Blackfish Fawnpug

During the holidays my sister and I watched the documentary Blackfish about orcas in captivity. It was an extremely interesting, well done, and tragically sad documentary. I admit that I did go to Sea World as a kid a few times, but I would never be able to go as an adult now that I fully understand what it means to keep orcas in captivity for human entertainment. While I understand that there are some educational benefits, I think the main problem with orcas is that they are just such large and social creatures, it's hard to provide a suitable environment in captivity.

Afterwards, as my sister and I sat dazed in a post-documentary and -wine-and-chips-binge (yeah, we're classy like that), she asked whether we're kinda doing the same thing with dogs. I looked over at my snoring pugs, happily draped over our laps, and answered that while that may have been the case early on in the domestication of dogs, I seriously don't think our dogs could survive or be happy in the wild now. Pugs especially have been bred to be companion dogs. But it definitely made us think about how we interact with animals both as pets and as wild creatures.

If you haven't seen it already, I highly recommend watching it.

P.S. I know lots of people successfully have crate trained their dogs, but I generally let mine roam free in most of my apartment while I'm gone. It's just a personal preference and the girls rarely cause any trouble or messes (knock on wood! Watch now I'm going to go home to some sort of disaster today). The only time they're in there with the door closed is when I have maintenance workers in my apartment or if we're traveling in someone else's car.

Seal Pug

Today I am doing three posts because I feel like it and I probably won't have any new ones for the next few days due to a friend's visit. If I were a normal and patient person I would schedule my posts in advance, spaced out evenly, but unfortunately I am neither of those things.

One of my favorite pug poses is when Sunny is super relaxed and drops her ears so her wrinkles get smoothed out. My sister and I refer to this as seal pup or baby pug. I know a lot of pug people have noticed and commented on the seal pup face and so of course I had to draw a side by side comparison!

Merpugs

Merpugs - they exist!  What?  You've never heard of merpugs?  Hmm, well it might be because they stay close to the ocean floor.  Their weight naturally keeps them down and so they only move around if they exert effort, and that isn't often.  And they tend to spend most of their time eating and sleeping soooo...  Hmm, no wonder merpugs are such rare sightings!

Octopug

It's an octopus. No, it's a pug. NO. It's an octopug! I got this idea randomly in my head and couldn't shake it. I think I can do a better version with more planning and rough drafts but this was a fun one to crank out quickly. Ah now there's more room in my brain for new crazy pug ideas...

Second Pet? (octopus)

I've often considered getting another pet for myself and also to be a buddy for my lil pug.  I'd probably get another pug since I'm pug-obsessed, but I like to consider other pets too for fun.  Somehow I don't think an octopus would be a good choice...

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.

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.

Behind the Scenes of The Squid and The Whale

Everyone thinks they're fighting, but maybe they were just hugging.

Lurker at Sea

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.

August

Most days in August I step outside my apartment building and feel like I'm walking in hot water.  So freakin humid.  I'm ready for fall now.

Creatures of the Sea

I am both fascinated and terrified by the ocean.  Who knows what creepy things are down below you and want to eat you!