Daenerys line art done, next up: Robert Baratheon

Well, the Game of Thrones characters are moving along, I've spent a bit more time on them last week and today (including managing to fit in this weekend: visiting a friend, deep cleaning my kitchen and wasting hours on Call of Duty Black Ops 3). I finished the line drawing of Daenerys (although it looks nothing like her, I'm hoping when I colour her in it will resemble her a bit more), and I've got the body sorted for Robert Baratheon: 

Daenerys Targaryen

Robert Baratheon

The idea is not to have the lines when I colour it in. I don't want this to look to cartoony, although if this looks crap coloured in with pencils then I may resort to cell-shading digitally XD

I'm still being a hermit this at the moment (saving for a house), so I haven't got much to report on. I'm gonna be seeing a few people this week I've not caught up with for a while. Hopefully I'll be able to get some more drawing in. It would be awesome if I can finish Robert Baratheon and get another character started.

Someone who I work with highly recommended going to a life drawing class. We have one that happens every Wednesday in my home town, I'm out this Wednesday but hoping to get to it next week. At the moment I use a Pose app on my phone to draw poses from (my wooden mannequin is shite), but I've been told that nothing beats drawing from real life. I can kind of relate to that; drawing still lifes at home is much better than drawing it from a 2D picture. 

Anyway, that's enough for this week. I was hoping to draw more of Robert Baratheon (maybe half an hour more), but after playing CoD it's made me pretty tired, so I think I'll have a bath as it's a cold day today, and then read in bed.

Last but not least is my Pinterest of the day: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355204907481/ If I could get my GoT characters to look half as good as this I'd be happy

April can't come quick enough!

Well, I started 2 ideas this week (I'm great at starting ideas, finishing them seems like a marathon though!), I've started a quick concept for a tigershark:

Sorry for the dark image

And I've started on the Game of Thrones characters I mentioned last week:

Daenerys WIP

Once I sat down and worked out who I wanted to draw it was actually quite difficult which families I wanted to represent, and at what stage each house is at too. I've decided to go for series one, and just the main characters. The characters I want to draw are:
Baratheon: Robert, Cersei, Joffrey, Tommen, Myrcella, Renly, Stannis.
Lannister: Tywin, Jaime, Tyrion
Stark: Eddard, Catelyn, Robb, Sansa, Arya, Bran, Rickon, John
Targaryen: Daenerys, Viserys

Think I have bitten off more than I can chew?

I've done it this way so even people married into other houses are represented (hence why Cersei is in the Baratheon house, not the Lannister house), and I also didn't want to draw things that have happened in the series in case I reveal spoilers for people who haven't seen/read it yet. Game of Thrones is one of my favourite all-time shows (I've seen all of the TV shows, but only read book 1), and I can't wait for it to return in April/ I'm hoping to have this finished by the time it returns.
The plan is to do character outlines on my computer, then transfer that to paper and finish it off with my new colouring pencils I've yet to try out. That way, if the colouring pencils don't work I can still do something with it digitally. Also, the added bonus is working digitally I have an Undo button, and I can skew things how I want. The final idea is to have all houses together on one long canvas.

I'm also slowing realising that I seem to draw people/animals/still lifes better than what I want to do, which is draw from the imagination and draw concept art, specifically landscapes for computer games.

Anyway, I think that's enough for this week, I think I'm just gonna keep hammering the line drawings of the GoT characters for now, and see how it goes. My Pinterest for the week is actually another blog! I've not read much on here yet but I've bookmarked it for a later date, hope you get something out of it: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355204806209/

A little bit of art...

I've not done much more in the way of art this week, but I did give the picture of the fluffy cat to my best friend as her 30th birthday present. I've also had another idea I want to start, I want to draw all of the main characters from Game of Thrones, although I'm not sure if I want to do them in a realistic style or a cartoon style. I'm sure I'll figure it out.

I have done a few quick sketches of bunnies doing yoga poses. It's a series I want to work on, as everyone seems to be into cats these day, I think bunnies are just as cute!

Bunny (child's) pose

Tree pose

Downward bunny (dog)

My idea from last week that was spawned from my dark mood hasn't been touched. Although I'm pretty sure I could've finished it by the weekend, as the week got progressively worse for me at work. I'm learning from my mistakes though, and it's only one person that winds me up (although she winds me the f*ck up!), so I'm not too bothered. I was really tired last week, so it made me really emotional. I'm over it now though:

Not really

However, I feel like I'm going to go into a food-coma, as I've been to an all-you-can-eat restaurant and made a pig of myself.

Anyway, if any of you feel like you're stuck in a creative rut the following might help; my Pinterest of the Week! https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355204608653/

No art!

Well, I think the is the first blog post where I haven't done ANY art to contribute this week. I could come up with a plethora of excuses, but simply put I've not had the time. Funnily enough, I've had more time than ever as of the start of this year (as I'm not going out as much to save for a mortgage), but I'm filling up my time with other things, such as deep cleaning the house and washing my car.

After deep cleaning my house I came across a bunch of old ImagineFX magazines. I've not touched them since moving out of my parents house 3 years ago, so today I've been going through them and noting good bits of information, plus ripping out images I'm keeping as inspiration:

Top middle: Chris Down, www.chrisdown.co.uk. Bottom left & bottom right: James Chung, www.jimbopaints.blogspot.com. Helena Bonham Carter as Bellatrix Lestrange: Mark Hammermeister, www.imaginefx.com/markdraws. Centre & Centre-bottom: Owen Rixon, www.owenrixon.com. If anyone knows the artist of the top-left or top-right image please let me know so I can credit accordingly; I threw the magzines away before I got the artist details! 

In regards to artwork I have a couple of ideas up my sleeve: one which is quite personal and I'm not sure if I'll ever share it, but I've had a pretty dark day today in terms of my mood, and it's totally linked to lack of money. I've also got the idea with the wax crayons, and I've dug out the picture of Portrait of a Boy. Wow. That picture is so washed out, so I'm going to redo it with my new colouring pencils.

The amarylis died, so if I want to draw it I'm going to have to use last year's pictures I took.

Anyway, that's enough for this week, here is my Pinterest of the week, hope you enjoy! https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355204564018/

The cat is done, evil will not triumph

I finished the cat! Her name is Milly, and she is the spawn of satan:

Don't let the fluffiness or cute eyes deceive you, she will claw your eyes out the first chance she gets

I really enjoyed doing this piece. There's something incredibly satisfying drawing art traditionally rather than on a computer, however traditional art doesn't have an Undo button (and I had to rub out most of her forehead to redo the eyebrows, yeah, those wispy little white strands). I've even had approval from my peers for this, so it must be good!

On top of the colouring pencils I bought I've also bought some chalks and some wax crayons. More on that on a later post...

The amarylis hasn't bloomed properly. There's 6 flowers in one head, and I think it's just so crowded the flowers won't open properly. And it looks like it's dying :(

I have a couple of ideas in the pipeline for some art (the wax crayons above being one of them), but I need to get a few more bits. I wanted to get some fixative spray for the above artwork, as it's done with graphite. It's a good job I didn't buy the 'fixative spray' from my local stationers, as what they think is fixative spray is sprayable glue!

And lastly is my Pinterest of the week, what this artist does on such a natural and tiny space is incredible: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355204564003/

Cat WIP

I think I'm over my laziness now, I've been working today on drawing my friend's cat today (she tasked me with it on Monday as I didn't have any ideas on what to draw), and I have a few progress photo's:

Milly, the spawn of satan

I've quit Facebook again, as I spend way too much time procrastinating on there. I'm still on Twitter though. Funnily enough, I do feel like I've got more done since quitting Facebook.

I bought a new colouring pencil kit the other week (a half decent kit this time, not cheap pencils), and I haven't used them! Instead I've been using the kit my parents bought me for Christmas, the cat pictures above have been done with a graphite pencil only. I have an amarylis, and I'm waiting for it to bloom before using my new colouring pencils. It's nearly there:

How many flower heads?!

In November I bought 10 yoga classes at my local leisure centre for £10, which is a bargain. However, the site I bought them from stated it was for yoga, but the leisure centre stated it was for Pilates. When I arrived it had changed again - to Stretch and Tone! Whatever, I enjoyed the class anyway, and even after going to the class on Thursday I'm still aching today. I've also been doing a daily yoga practise using the DoYouYoga Youtube video's, however I can't do them for a little while now as I put my back out today.

Anyway, I'll continue with the picture of the cat and see how far I get. I'm also going to try upgrading my laptop to Windows 10, I'm really apprehensive about it as when I upgraded my tablet the integrated Wacom pen driver wouldn't work anymore. Plus, the tablet kept crashing, so I reverted it back to its original operating system. Here's hoping my laptop copes with the upgrade.

One last thing that I nearly forgot, it's my Pinterest of the week, hope you enjoy! I think it's really pretty https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/314548355204375006/

New year, not new me

Another week, another lack of excuses of why I haven't done much art ;)

I'm feeling more lacklustre than usual at the moment, I think with it being Christmas time and lack of routine has left me feeling a bit bummed out. I'm a creature of habit. Good job I found this infographic:

I'm also a bit bummed-out about my financial situation. I'm not broke, far from it, but I'm trying to save up to buy my own house, and it's proving a lot harder than what I though. I've been renting for 3 years now, and I had hoped to have my own house by now, but I keep spending money on going to the pub and on holidays. So I've called up my nearest and dearest and told them we will be hermits this year. We *should* have a half-decent deposit saved by the end of the year.

Here's my doodling I did with my new sketching kit. This is purely done with a pencil, then inked. I'll do a cleaner line version when I get the time, but I want to colour this in.

I've also made progress on my dragon, not sure if the cave looks cave-y enough. Also the rabbit is kind of lost now:

Well, that's about it for this week, of course I will *try* to make more art... but we all know how that turns out with me! Last but not least, here is my Pinterest of the week: https://uk.pinterest.com/pin/175640454195289005/