O*P*I Doodle

I just started a new job, and some days are super quiet, so during those slow times, i'm trying to doodle. This little polish was sitting on the register, so I sketched it and colored it at home.

Washbucket

This was an example in the book "Painting Weathered Buildings in Pen, Ink & Watercolor" by Claudia Nice. The book is really great...especially since I love all things rusty and crusty! ; ) I would liked to have a little bit more value range, but I didn't want to keep putting more layers and make it muddy.

Geronimo

This is for one of my groups on flickr. They post a photo to use as a reference and everybody posts their versions of it. Love it! They post some really random pics so far! LOL!

Mixed Media in one of my hand*book journals.....

Strawberries and Crawfish

Spring in NOLA....the absolute best time for local food....crawfish, shrimp, oysters, strawberries. yummmmm! I couldn't resist trying to paint part of my dinner tonight....the colors were absolutely amazing and vibrant! I definitely feel like I could use a lot more practice capturing the colors in watercolor, but hey, who could complain? Extra practice means more seafood and strawberries to use for reference...LOL! I could eat this stuff every day! and definitely, the hotter, the better! I can't wait to draw some more tomorrow! ; ) perhaps some hot sauce?.....

The Aldige Angels

I used a photograph of one of my favorite statuary pieces for this journal page. It memorializes a mother and daughter that drowned in a steamboat accident back in 1848. The base of the sculpture is a boat. I especially love the emotion on the faces in the sculpture. Eventually I'll do a large painting using this sculpture.

a new journal page....

another page using a photo i took in one of the NOLA cemeteries.....I LOVE how this one turned out! I don't know about mixing the Derwent watersoluble pencils with the watercolors....it may be making the drawings look too dirty, which is totally weird for me to say, since i love grungy looking pages...this combo may just be grungy in a not so good way. but good at least for this page! i love the colors...... this is sure to become a bigger painting......

Angel journal page

So I have been working on some larger pieces, and also doing a little more photography lately, and my posts have fallen by the wayside. I did this spread just to start messing with my watercolors..... the colors didn't scan very well. But i like the grunginess of how it turned out....i just like grungy things...and i keep doodling this angel(it's one of my photographs, but i keep grabbing this particular photo out of the pile every time...i must reallllllly like it! LOL) This is in my square hand*book journal....

Pin-Up Study #9

Another study from Taschen's 1000 Pin-Up Girls...proving to be worth every cent I spent on it! ; ) So her head is too big...that, or her shoulders are too small, but I kind of don't care, because her face came out so well on this one...and her hair. I am particularly loving this hair. This one was really fun to do.... I think I need to try drawing the outline with either brown charcoal pencil(although i don't know if I'll get the point sharp enough) or a brown colored pencil....maybe that will help the outline blend a little better...but either way, i don't mind the pencil lines showing through either...i have got to be more patient, though and wait for things to dry before going back into it....ugh! i almost royally messed her up!!! ; )

Product of Lebanon

I found a wine shop that sells this Lebanese wine, so I bought a few bottles, because my Grandmother's dad is Lebanese, so I'm always interested in family heritage, culture, etc. I was hoping the label would come off easily(and, yay, it did!) so i could use it in this spread.

I have all these fabulous photos of my grandma and her friends cheesing for the camera, just being girls. This is one of my favorites, so I painted it here. She loves to tell me that her bikini was red, so I knew it would be perfect with the colors of the label...

Pin-Up #7

Just a little quickie partial gal. I've been working on some other pieces, so these got put to the side for a minute, however, i can't improve if i don't practice, so even if it's little, it's going to get done.

I've been liking how some of the old pin-up pictures have just quick brush strokes of color here and there, rather than coloring the whole thing, so I thought i'd give it a try.

Chick #6

This is a study from Taschen's The Great American Pin-Up. The original artist is Al Buell. Other than making her a little too skinny(maybe she needs some of my Hershey's Miniatures...I mean I'm just sayin...), I'm really pleased with this one.

Thanks to Owen at Everyday Matters, for the tip to put a little soap in my water to help break down the wax coating on the pages....so now any painting boo-boo's are strictly due to the operator of the brush, rather than the supplies being faulty. ; )

Hershey's Miniatures

So, if you start one moley, why not start 2? ; ) I had a small watercolor one, and i had some hershey's miniatures, so i painted them. I am not an experienced watercolorist, but i had ordered a ridiculously large amount of Daniel Smith watercolors, and there's no time like the present to try them out. I actually like how this turned out. My Special Dark bar is a little rough, but, that's ok. I played, i learned, and that's what counts. I need to focus some attention on learning more about mixing colors, because generally I just paint straight out of the tube...I know! The Horror!! but, hey, sometimes i just like the color that's in the tube. what can i say. the other thing i might need to pay a little more attention to is light sources and shadows...but i have an excuse for this piece...i ate them before i actually painted the sketch...LOL

Pin-Up Study No. 5

1st off, the pin-ups have a new home...the playboy mansion of journals, if you will...The Moleskine! It's my first Moleskine sketchbook. It's a bit tough to get used to the waxy coating on the paper, however I think once I get over that, this will be one of my very favorite sketchbooks!

So, this little cutie(much cuter by the original artist, mind you!) is a study of one of Rolf Armstong's gals featured in Taschen's The Great American Pin-Up. It's smaller than last journal I was using, so painting that tiny will take some getting used to, just like the new paper, but I think the extra effort will be worth it in the end. It forces me to slow down and really look at what I'm trying to do. I like small detail work, anyway.(most of the time)

Pin-Up Study No. 4

I am loving doing these pin-ups! Each one, I really learn something new, both with the drawing aspect, and then the painting aspect. I know for sure this sketch book paper is crap! Grrrr! If I put too many washes, and by that, i mean more than one(!), the paper starts scrubbing off. BUT, I refuse to not finish a sketchbook I've started...I just may have to use this one for strictly gestures, superquickie sketches,and notes, because I've tried gouache, watercolor, acrylic, and just plain graphite, and they all look horriffic in here. UGH! So, perhaps I'll move the pin-ups to my 1st ever Moley...

I don't think it shows up in the scan at all, but her bikini is gold! ; ) What gal doesn't want a sexy gold bikini and a pair of ridicuously hot purple shoes?!

I still am struggling with hands, feet, and eyes...and getting the proportions of the face right, but it's coming along, so I'm happy...

This another study using my Taschen's 1000 Pin-Up Girls...

Pin Up Study No.3

Here's today's pin-up sketch. These are proving to be a lot of fun, so I'll definitely be continuing...

Today's wasn't based on a drawing, but on a photograph from "Burlesque and the Art of the Teese/Fetish and the Art of the Teese" by Dita Von Teese...

Still some proportion issues to work on, but the hands are a little better, and so is the thigh! Yay! I do wish I hadn't tried to outline it with a 9B pencil...ugh. Next time I'll try to use one of my micron pens.

Pin Up Study No.2

ok, so i could list a million things wrong with this one, however, the face is better than the last one, and even though some of the shading didn't go on as smoothly as i like, i like the coloring of her. i guess that's the point of doing studies, though, isn't it? to mess up, and to learn? it's funny, i started college in fashion design, and abandoned it years and years ago, but doing these studies makes me remember how much i loved it. as a kid, and all the way through high school, i could sit for hours and draw clothes. it was all i did. so it's actually quite nice to sit and draw and paint some fashionable little pin-ups.

pin up study numero uno

One of my (many!) resolutions is to focus on drawing the human figure, both naturally, and in my favo style...the pin-up. I bought several books last year including Taschen's 1000 Pin-Up Girls, and this is a study from that book, For a 1st attempt, I am more than pleasantly surprised at how it turned out, and at how quickly I did this. I love her, bad feet, skinny thigh, and all! ; ) WHY DIDN"T I TRY THIS SOONER?! LOL

p.s. ...i've mentioned them in a couple of the last posts, but let me mention them here again- I totally heart Derwents watersoluble graphitone pencils. Do a little shading, wash over them with some H2O, and you get the best sparkly gray wash, and awesomely enough, the sparkle will show through your gouache! How can you not love something that leaves a little glitz?

quick sketches for my commissioned pieces

just some rough sketches for 2 different commissions i'm working on, but i like how they came out, so i thought i'd post them. the 1st one will end up being 2 panels, with lots of gold, and using the cemetery imagery. it's based on one of my previous cemetery paintings where i painted on the coffee filter. the 2nd one is going to be massive... a large painting to basically serve as a headboard of sorts, and she gave me free reign to whatever...her only request: japanese tattoo! SWEET! i do have to laugh, because i did all my doodles in pink, and she is most certainly not a pink-y kind of gal. she loves red, the darker the better, so i'll have way more doodles to go with this one, just to get to the red vibe!

NOLA Cemetery Journal Page

I love how this page came out! The gold gouache looks so cool! Gouache and Pitt pens in my small hand*book journal.

Hurricane Gustav Journal Page

gouache and gold Sakura paint pen in my small hand*book journal....did this one during my evacuation from the hurricane