Phew! I’m back! I managed to get quite a bit of drawing in during my two weeks at camp, thanks to my trusty moleskin sketchbook. However, I’m so behind on updating this site, that I still have some moleskin sketches from before I left to share. I don’t want to overload anyone with a super image intense post, so I’ll do this in three parts (all with snazzy titles). This particular post will contain the stuff from before camp, the second post will be from my first week of camp, and the third post will encompass my sketches from the last week at camp. Got it? Then we’ll move on to some other posts I’m still behind on…
Anyway, let’s get to the art:
I found myself done swimming at the local lake before my kids, so I took out my moleskin and started drawing. This was a twig I picked up nearby.
I drew this sketch of my youngest son from a picture on my phone. It doesn’t quite look like him, I need more practice.
Another sketch from the lake, this started as some scribbles and turned into…whatever it is that it is.
Lake sketch of a lake monster? With 80s hair band hair? Something weird going on with his cheek/jaw…
Jum Jum here was inspired by a fish in the fish tank at my kids’ dentist’s waiting room. I think he might show up in Revery at some point.
This was my view one afternoon at the lake, again waiting for the kids to tire of swimming. I want to work on representing clusters of leaves in an intelligent way without drawing each leaf. I still need practice.
This was the trunk of the tree from the previous sketch. The sun was setting and casting some nice shadows. I love the textures of different species of trees.
Before heading off to camp, I needed to get some new tires for our old van. This left me sitting in the (smelly) waiting room for a few hours. Fortunately I had my moleskin on hand. This was my pathetic attempt at a Muhamed Ali portrait based off a magazine cover nearby.
The Muhamed Ali sketch left me frustrated and irritated, so I tried my hand at a cartoony monk. I need to work more on diverse face shapes…
Still waiting for my tires, I opened the magazine again and found this guy in an old photo in the article about Muhamed Ali. He had an interesting face that stood out to me, so I sketched him. Not perfect, but more successful than my Ali. Drawing faces (and bodies) from magazines is a good exercise that I should probably do more frequently.
I had time for one more sketch before my van was ready, so I decided to do a cartoon self-portrait that really pushed the cartooniness. Even when I’m trying to go for cartoony and simple, I still tend to get too detailed (I love details). I should practice over simplifying characters more.
There you have it, the pre-camp moleskin sketches. I’ll wait a bit before the next installment.
Oh! Before I go, I should mention that I’m making this update on my new Samsung digital sketchbook…thing. Sorry, I don’t know the specifics about what it is, my IT department (i.e. my super wife) surprised me with this in between my weeks at camp (and I don’t “get” technology). I’ve been wanting a portable digital solution for a while now, something that I can sketch on, produce digital art on, update the site from, etc. Basically, it’s a tool that should help me be more productive. It’s a bit of a learning curve, but I’m making this update from the comfort of my couch at night, while watching tv. This is my “wind down” time, I don’t want to be sitting in my studio at this time of night. With the tablet, I can doodle while I veg or sprawl on the couch as I tend to do, but also I can take care of the tedious “busy work” of promoting myself as an artist (kinda like what I’m doing right now…), leaving me more time to focus on actual art making when I’m in the studio. Stay tuned!
Please let me know what you think, it makes my brain happy.