More character designs!

Thought since I haven't updated in a while I'd pop some of the character designs I've been busying myself with. Also the world was meant to end about ten minutes ago and it hasn't yet so I thought I'd just blog instead.

This set of drawings I did sitting in the food court in some shopping centre in Coventry. So many interesting people around there! My favourite one is definitely just above, the little girl happily sipping her McDonalds milkshake. Once you get in the zone, people-watching/sketching is so much fun and you can see all these caricaturing, cartoony possibilities opening in front of you.

These drawings are designs of good old Issa and Viv in an attempt at the Al Hirschfeld style. Just a bunch of roughs really but I tried to make a few finished ones.

 In this particular one I was experimenting with my new inkpen. So different and scratchy compared to my brush pen but once I got used to it there was so much delicious control over the line!

The finished above of Viv was a live-traced then filled in Photoshop one, and then the finished of Issa is all inked and coloured by hand and traditional and stuff. Despite the finished quality of Viv in the above one I still prefer the organic quality of traditional. I'm learning to accept and experiment with digital a lot more on my course, because it gives your images a real professional quality, but I will always be a traditional girl. You can whip out a sketchbook and pencil anywhere in a way that you really can't do on with a computer. You can feel the pencil underneath your fingers. I won't keep going on about it because I could all day but there we go.

I had a meeting with my tutor to talk to him about my internship work and he liked my Hirschfeld stuff. He also said he wished some of his third years had the same confidence in line that I do which was about the best thing anyone has ever said to me ever in my life. I nearly phoned my mother afterwards to get excited about it down the phone but I thought I'd better not.

Anyway, this bunch of ruffs is some stuff I've done for a few Ren and Stimpy style characters. The baby bird is called Chiff and the baby rat is called Binx. Drawing in this style is so liberating and fun and gives squashy-stretchy freedom. Brillo pads.

A lot of fun. My flatmate assisted me in making sure they were grotesque enough but not revolting and gory.

Here's a few more of Helena. Her design is going through some changes, at the moment I'm trying her in a kind of, Coney Island Roaring 20s-esque style, but here's a bunch of stuff I've done on her.

I've done quite a few more drawings of her since I did these, and her design (well her hair and dress) has changed a lot. Aaaah I look at that pencil drawing just above and I just love pencil so much. It's just so expressive and you can use the end of side or slant of the pencil and get different textures and lines and loveliness. Thank you Glen Keane and Jin Kim for teaching me the important ways of the pencil and all its different sides.

I'm sure I'll upload again soon with some more Helena stuff and hopefully some Tom and Jerry style stuff, which my tutor Francis encouraged me to have a go at in our meeting. So exciting! Thank you so much for reading and looking at my blog it means ever so much! Thanks guys :)

Update!

I am so sorry, lovely readers of this blog, that I have not updated in around two months. Despite the fact I've just finished a massive project and have already completed three others, I don't ever feel as if I have anything to put onto this blog. Which is silly, because I really do.

But I shall now attempt to update with some stuff that I've been doing, both personal stuff and uni work.

For the last project I did we had to design a front cover and four spot illustrations for a short story, and my short story was Samantha's Diary by Diana Wynne Jones (the Howl's Moving Castle author wahoo!) I thought I'd post some of my Samantha character designs.

I apologise for how scribbly they are, but I'm sure you're used to that now because that is how I draw 90% of the time. 

This is my favourite piece of work I produced for the project. I enjoyed designing and drawing Liam (Samantha's off/on boyfriend) the most and being able to go slightly more conceptual with character design, because it's for a book not animation, is quite liberating.

Anyway.

Now that my big project is finished I can finally do some personal work without feeling guilty. There's an internship that I would love to do at an animation studio in Ireland called Cartoon Saloon, and my tutor is helping me prepare for it. I've got to do eight character designs, two characters per style, and then make model sheets for all of them. So quite a lot of work, but in the words of a Nordic guard on Skyrim I LOFF A CHALLENGE.

Here are some character designs I did of Helena yesterday, I've put them in order of drawing, because I want to map the development properly. Some of them are awful drawings and I cringe looking at them, but I want to show the stages of her design from three o clock in the afternoon yesterday to about a half an hour ago, haha. They're only quick scribble drawings anyway.

The last drawing is probably the first drawing I've done where I thought 'a-ha!' and had one of those Glen Keane moments when you see the character properly. I don't think she's completely done being designed yet, probably work more on her clothes, but in terms of character and definitely facial design I think she is ready. I would spend longer on her but I've got 8 characters to get through before the end of term so I can't afford to spend lengthy amounts of time on her. She has changed quite a lot since her pigtail stages a few months ago though. And I love her with straight hair! Anyway enough blabbering about her.

I'll probably be uploading (well hopefully) a lot more in the next few weeks as I churn out these character designs. Need them done before the 14th December, doubt that's going to happen, but I'm going to work on it whenever I get the chance!

Hello my dears

It is me. I am here.

I am quite excited because I recently paid for a lovely violin that used to belong to my Grandpa (who never plays anymore) to be restored and today my lovely father went and collected it for me so it's all very exciting. I've never played the violin in my life before but I've wanted to for so long and I had a little go and managed to make a sub-standard sound so there we go!

Anyway, this blog is for art, not music.

Here are some of the ruffs that I've done this week.

Of course they're all of my new characters and that lot. The one of Viv just above is probably my favourite out of all the creations I've created this week. Don't know why. It just really looks like her.

This lot up next are a few drawings I did after looking at the work of Nico Marlet. There's something about his style that is like no one elses.

Then here are some more sketches I did of Adana, Bobo and Viv also based on Nico Marlet, but more his use of colour. The way he can appear to get a whole range of tones just by using two or three colours. It's genius.

Then here are some more ink and colour drawings that I did over the week, of course inspired by the brilliant Al Hirschfeld once again.

This is one that I did for my Grandma as a housewarming present; it is of course myself (tee hee har har), my little cousin Neyla and my little (but taller) brother Ben. It was inspired by the way Neyla and I skipped up Main Street when I took her to Disneyland two Christmases ago.

Thank you once again for reading/looking everybody, it is very much appreciated! It is so kind of you all to take time out of your day to look at my art, so thank you!

Hello dears!

Hello my lovelies! This week I've really been studying the work of a few individuals; Al Hirschfeld, De'Von Stubblefield and Jean Gillmore.

I've always adored the style of Hirschfeld, but never really knew how to incorporate it into my own art, and the times I did try, well... they were nothing short of disaster attempts. Haha. But the other day I spent lots of time looking particularly at the art of Stubblefield and Hirschfeld together, comparing the two. Stubblefield is a fantastic young artist who has already had an internship at Disney and is going to study at CalArts starting this Autumn. He's really brilliant, you should go check him out!

Anyways, his style very much reminded me of Al Hirschfeld, however it was somehow simpler, more easy to understand, and I could really see how it would work with my character designs. So, this week I've been trying out my own designs and incorporating Hirschfeld's style, and it has actually been so much fun! I've always had my own sort of scribbly, loose style, and always wondered what a more refined drawing look would look like.

First, here are some drawings I did after looking at the brilliant character artist Jean Gillmore, who is absolutely fantastic, I'll be studying her style a lot more.

 

 

I've decided to name my older brother character Issa for now, it may or may not change if I find a more suitable name. You know, when you hear a name and you know that it's exactly the right name for your character? I feel that way maybe only about Adana and Bobo. Who knows what they'll all end up being called!

And here are the drawings I made after studying Stubblefield and Hirschfeld!

I am loving experimenting with this style so much. With my more Glen Keane/Gillmore-esque style it takes me tops half an hour to bang out a drawing, but this demands so much more patience and time on my part, and I'm enjoying most of the outcomes, hahar!

Anyway, thank you SO MUCH for coming to look at my art and my blog! Very soon (in about three weeks or so) I shall be starting my new course in Illustration and Animation at Coventry, and I'm so excited.

Special shout out to Jesus Christ for giving me more creative juices this week than I know what to do with. So much so I've been getting the 'creative urge' at about midnight and I'll carry on making drawings until four in the morning, hahar. No really, it's like Glen Keane said, 'Animation is a gift from God,' and I'd do well to remember that every time I sit down to sketch.