Rose-Colored Glasses

This is the latest face I've been practicing on. I scanned the sketch into Photoshop and started "painting" with the mouse again. I'm getting the hang of it better, but still not where I want to be. Once I get the opacity down, I hope to be able to blend better.

In Monica Zuniga's drawing class we are working on noses this week. This is a rough one but I have all week to practice them. Then we are to try to sketch what we've learned so far combining the eyes and noses. I did this sketch and filled in the mouth and hair from what I've learned in Suzi's class. Monica is such a fabulous teacher. Both she and Suzi are number one with me. :)

I know she doesn't exactly have glasses, but I couldn't figure out another title. I thought about "Gypsy Spirit" but I'm working on something else that will probably have that title, so I went with "Rose Colored Glasses". That rose is a temporary tattoo! Suzi showed us how to add those to our art. So cool!!

Until I can do something with the actual sketch I thought I would show what I did digitally with her. I think she's pretty cool. :) I'm thinking about adhering this sketch to wood and seeing where that takes me. Now back to the sketchpad.

Magenta Muse

Still experimenting with the faces I'm drawing in Suzi Blu's Goddess and Poet workshop. I really liked this face but I couldn't draw any suitable hair for her. So I didn't give her any. She's been sitting in the sketchbook for awhile waiting for something to happen.

I just began another experiment in Photoshop: painting my sketches! Duh! The paint brushes are called that for a reason! You paint with them! I've never used them to paint my own art; only to "color" in images that I would use in a layer mask. I was in Barnes & Noble the other day browsing the digital art magazines and kept reading how the artists would scan in their art and paint it. It's not so easy with the mouse but I gave it a try.

This is why I love Photoshop: The photo below is what I started with (scanned from my sketchbook with a few adjustments so you can see it better).

The result at the top of the page is just my playing with painting her face, lips, etc. All of the elements in the finished product, except for the font, the face and the hair, come from the Somewhere Beyond collection at Scrap Artist.com. Love them for their cool elements!

I had this photo of these gorgeous flowers called love lies bleeding in my files. I thought how cool they would be as hair! Voila! Now I'm thinking I need one of those Wacom tablets to help me paint better (no pesky mouse to try to maneuver!). Hubby will have to be convinced first, though. He's already promised to get me the new version of Photoshop. A Wacom may be pushing it... ;)

As for the actual sketch, I think I'll adhere her to wood and work on her along with the other graphite face in next week's lesson, "The Portrait on Wood". Right now she's still in the sketchbook. And I'll always have her in the computer if I ever want to give her a new look. We'll see what happens.

Portraits and Goddesses

We are only on Lesson 2 of the Goddess and Poet workshop but I wanted to show what I've been working on. These portraits are done in a Moleskine sketchbook. I LOVE the soft paper and the buff color. First we were to sketch a goddess and use minimal shading with the graphite pencil. Then we were to lightly color over the graphite using only creams and browns for the face/hair and reds for the lips. We will add more to these pages later. We were just to sketch and color.

For this next goddess we were to sketch her in and do only a few lines of graphite shading. Then we were to color her with the pencils gradually building up the layers. I'm not too crazy about this one but it's all part of the practice. Then we were to color in her hair a base color. I'm in love with Golden's Iridescent Bronze Fluid Acrylic so I colored her hair in that. I need a lot more practice on the building up around the eyes and the cheek area.

The next lesson will be posted Wednesday and we will be adding more to the backgrounds of these pages. For the final two lessons we will work with the first portrait that I posted a while back (the goddess done only in graphite) that is mounted onto wood.

I've also done some work in an art journal that I'm having a little success at maintaining! Still pulling together images for the faux encaustic collages and will post those when I have something to show. That's it for today.

Goddess Sketching

Yes, I've been busy with the workshops! I've been sketching and erasing for two days now but I think this is the face I'll use for the Goddess and Poet workshop. I am still working on the shading and have a few more things to do before I put this onto the wood panel. It's coming along and I've made progress since my first sketch.

We had to start out making a gray scale (8 boxes that go progressively from white to black), a sphere (with 4 shades in it plus a shadow) and crosshatching. So I did that for a couple of days. Then we were to try a face. I really liked the first one I did until I watched her videos again. Then I decided to forget that one and try again. It's all practice, practice, practice but I'm getting the hang of it.

I loved the faux encaustics workshop, too! I watched all of the videos and have four canvasses gessoed and ready for collage. Hope to have something to show in the next few days. That's it for now. I wanted to post this while I still had the courage. ;)

Drawing Les Petit Dolls

OK, here's what I've been up to. I found out about this awesome drawing class being taught by one of my favorite artists: SuziBlu (see side panel). It's teaching you how to draw dolls. You all know I LOVE anything to do with dolls and I've been wanting to figure out a way to paint them...well, here it is. She teaches you to draw her kind of dolls: Les Petit Dolls. They are kind of whimsical, kind of primitive, big eyes, exaggerated features, just what I love!

I just found out about the class Wednesday. It started Monday so I was only a few days behind. The first lesson is drawing, drawing, drawing, practicing, practicing, practicing, faces and bodies. By Saturday we have to have a sketch of our doll posted for the critique. Right now I've been drawing like crazy trying to come up with something I want to use as my doll for the remainder of the course. I've got three sketch books going and have posted some of my favorite pages. I love the little girl at the top. The paper she's drawn on is kind of a funky texture so I had to increase the contrast so it would show up. Same as with the second photo. These are my two favorites so far. I've got to settle on a face soon because I have to give her a body and clothes and post her by tomorrow. So the first two are my favorites and then they are listed in random order:

One of the things Suzi emphasizes is DO NOT DRAW THE SAME FACE over and over. She wants to see different faces on each doll sketch. She shows you how to vary your faces so there's no excuse for the same face each time.

Some of her dolls have completely round faces, some have more angular faces. I'm trying to mix it up and see which I like the best. I have a ton of ideas for body poses and clothes so I'm narrowing the faces down this afternoon. I'll sketch the body and her outfit tonight.

This last one is an example of what she calls a more stylized face. It has exaggerated lines for the nose and usually is used with more elaborate costuming.

So I've been a busy little sketch artist. Have I ever drawn in my life? NO! I usually just doodle. But I love faces and dolls so I think I can do this. I just draw page after page of eyes and then start to add the rest of the features. When I have my finished sketch, I'll post it.

Eventually, after you've got a workable draft, then you begin the process of painting a background onto a wood support. Then you add your doll, paint her and add some 3-D embellishments. It's a five week course that seems to move pretty fast. So, off I go.

This is all tying in to my series I'm working on but I'm not going to tell you any more than that for right now! Also, I'm sewing down the finishing touches on the woven collage and will post that soon as well.