Two-dimensional Chicks

So, about those Easter chicks...they had been sitting in storage for almost a year under heavy stacks of paper and large boxes, understandably they were a little flat.

I did the best I could to return them to their cute fuzzy form, delicately squashing and crushing them with my bare hands, but I'm not sure whether what I ended up with was quite so "cute and fluffy." I feel I just made them a little scarier.

Thank You!

Just a bit of festively appropriate imagery for my wee band of followers and anyone who may have just happened upon my blog.

So, firstly I'd like to say, "I'm not dead." I've just spent this last month doing some practice sketches, working on techniques and such. There are many aspects that I feel I need to improve upon. I also have a couple of pre-sketches ready to be transferred onto A2 this January. 

Anyway thank you all so much for following and sharing all your thoughts and feed back. 

Finally finished!

So, I was up early yesterday morning, to make up for the fact that I didn't finish the drawing on Friday. My early awakening was fuelled by a healthy breakfast of Christmas themed chocolate cup cake.

Sorry this is blurred but, look, it has a star and everything!

Once I sat down on the beanbag to work I realised I really hadn't done all that much so more drawing for me. Eck!
Anyway midday came round and I was in need of a short lunch break, so I decided to collect my first ever pare of glasses. Well, I have been reminded that my vision is quite bollocks. Having tried my glasses on and off again, to compare the difference in my vision, I was suddenly pretty damn aware that I have been living in a soft ambient haze. This seemed not to have affected my drawing though as, even with the glasses on, I would work just as close to the paper, close enough that the glasses would make no difference.
Also I actually got two glasses in a two for one style deal. Sweet!

The sophisticated                       The serious

So by the end of the afternoon I actually finished that drawing. This time I applied a bit of ambient shading to give the image a little depth and I'm quite pleased with the results. I think I may have to go back to a few of my other pieces and do the same to them. Hurrumph.

"I have you now!"

Meh.

So I've been working on that drawing for about five hours today. As it turns out I've lost my concentration.

Meh. 

Eh. 

Bleck!

I'm calling it quits. I don't want to ruin it. I might look at finishing it when I get my glasses on Saturday. I'm curious about how different my drawings might look to me when I wear them...I'm a wee bit worried. Anyway here is how it looks so far.

The perspective on this photo is a little weird. Have fun with that!

I've never stopped mid drawing before. I feel guilty now. Argh.

Suspicious eyeballs

So I had an eye test yesterday and it turns out I'm actually very short sighted. Whoopie! I had been suspicious of my eyeballs for a while but the change in my vision has been so gradual that I had adapted to it and so I quess it didn't bother me. (Even though I've been creeping closer to my drawings over the years.) I think now my nose hovers quite close to the paper.

Anyway I'm working through my next piece. I wanted to draw a Leptoceratops and a Tyrannosaurus on a bike chase so the rough started with some dodgy looking stick figures as I worked out the posturing. It was looking bad.

Eventually I was able to work it out. Today, however, I have completed the final pencil drawing on A2 and this is how it looks now.

Boosh!

Expect an update tomorrow. Thanks for the support.~Nuggie

Them snazzy doodles

So I spent the last week cleaning up my pieces and adding watermarks on Photoshop and I'm finally up to date again. (Yay!) Now images that looked like this...

 ...look like this...

"Tadaah!"

I've updated my gallery so you can see what my doodles actually look like, free of lens distortion and ambient light discolouration.
Next I'll make a few aesthetic alterations to the blog, add a funky shop page, a commissions and contact page, and create a few banners for them. So, no drawings for another week but once all this is done it's unlikely I'll need to do it again...and I'd like my blog to start looking a little better.

In the mean time I'll post a couple of Photoshop tutorials for anyone who may want to "clean up" any traditional imagery, without effecting the integrity of the original pieces, and assist with the kind of temperamental behaviours I discovered while working with photomerge.

"Quack, Quack, Quack!"

So I finally got round to finishing this piece. It was a foreshortening nightmare and was the first time I attempted to draw pompoms or wool but I'm happy enough with the results. Also I believe I've discovered I really like ducks. (Mostly out of immature amusement as I've always felt that a duck, face on, looks as though someone with a pair of frying pans smashed them together, with the duck's head betwixt them, causing their little eyes to pop out under the pressure) Anyway, as always, feel free to give feedback. It's helpful.

So many duck skulls...

I don't have any plans to draw this week as I have a backlog of drawings that need to be "cleaned" for screen visibility and water marked, as well as make my blog look snazzy. Also, until I make a proper link to my shop, here is a crude tag in the mean time. http://www.redbubble.com/people/nuggie?ref=artist_title_name

Thanks~Nuggie

A small update

So I've spent the last couple of days working on my new piece and it seems it'll be taking a little bit longer than I thought but most of the hard stuff is done.
Also I've also decided to set up a new little work space too.

first is the pencil work

then the ink, presently half done

I recon another morning or afternoon should see it finished.
Anyway, about my new work space-Until this point someone had kindly given me access to a studio space they didn't use but I felt I needed a little spot of my own for those occasions when I wouldn't be able to go there. I've put together a little corner behind a chest of draws. There is a dinky little table, a beanbag for a seat and the easel which is set at table hight (effectively making it floor hight.) So, yeah, it's a little den to hide in. I'm a fully functioning grown up. I love having a den!

Photoshop, Photomerge and Ducks

So this last week I've been altering my pieces on Photoshop, not to fix them or "improve" them but to give the images clarity on a computer screen (as dodgy photos were removing all semblance of detail) and so they can also be applied cleanly on my Redbubble products.

It began with the scans of my A2 drawings on an A4 scanner, which had to be done section by section, and took several attempts in order to get a consistent set of images for each piece. Then I then "patched together" on Photoshop using photomerge. Some of the images merged together almost seamlessly, with minor need for alteration, while others were pretty damn weird so I would have to do something a little like this.

Meh...I'm working on it...

I found that Photoshop seemed to learn from corrections I made, so sometimes I could shorten the process by making a few changes and running photomerge again afterwards. "Skidoosh!"
Suspended like all things was one of the more difficult pictures to merge on Photoshop. After several hours aligning the separate scans, and adjustments of colour and saturation levels, it turned out like this and I think I like it.

Done. Boom!

Anyway, as I have not done another drawing in just over a week, I decided to make a start on my next piece. Here is a little sneaky peek. It's a rough drawing uncompleted and not yet finalised.

Thanks for reading~Nuggie

Trying new things

So I plucked up the courage to scan one of my A2 images, bit by bit on my puny little A4 scanner, with the express aim of sticking the separate scans together with Photoshop.

And let the fun commence...

It was awkward. Most of the scans were a little warped as the oversized paper would droop on either side, then, once I had finally got the best scans I could, Photoshop refused to align the images perfectly. Anyway, after much flapping around I managed to clean the image up.

Tadaah!

Let it be known I'm pretty bad with Photoshop, so all my drawings are traditional and, therefore, if I make a mistake, I have to start from the very beginning. Bleck!

Also I'm going to make a blunt plea. I am eager to get criticism and feedback, it can be good or bad. Even something as simple as "hay, I like it" is useful as that way I can tell if I'm doing something that people find appealing in some way as opposed to just doing something stupid.
Also someone asked me how the "join this site" option works. If you have a Google Account (something you will have if you have a youtube account or blog) you can click this option and then Google gives you little alerts when I create a new blog post effectively making you a "follower." That's all it is.

Thanks~Nuggie

Doing the things

Well, I have been doing the things. I'm in the midst of fixing that raptor image (I really don't like the way that photo turned out.) and setting up my pieces for sale on Redbubble, with the aid of Photoshop. (University gave me Photoshop and this mac for being dyslexic. I'm too poor to buy all this.) Let it be known though, all my drawings are traditional, if I make a mistake I start again instead of just altering it in photoshop.

No Cheeser here today

So, if you like you can get snazzy prints, mobile cases, net-book cases, tote bags, tees and all sorts with my fancy doodles on them. I've only altered a few of my peices for sale so far but the link for my shop is here. http://www.redbubble.com/people/nuggie?ref=artist_title_name

Also it was my birthday recently and someone sent me this adorable little thing. I shall play with it like the fully functioning adult that I am.

"Tadaah!"

Raptor on wheels

So I have finished drawing my Utahraptor and his penny farthing. Velociraptor was a little too small to put his bony butt on the seat and reach the peddles, at the same time, so I decided he would have to be replaced by the bony butt of the this guy. 

I call it Totally Pimpin'

With my current series of drawings I've been aiming for an emphasis on realism. This means I've been a real stickler for proportions so, when I returned to start working this morning, and looked at what I had done the day before, I decided it needed some ruthless alteration. This isn't just a case of aesthetic preference though. I want to create accurate skeletal drawings that, stylistically, look like they have been taken from an anatomical/palaeontological text book, or from the wall of a museum but then put the subjects in unusual scenarios or postures, creating a juxtaposition. (Also, I put this stuff up on the internet, and if  an anatomical or palaeontological expert should chance across this stuff I'd like them to say ooooooh instead of ewwww.)

Anyway, despite having issues with the initial pencil drawing, the inking process was comparatively leisurely. (Right up to the point I started work on the wheels.) I was supposed to have acquired a compass, earlier in the week, to make drawing them easier. Well, I forgot. So I had to draw them free hand. I think the concentration made me sweat a little. Nice right?

     There were too many circles in this drawing...                                     

So this piece took over fourteen hours but I think I like the way it turned out. Once I took a photo of it directly face on however it seemed the camera would only focus on the front wheel of the penny farthing. The rest of the drawing has lost all definition. I took several pictures and this kept happening. I'd like like to try and amend this before the end of the week. This has left me feeling kinda grouchy.

Not a Velociraptor

There are some drawings which are very easy to start. With these particular drawings you know just where to place the first pencil stroke. There are others however which refuse to make this easy. This was one of those drawings.

I was trying to convert one of my rough sketches onto A2. It's a Utahraptor on a penny farthing.

This is the original rough drawing. It shares a page with the initial "Music Hog" sketch.

I started the transfer with some very dodgy circles....

I was off to an awkward start but I did eventually recover and progress with the rest of the drawing. It was important that I drew the bike first as I know too well that if someone, with varying poor spacial judgement like me, drew the raptor first the bike might just have disappeared off the side or bottom of the page. As a result I had to draw the utaraptor from the feet up, in order to make sure he connected with the bike properly. I would usually start with the head as it makes judging proportions easier.  Anyway, at one point, my picture was looking kinda weird.

Weird...

Eight hours latter it was nearly done. I couldn't finish the initial pencil sketch as I have places to be but tomorrow I'm hopping to finish it entirely, ink and all.

Working Small

So since starting this blog I've been working on A2 and drawing on that scale takes a long time. The fastest drawing took twelve hours while the longest took thirty. So I decided this time I would actually try making things easier on myself and draw on A4. This is what I came up with.

I also did a variation with some funky sound waves for the sake of experimentation

It seems a smaller drawing made it easier to focus on shading and detail (although I guess I'm not surprised) and I think it helped me refine a smoother consistent type of shading. I will have to try it on my next A2 piece.

Also I've just created a new page about why I started blogging. I'd appreciate any thoughts you may have on it. Thanks.

Time to talk Stuff

So my spare time is no longer being taken up by other matters and I can focus on my drawing and return to my usual schedule again. Huzzah! These last couple of weeks have felt like such a waste of time. Right. Time to talk stuff. A couple of weeks ago I posted a rough sketch I had prepared of an Entelodont on my blog.

An Entelodont? Say what? Enteledonts, fondly nicknamed "hell pigs" by some, are onmivores. They emerged in the late Eocene and eventually went extinct in the early Miocene (that weird bit of prehistory between the disappearance of dinosaurs and now) They were common in Europe, Asia and North America.
OK. They look weird. They have an enormous wolf-like skull, a boxy chest which looks like it was borrowed from a warthog and...hooves? If they were omnivores how could they hunt with little feet like that? They certainly couldn't use them to grab their prey or grip the ground if they got in a tussle. So it would seem they may have just been scavengers but, on closer inspection, it appears they were pretty hench. Those tall dorsal vertebrae, at the top of their spine, would have supported enormous muscles which would have held the head in place but also would have easily assisted them in a fight and those protruding cheekbones would have been the frame for a hulking pare of jaw muscles. Basically they were ripped. So hunter or scavenger? As much as the consensus appears to be that they were scavengers that may have hunted a little by most experts, this is one of those things you can never definitively confirm. Meh.


So. The drawing bit. I spent the first day converting it onto A2 in pencil, as always, but when I went to start inking it the next morning I decided it was way too small. I would have to entirely redo it and I really dislike redoing stuff (especially if I have already devoted so much time to something.) Despite the way I felt I forced my self to ahead with it anyway. If I have to redraw something my main concern is whether I do a better job than the previous attempt but this time I think it payed off.
It took just as long to draw it in pencil but the inking process was comparatively quicker and I think possibly the quickest I have done so far. I also think my shading may have started to improve.

I think I made far better use of the A2 this time

So this is the finished thing. (And that is a fork in the ground.) Looking at it now I think there are points that I need to work on but I think it's definitely an improvement. At some point I will probably work up the nerve to go over all my pieces ad fix them if I can. I'm too timid at the moment though.

Thanks for reading!

I'm back

So I'm back to drawing and blogging again. I said I would be. I've got plenty of rough sketches to convert onto A2. I'm kinda excited about it.

Music Hog and Spider

Still busy this week so I thought I'd feature, "Music Hog" in this blog post. (I may change the title at some point.) It was one of three drawings I did, before I began my blog, so it only made a brief appearance but this particular image had been floating around in my head for possibly over two years. It was one of the contributing factors that got me drawing these skeletons and back to drawing in general, so I thought it deserved a bit of acknowledgement. I feel that a blog could be a little boring if the focus was only on "the process" so I'll throw something else in. The return to drawing will probably be the subject for another blog if I keep things going for long enough.


Like all my pieces this one began life as a rough sketch, only this one took several hours before it started to look right, specifically because sources were minimal and made the ribcage difficult to perfect. I had to redraw it over and over again and, when erasing it in-between failures, would have to carefully go around the skull and its tusks every time. I hate that rib cage.
Eventually I was able to transfer it to A2. So I started working early, as usual, and by mid day was making good progress when a dot appeared in the middle of the paper. I peered closer to find it was a tiny spider which had abseiled down from the top of the easel. Thinking it would be the humane thing to assist in relocating the little dude, I unhooked the line and lifted it away from the paper, spider still attached. But suddenly, spider was not attached. So I sat back down to resume work. Then a familiar dot very slowly inched it's way down over the paper. So I extended a finger to unhook the line and Spider tuned and scrabbled back up, disappearing over the top of the easel. Again I tried to resume working and again spider inched slowly down in front of my face. Things repeated this way for a few minutes longer until the little dude was successfully removed and hooked onto the edge of a desk.
By the end of the day Hog was drawn in pencil and partially outlined in ink.

I had to take sooo many photos to get him in frame...not sure if you can really make him out though

All preped for inking

The following day was spent inking the image. Shading the tucks was the scariest part as they are large and obvious and if I made a single mistake it would be equally as large and obvious. Shading the dead phones was really fun though.

The close up just made me aware that the photos aren't giving a sence of skale

Looks kinda small....its longer than my arm.

Made a Gallery

I've just put a little gallery page together as I've probably got another week ahead of me before I can get back to my usual drawing schedule.  In my minimal spare time I've been doing rough sketches so I'll have plenty of material to work with. Anyway, you've probably seen it all before if you're following but I do hope you feel inclined to take a peek ~Nuggie

I'm Still Drawing...

Mouse Ears as promised.

I think I'd like to give those feet something to cling to but I'm not sure what yet so I'll get round to it.

So, as I won't be able to do any large works for a couple of weeks, I've decided to do as many rough sketches as I can so that once I'm back to my previous routine I'll have plenty of  material to work from.

I'd like not to reveal to much so for now I'll just leave you with this rough drawing of an Entelodont, a pre-human critter from the Eocene and Miocene.

Mouse Ears Again

I shall have a better photo for you soon. I promise

Mouse ears is all done now. Influenced by the Warthog, I gave the little guy ear phones as a prop. That head is far too small for actual head phones.

Expect to get fewer updates over the next week as  I won't have the time to draw. After that things will be back to as they were. I have no intention of stopping.

An Update on Mouse Ears

So the bat has been transferred onto A2 in pencil.

I still haven't decided on a prop yet. I really need to as tomorrow will be the last opportunity I get to spend a day on drawing for a while...

Forty-five Grams in the Attic

I've begun work on my next drawing! The last one was meant to have been simple and relatively quick to complete. Well, it took three days. I thought maybe this time I should try not to repeat that.

So, I decided to try bats. Their skeletal structure is minimal making them an easy choice. Now I just had to pick one out of 1,240 bat species. (It's only an approximate figure!) That was when I discovered they were the second largest order of mammal species. Yay? I think.

After some searching and reading, I chose the Greater Mouse Eared Bat as the neutrality of the skeleton makes their silohet immediately identifiable as bat like.

The Greater Mouse Eared Bat. Apparently at 45 grams its beefy for a European bat...our bats are pewny!

With the images I had collected, I was able to make a rough sketch. When drawing these rough pictures I gather images of the animal with fur on as well as just the naked bones. It helps to build a picture of how it behaves, moves as well as understand it's physical limitations. Footage can help too. All this information goes towards creating a "pose" in my drawings.

For this particular drawing I needed to see how these little dudes affixed themselves to the ceilings of caves (and a lot of attics apparently.) I also wanted to make sure I was able to create a sense of weight because, although they are tiny, they aren't entirely weightless and using images as aides would help me to do just that.

I found that arcing the little guy's back slightly solved the weight issue and determined that keeping the toes only slightly apart and relatively taught was what gave the bats the firm grip that they have so I stuck that in too.

I forgot to take a picture of my rough sketch so I made the educated decision to replace it with a subed strip of Batty from FernGully.

I love his design, so flexibly expressive. I envy the guys who had the opportunity to animate him. Anyway thanks for reading.

It took a little longer than planned...

I think this proves I need a large scanner...

Look. I did it. Ha! You think I'm elated? No. I'm anksty! It took three days. Not two. Bah!

By the end of the first day I had pencilled it onto A2, as usual, and I was feeling quite happy with the progress I was making. Eight 'o clock, the next morning, I began inking but by nine that evening however, with just over three light bulbs completed, I had learnt keeping the shape and shading of each light bulb consistent took hours at a time, far too long to keep going with it growing so dark. Eager to finish, I returned  to inking it at five the next morning. Drawing identical bulbs did demand a degree of patience and several times I thought I'd ruined it, making me consider wheather I'd tried to do something to ambitious. Was I wasting time? Should I stop and start on another idea? Some how, six and a half light bulbs later, it was done.

Ok, I moaned, but I am pleased with the final out come. Also, I don't want to sound too corny, but I kinda enjoyed the challenge.