Maybe jellyfish next?  Frightening/fascinating.

Scary Bathroom Late in the Office

As if working in the office late at night and on weekends isn't bad enough, at my old office they'd turn off some of the lights, sometimes in the bathroom!  Having grown up with an intense fear of Bloody Mary (the scary urban legend, not the drink) and finding bathrooms in general kinda scary places where people (or monsters or bugs) can hide in stalls waiting for the perfect moment to attack, I really did not like this.  Sometimes if my coworkers and I got desperate, we'd use those light wands they pack in our emergency kits.  You know those things you have to snap to light up.  I went back and forth whether to do this in a thicker paint style or a more traditional watercolor style, so that explains some of the splotches.  Also please disregard the errant lines in the door - I have perspective/spatial issues.

October - That's a leaf, not a carrot

Pug and bunny are not the brightest bulbs on the tree and are reaching for the orange leaf, thinking it's a carrot.  First, that's not a carrot.  Second, they're not even close to reaching it!  Sheesh!  It seems like with the warm and rainy fall the leaves have stayed green for longer than usual, but recently we've started to see some foliage finally.  I am testing out some different methods of using the gouache and had fun with this one, using lots of layers and dripping paint.

Don't Push Us

Cause we're close to the edge...My friend/former coworker (let's just call her Fritillaria) and I would make ourselves feel better during really bad times at the office by thinking up the most horrid and creative ways of exacting revenge.  My preference would be to leave a slightly open jar of kimchi in the deserving person's office, maybe hidden in a vent or somewhere where they wouldn't be able to find it.  I grew up with and love kimchi, but even I will admit that it smells bad when you open up that jar.  Fritillaria's preference would be to eat a bunch of asparagus, collect her pee in a spray bottle, and then spray it on the deserving person's desk and chair.  Like so...

Don't worry, we never actually did any of this.  Well, I can at least vouch for myself.  As for what Fritillaria may, or may not have done, I cannot say with certainty.

Who's there?!

Friendly neighbor or sinister stranger?  Either way, Sunny and bunny are scared.  One of the houses I grew up in as a kid was a huge ranch-style house that was beautiful, but totally haunted and gave all of us the heebie jeebies.  My sister had recurring nightmares while we lived there, and one nightmare involved seeing a blurry and vaguely familiar, but menacing, figure standing outside the yellow obscuring glass next to the doors.  For some reason that image has stuck in my head longer than any of my own nightmares!

I painted this with my new gouache paints (I totally butchered that word at the art store).  At first I was in love with it, but as the paints started to dry I found it a bit harder to mix enough of my colors to last before they dried out.  It's not a problem if I'm going for a more sheer traditional watercolor look, but for a more opaque look it was harder to achieve using less water.  I think it'll get easier with time and practice.  And next time I go for a more opaque look, I'm going to do my initial drawing in pencil first and then ink after painting.  I'm horrible at drawing straight and even lines, but I also hate using a ruler, so I embrace my wavy lines.

Oh and here's a picture of my painting before I inked in the final lines.  When I first started I wasn't sure what look I was going to go for but my skills are still sloppy and so I needed the tightening of the ink line at the end.    Except around the shadowy figure.  I thought it best to leave that loose and undefined.