Robert Baratheon started, and Shaw Academy course started

I've only managed to get an hour in of colouring this week for Robert Baratheon, but I really enjoyed doing his face. I think it's the closest likeness I've achieved so far, and I especially liked colouring his beard:

I'm really going to struggle to get any done this week. I started the Shaw Academy Graphic Design course last week. Lesson 1 I found pointless, as it was talking about the lessons due in the course, and a quick overview of Photoshop layers. Lesson 2 I found immensely helpful, and Shaw Academy have saved the slideshow as a PDF which I've since downloaded (I really wanted this as it has lots of good information on it). Lesson 3 was an on-demand lesson which was released on Friday, and I've only just got round to watching it today (Sunday). The first half I already knew (how to basically use Photoshop), and the other half how to make composite images, and using things like filters and effects. I thought this week's assignment was to make a composite image, but actually it was a test (I passed, 85%), but I decided to make a composite image anyway:

Who doesn't love penguins in the desert?

Anyway, I have 2 more lessons this week, plus I'm attending an Introduction to Yoga course on Tuesday. Together with catching up with friends will leave little time for finishing Robert Baratheon, but I will try!

Anyway, for my Pinterest of the Week, it's kind of art, but also a tattoo idea I've seen: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355206637476/

Game of Thrones: Still working on Cersei Lannister

I've not had much time to work on my art this week; I've restarted Insanity so I've been going to bed early to give my body time to rest after the intense workouts. I did finally pick up the paper I think I'll get on with, but I only got it yesterday, and I've since been in Derby visiting family so I've had no time to do anything with the paper yet. I have done some work in Photoshop this week though while I've waited for the weekend to come around so I could buy the paper:

I can't show you the timelapse video for this; it took nearly an hour to render a video that was poor quality, so I'm not going to upload it to YouTube. I've also since broken my laptop, it still works for now, but I dropped it while it was plugged in, and I dropped it on the edge it was plugged it, so the case and ports in that area are cracked and bent out of shape. It does still charge (fortunately, but I'm now uploaded everything to the cloud incase the laptop gives up the ghost), but I'm worried when I try to fix it I may damage it more. Currently I can't shut the lid. I'll have to see how it goes.

In other news, my long-awaited holiday is next weekend! I'm away for 2 weeks, so there won't be any blog posts. I will take a sketch pad on holiday with me, but the likelihood of me drawing anything is pretty slim, as I will be sunning myself round a pool drinking beer.

So, as I don't have anything further to update, I'll leave you with my Pinterest of the Week before my laptop dies a death: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355205811079/ I just think it's a very pretty piece, I love the colours and the concept of the peacock big cat.

Stannis Baratheon finished, also Renly Baratheon is done too

Well, I've really got my skates on this week, I've finished two characters from my Game of Thrones epic drawing quest:

Stannis

Renly

That's all of the Baratheon brothers finished! I totally forgot to draw any poses this week though.

Hopefully some of you more eagle-eyed readers noticed I changed the theme on my blog. I've gone from the vibrant, orange, in-your-face colour scheme to something more muted and subtle.
Some of you may have noticed the theme change, but did any of you notice the new web link I added to my blog? It's in the menu on the right-hand side. I have my own website now! Granted, it's a free website, and it's very basic, but I have one, and it showcases some of my work. Go check it out: http://kimberleykirk.wix.com/illustration

Something I bookmarked a couple of weeks ago is the following web link: http://www.creativebloq.com/illustration/master-art-figure-drawing-new-artists-model-21619041 I'd love to get one of these but can't stretch financially to afford it. Especially as my wooden mannequin is rubbish. Guess I'll have to keep using my pose app on my phone for now.

Also, the amarylis has come back to life, and looks better than before! not sure why it's come back, but it's welcome in my house:

And on a final note, here is my Pinterest of the week: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355204907501/ Daffodils are my favourite flowers, and I have a bunch in bloom where I live. Also my boyfriend bought me a bunch last week, and they've all opened. You may remember a post where I sketch a daffodil on my tablet using a free app, I didn't realise how grey I made the final picture! http://kimshibbybob.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/the-lady-in-greyscale-and-daffodils.html

Scaly things

Last week I kind of cheated with my dragon. I wanted to draw scales, but couldn't be bothered to draw every single scale individually, so I made a custom brush and painted them in. I didn't think it looked too bad.
The next Schoolism video showed me how to paint eyes and scales, so I've gone back to the drawing board with the scales on my dragon and refined them:

It looks subtly better now. Oh, and I did some work on the rabbit! I will probably shrink it even more though.

I'm hoping to get the Schoolism course finished now, I'm on lesson 7 out of 9, and I still have 2 weeks to do it. I've also quit Slimming World now, so I'll be getting my Monday nights back. I'm also still a week behind on my writing course, and I'm still as blasé about it as I was last week.

Nothing much to report on from the past week. I have a busy schedule for the next 6 weeks (including, but not limited to: work visit's, seeing my nan, Xmas party, work away-day, Amsterdam and Xmas to name a few!). I think December will be a quiet month for drawings, as I'll be so busy, I'll try to get some things done though.

Also, I've come across a few websites where you design something, and if you upload it to a particular website it can be printed on things like phone cases, cushions, you can earn a commission from it if people buy it! Let me know in the comments below if you're interested and I'll post the links next week.

Anyway, that about wraps it up for this week, I've re-discovered a playlist on youtube, it's called a Study Playlist, but it's good for having as background music while I draw: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLx65qkgCWNJIs3FPaj8JZhduXSpQ_ZfvL It's totally not my style of music, but sometimes I don't like listening to someone sing while I'm studying/drawing as I find it off-putting.

And here is my Pinterest of the Week, hope you have a good week everyone! http://lisapace.com/files/2014/07/1601284_802860943081664_2679415269977914934_n.jpg (sorry, I have a thing about rabbits)

30 days of lacking!!

Well, I've had a better stab at drawing more this week:

Random lamp study

Quick ornament study

Another hand study

30 days of graphic design. Redesign the nearest shop's logo. This is only a quick sketchy idea

30 days of graphic design. Pick 3 designers and make a new design mixing their styles. I chose Milton Glaser, Stefan Sagmeister & Paula Scher 

I've also watched a film, Inside the mind of Leonardo Da Vinci, which I've found immensely interesting. For example he was an illegitimate child, and because of this received no formal education during his childhood, yet to look at his sketches you'd think he'd completed an engineering degree at university! It's another proven point to me that you don't need to be educated to a higher standard for something in this industry (although I'm sure it helps of course).

I'm not sure if I'll carry on with this particular 30 days of art/graphic design, as I feel it's not drawing. While I enjoy making the initial sketches I don't have the time in the day to make a fully refined drawing every day. After coming home from work, eating dinner, etc I'm lucky to squeeze in an hour to sketch (and most days I don't!). There's loads of other '30 days of art' out there, so I'll find one that will give me the motivation to finish it!

Anyhow, not long now until the first holiday of the year, but first we have AC/DC to see before that in a few weeks! I only have 1.5 weeks left at my current job, it's all happening at the moment!

30 day challenge, logo completion and an annoucement!

Hey all, I've done a little more art this week, although I've had a headache pretty much all week.
I've watched a random video on Photoshop on how to draw smooth lines, and it pretty much boils down to doing it quick, and drawing from the elbow, not the wrist. I knew this before (the wrist thing), but never really applied it, so I've been practising with the motion today and guess what? My lines are better :)

The kickstarter campaign for Schoolism has finished, I think I'm starting mine in October. I've been watching a few of Bobby Chiu's vids on youtube this week, so talented!!

On twitter I noticed in my feed a behance page called The Pocketbook of 120 tips from featured creative from the design world. I'm not far into it but there's a pretty decent 30 day drawing challenge. So day 1 is to tell you I've started. Let's call that yesterday. Day 2 is today, and although I kind of started it yesterday I've done most of the work today:

Make a logo of your face with your name which describes your personality - smiley and bright! I did want to use bright purple text, but it was lost in my brown hair

So for the week ahead (it'll be interesting to see if I do all of these!)
Day 3: Make an illustration of your favourite number
Day 4: Choose 3 awesome graphic designers and try to make a new design mixing their styles.
Day 5: Redesign the logo of the nearest shop.
Day 6: Choose 2 objects. Mix them.
Day 7: Make a logo for an astronaut's umbrella shop.
Day 8: Draw something with your left hand.

The link for The Pocketbook can be found here:
www.behance.net/gallery/24768773/The-Pocketbook
And it's on a Creative Commons license :)

Oh, and I think I've finally finalised a design for my logo!! Although I'm torn between 2, so please see both below, let me know if you prefer one over the other!

I was eating dinner yesterday and heard something fall over in our bedroom. My canvas I've been working on had fallen over. There's no damage to the canvas or the frame, but I've now put the canvas away as I have no motivation to finish it right now.

The London MCM Comic Con was last weekend, and I really wish I had gone. I've not been to the one in London, but I've been to the Birmingham one, and Collectormania in Milton Keynes. Both have not been great. There's a really good convention on when I'm on holiday, there are so many Game of Thrones stars there, and we'll be nowhere close to go :( I've even looked into getting a little flight from where we're holidaying to London, but there only do 2 flights a day, one there and one back, so it's not worth it. Oh well, there will be more cons in the future.

The trailer tent is coming on nicely, we picked up a bottle of gas from our town, hooked it up to the little oven that came with the trailer tent and it works fine! The lights don't work though, I think we'll need to buy a light board to make the trailer road-legal. While I was at the shop buying gas they also sell a small range of tools, so I managed to get a drill bit for drilling a 30mm hole for my brewing buckets so I can get a bitter and a lager kit brewing. Although to be honest since I started Slimming World in Feb I haven't been drunk since then, so 2 beer kits will probably last us into next year!! We're supposed to be having a heatwave next weekend, I've asked the other half to get the summer clothes out of the loft, I wonder what clothes will be too big on me now?! That's the nice thing about losing weight (I've been overweight for 10 years), I can buy clothes that actually look good now rather than fit for funtionality, and I get a massive confidence boost to boot!

Anyway, I have an announcement to make (which I can't make until tomorrow, all will become clear). It's probably not a big deal for anyone reading this blog, but it's a huge deal for me. I don't know who reads this blog from my twitter feed, as I have friends and colleagues on there, so I need to keep it secret until tomorrow. And for anyone wondering (and for the people that know me), I'm not pregnant!!

Re-learning techniques

Again, I've not done much in the way of art this week, I did manage to get a foot drawn quickly yesterday, but mostly opted to watch films and play games with my spare time yesterday.

I'm getting a bit of a headache, so this will be a quick post anyway.

So, this is the one piece I've done, in Graphiter on my tablet:

This is not my foot!

I haven't done anything else art-wise this weekend, but I have been making use of the free magazines my library offer online, and I've re-learned the use of masks in Photoshop. When I drew the statue of the lady I spent about 45 mins getting the lines down, maybe an hour or two shading, and then the rest of the time cleaning it up, and this took hours. Using masks with the transparency layer locked I won't have to clean up my line work all of the time, so should save me lots if time in the future.

Art expo, hands and general doodling

So, I'm feeling a lot better! Although I managed to shake off my sore throat from last weekend it was promptly replaced with a cold, which I didn't start to shift until Thursday, but then by Thursday evening it was like I had never been ill.

I've been trying to get more daily sketching in, even though I haven't done it every day I've at least done more than what I would normally. On my tablet (which has a stylus so I can draw on it like a Wacom Cintiq) I've downloaded a free app called Graphiter, which is a great little program for sketching on without having to load Photoshop all the time with all of its fancy gadgets. I've been focussing on hands this week, and initially I was just copying pictures from Google using the Drawing On The Right Side Of The Brain techniques, which looked pretty OK. However (I had an 'ah-ha!' moment), I realised if I wanted to progress with my art I would need to work out the mechanics of what I'm drawing, not just copy, otherwise if I want to draw something in the future I'll struggle as I wouldn't have learned anything:

Top-left & top-middle are the ones I copied direct from Google Images. Bottom middle is my hand with the fingers foreshortened, that was harder to work out the mechanics

I've also done a bit of general doodling this week, the first was quickly sketching my partner close-up as he's playing a video game, although when he's concentrating he sticks his tongue out and moves it around, so I struggled to get the lips right:

The other doodle I did made up a character while my fella and I were taking turns playing games, I've no idea where it was going at the time, not bad for 10 minutes though huh?

Also I've noticed there's a new Wacom Cintiq that +CreativeBloq have reviewed. It's their most affordable yet, although to be honest if I had a bit more cash I would probably get the Surface Pro 3.

I managed to get to the art expo this weekend, I really enjoyed it, and it's nice having something like that in my hometown, where it's a small town and nothing much really happens. I was quite inspired by a few pieces I've seen, and I thought the art being sold was very affordable, although we weren't looking to buy. Some were ridiculously overpriced though, but I guess that's just my opinion. There was a range of art for sale, all different subjects and mediums, quite a lot of watercolours which, while I think looks pretty, is not my medium of choice. 
It was also my gateway to see what our local Art Society did, and while I enjoyed the art I don't think joining the society is for me. They do have life drawing sessions every Wednesday which is open to non-members, so I may pop along to one of those in the future. I've looked up other art groups in my area, and they're either not for me (ie ceramics) or closed groups. I think if I want to do a collaboration in the future I'll need to do one online. I keep meaning to join a Hangout on Google+ on the Sycra forums but I always seem to miss them (I think because they're over in the states and me being in the UK it's always the time difference).

Anyway, not many plans for next week, will just try to keep up the sketching, and maybe finish my logo, and might try to get a BriefBox done this weekend too.

More art, but starting to focus more on graphic design

I worked a bit more on my canvas last week, unfortunately the picture I took of it was when it was drying, so the blue colour in the middle looks a lot lighter than it actually is:

I spent about another 1.5 hours on this from last week. I'm happier with the clouds on this now, as at least they look like clouds, but I still need to add more shadows and highlights, rather than them just being a flat purple colour!
Something from my first picture of this as well is that initially it looked more like a sunset, and it's actually a sunrise, adding in a little of the green to the sky has helped with this.
However, on this day when I painted it I wasn't happy with the colours at all, eventually I gave up for the evening (rage-quit!) as it was making me more and more frustrated. I've yet to go back to it, I tend to paint on a Sunday at the moment, but we have another Bank Holiday tomorrow, so I will probably paint tomorrow.

I don't think I've mentioned this before, but I've come across a website called Briefbox, which is where they post fake briefs to give designer something to practise with. I was over the moon when I found this, as I've been struggling to create briefs for myself to keep me busy and boost my portfolio. So this afternoon I've worked on a cafe menu, and the initial design only took 20 mins (which I think is a bad thing). However the brief said they wanted the new menu to reflect the qualities of their cafe (and to be 3 colours max): relaxed ambience. So I opted for a simply elegant design:

I did toy with the idea of adding a watermark, but the 'simple' design I came up with just looked like a child had done it, so I scrapped that idea. I've submitted it to Briefbox anyway, and I'll upload it to my portfolio too.

Week in week out I'm applying for graphic design job near where I live. I thought I might've been in with a chance at one job, but after speaking to the agency the design house wanted someone with good HTML & CSS knowledge. I only have basic HTML knowledge, and no CSS knowledge, so guess what I'm learning now! It seems graphic designers in this country seem to be a jack-of-all-trades when it comes to graphic design, not only does it encompass graphics, but web design, design for social media, etc. Good job I like learning new things!
The agency called me back and said they may be willing to train someone too, so here's hoping I get an interview!

I haven't worked any further on my logo yet, although I think I know what names I'm going to use. I think now I've done something for Briefbox (and my portfolio) I'll get working on my logo.

Anyway, as I've been teasing for weeks, please find below my original logo design:

Why does everything on this blog make white backgrounds slightly grey?

However I didn't like the name as:
1) It was too '90's'.
2) It reminded me of my old places of work

Also, (and again not sure if I've mentioned this), my partner and I think we've finally thought of a company name to run our own mobile catering business, so I get to design not one, but two logo's!

So I have plenty to be getting on with next week, hopefully I'll have a bumper crop of pics to show!