Sketchbook work Tag

Hi all, hope you’re all having a super weekend! I’ve only got two more weeks left until the half term and I’m literally counting down the days!

True to my words I’ve been keeping up with Inktober and it’s been a lot of fun! I’ve been doing two or three prompts in one go, which I think the whole point of it is that you can take your time with it and not stick to it religiously.

#Swift (1/31)

#Divide (2/31)

#Poison (3/31)

#Underwater (4/31)

#Long (5/31)

#Sword (6/31)

#Shy (7/31)

#Crooked (8/31)

 

Well, that’s it for now. I’ll be updating my Inktober drawings as I’m going so follow me on Instagram or Twitter for the latest updates.

I’m making ramen noodle soup from scratch so I’ve got to go and check it now (probably loads of photos of dinner later on!).

Thanks for reading as always and enjoy the rest of your weekend!

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Illustration

Hello all! I’d love to share with you some new work, which I’m very pleased with how it’s turned out. I’ve been busy making new drawings so that I can use them as textures for new pieces of work. I absolutely love, love, love using drawing inks at the moment- I just can’t get enough of it! Oh, and I also started driving again as I really need to get on with it… I worked out that it’s been 10 years since I had my very first driving lessons and I’ve not even passed it yet! Well, that’s sort of not true. I took the practical test twice and failed- so I left it as I went to Hong Kong for a couple of months. Anyway, kick up the butt, I’ve started again and I’m determined to pass it!

Here’s what I’ve been doing:

I shared some images of my sketchbook over on Twitter and I made loads of new random drawings over the past couple of days. Sort of abstract, crazy squiggles of plants!

Then, out of all the drawings I scanned in and started to use them as a background for a new piece of work. I decided to try something out that’s slightly out of my comfort zone. Dun, dun, DUN! NO ANIMALS OR BIRDS! Yup, that’s right. I wanted to start incorporating more people into my work as I feel that’s the weakest part of my drawings skills. I’ve drawn people in the past, but I want to move away from the line drawings which I normally do and use pencils instead. I spent about two days on it as I kept on going back on forth with it. When I can’t creatively solve a problem I’ll actually take a break from it for a couple of hours and revisit again or at a later date.

After a lot of editing and trialling things out, such as different positions of the figure, here’s the final image. Or should I say ‘images’ as I’m not sure which I like the most!

Now looking at all the images together, I think I prefer version 2. What do you think? Which one do you like? Or do you think that there’s anything else I can work on? I’d love to get your feedback!

Thanks for reading my post and I hope you have a lovely Bank Holiday weekend!

EDIT: Alrighty. So after even more faffing around (just because I’m so good at it) I decided that I’m going to keep all three images and make a triptych titled ‘Floating’

Sorry that the image quality is a bit rubbish but I can’t seem to save a higher resolution of it as well as having it 500px wide so that it can fit into the blog post… That aside, I made a gif using the three images!

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Illustration

Hello, hello! Sorry for the lack of updates as I’m currently on my summer holidays, so I’ve spent much of my time making new artwork and getting my Etsy shop sorted out as it was in need of a new update. It’s been absolutely brilliant having all this time off as it’s means I can concentrate on my art, which I don’t often get!

I thought I’d share with you some of my sketchbook work. If you’re following me over on Instagram you’ll have seen some ink sketches of Mario and more of Mario! I love drawing him; there’s something quite aesthetically pleasing about drawing him! He’s super easy to draw as he lies around all day. Plus, cats rule! I usually don’t work with ink but I gave it a go as I wanted my drawings to be a lot looser and fluid. Don’t get me wrong but I absolutely love drawing with my trusty old pens, however, it’s quite nice to be able to practice using a different medium. So the other day I bought some more Winsor & Newton drawing inks in Veridian and Liquid Indian Ink. I forget how easy they are to use, but not only that, the colours are so intense and vibrant (I don’t always water them down unless I’m layering different colours). I use a paint brush with the inks as I really like the smooth quality you get with it (do use and try out different methods as it depends on what you’re comfortable with using).


Flowers and abstract shapes seems to be a repeating theme throughout my work and I intend to continue with it. I don’t draw from direct observation but instead the process of mark making is more like automatic drawing. So, it’s all from my head basically!

Then I had an obsession with drawing the cats (and it still continues!). I’m not sure with anyone else, but when I’m interested in a subject matter I will literally zone in on it for a couple of days. I like the simplicity of the line drawings as I tried using one colour as a block colour and then drawing the outline with it. But it didn’t look right so I stuck with the line drawings.


Besides the cats I wanted to practice drawing big cats. I was researching Tibetan tigers and Chinese tigers (they looked like they were woodblock prints) as I really love the decorative side to them.

As I said previously about drawing Mario and Toshka, here I decided to add the Indian ink to the drawing (even though I was doubtful at first incase I messed it up). I think it works really well as the black is still quite soft and not too dominant. 

… and that’s about it. Now I need to go out and buy another sketchbook as I’ve finished it!

I’ll post some more progress photos as I’m going (when I buy a new sketchbook). I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this post and feel free to comment below on your own experiences of using Winsor & Newton inks. Or if you have any other recommendations, painting/drawing techniques I’d love to hear from you!

Thanks again and have a super Monday!

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Illustration

Apologies for the lack of updates as I’ve been quite busy at work and I’ve not had the time to make any new artwork. So I’ve spent most of this weekend drawing, drawing and drawing- just spending as much time as I can with my Faber-Castell pens and my sketchbook. And you know what? It’s been great. I love just doodling and not even think about it or over-complicate it if that makes sense?

So the illustrations in this post has a lot to do with social anxiety/ anxiety in general. I know I have anxiety, or at least some form of social anxiety (no formal diagnosis as of yet), and when I was thinking about the quotes to coincide with the illustrations they really related to me. I started writing down some short phrases in my sketchbook and it sort of turned into a mini series (see below), which I like as they are.

I’m going to continue with the series and see where it goes- it’s almost therapeutic just to draw these thoughts down.

I’ll keep you all posted with some more new sketches. For now, have a super weekend!

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Illustration

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