OneWeek100People 2020

Taking the challenge posted my Mark Holmes in his blog -and Liz Steel-, they do this every year. Here some of my sketches. I decided to focus on figure this time

One Week 100 People Challenge

Following the challenge that Marc Holmes posted in his blog:

#OneWeek100People2018: Day One: Metro Sketching!
I decided to take part this year. I love sketching people. from gesture to expressions, from loose to detailed. I thought this could be a good opportunity to warm up as I haven’t been sketching much lately. Today is Day 4. i will be adding one last day tomorrow. I hope I can make it! I used the Pentelbrush for most of these.

Update Friday March 9 3:04 pm challenge completed!

Sketching Pole Dancers

Pole dancers are very fun to sketch, the way they twist their bodies and do unusual poses and moves is very interesting and fascinating, like ballet, performance art. I did these from instagram friends. They are all done in ink with the carbon pen and the Lamy safari on a Stillman and Birn notebook.

For accuracy, I penciled first to resolve proportions, so that my line is cleaner when I ink rather than an spontaneous sketch that has many squiggly lines that fall around a ballpark approximation of proportion. I wanted to give justice to the beauty of these girls and their fabulous art.

Upgrading Detail

I have been studying anatomy and expression, and revisiting the Reilly method of drawing. I learned the Reilly method through years of working at a studio of a very accomplished portrait artist in Boston: Mr Ouelette. Barbara Morse, another brilliant artist and wonderful woman, gave classes in his studio for years, and I was a fly on the wall learning as I posed in her demonstrations.

To me this is the best method I have seen as it is very organic and flexible, it has beautiful rhythm and it’s dynamic and lively. Here my attempts to experiment and implement this in my figures.

In my opinion the best source is Faragasso’s book, as Frank Reilly didn’t write any books on his method, yet his pupils did. Frank himself was a pupil of Bridgman who’s books are a bible for anyone who wants to get seriously in depth learning the construction of the human figure.

There’s three basic foundations to draw people: 1- understanding anatomy, 2- studying proportions and method of construction (Bridgman) and the academic classic Atelier method, and 3- learning to see the rhythm, grace and beauty of the human machine (Reilly)

A Comic Page

I want to share this time a process from concept to execution for drafting inking and coloring a full comic page. It was really exciting to me ! First, this below is the background story pf how this comic came to be:

Background————

We are a group of friends from different countries in the FB group SW Comics, (Wes, Palma, Marion, Nicholas, Mark, Jutta, Jorge (+), Beliza, Cat, Jim, Holger, Sofiya, Marco, Paula, Carlos, Jane, Amy, Juliet, Jansi, Mia.. *see full list in the link** https://issuu.com/norightturn/docs/no_right_turn_20170425) led by Rene Fijten and we make stories!

Do you know or have heard about “Exquisite Corpse”? (Cadaver Exquisito) It is a method of creation in which people take turns developing a story or a project, it is passed on from person to person to keep developing and extend the story. This is how our “No Right Turn” has been done so far.

——————you can follow us in instagram @sketchingcomics————-

So, Rene gave me this

From here I drafted a storyboard

Then I fleshed out all the characters one by one

At this point I thought I needed another detail for the narrative, one more drawing so it goes with the dialog given.

All the drawings were brought into photoshop for resizing and do a composite, with the layout in the draft I made or close enough

Then I printed it and added the background manually to the hard copy

The next thing was to incorporate thedialog  bubbles for which I used Backissues font, a free font that it’s awesome for comics! For this I used InDesign

After that I colored the hard copy

And here is the final page all completed! 🙂

Some final thoughts:

Before starting it took me a few days to think about how to bring this concept to visual. Once I had the draft the whole proces was about 8 hrs 3 hrs one day and 6hrs  today.

I think I’m comfortable with this process now!

I hope you liked it 😉

Pen and Ink Portraits November

Portraits it’s my favourite subject. I have found a lot of inspiration in images from the SKCHY app community.

These portraits take from 20 to 40 min and are all done with a Lamy Pen, a pen and nib holder for the heavier lines, and the Pentel Brush on Stillman and Birn paper, Beta series.

I’m trying to be more defined by investing more time in detail. From the begining I set my mind in how much time I want to spend on the sketch. Then I draw my lines accordingly slowing down or taking time with the strokes. There is a significant difference between short or longer sketches. I always aim for the sketch to “feel” complete so when i work I work all over, like i don’t start with an eye making it all detailed, I start with an oval shape, placing marks and looking for distinct features that makes that particular face unique, I then exaggerate a little those features and find a touch of beauty that comes naturally. There is a difference in how I see and feel a face from what I try to translate it to lines. Like having an insight on what the face expresses to me. I try to reveal those thoughts visually.

 

 

 

All About Trees

The Arboredum in Forrest Hills is a great source for drawing and learning to represent the characteristics of different trees and they are identified by label! They also have an enclosed section with beautiful Bonsais as well

I recently did a demo video on a generic tree. Here it is:

Here my test collection of trees in different inks:

Botanicals

I decided to try a new subject series: Beautiful flowers, with a little more precision than my usual sketches. 

For this series, which I plan to sell as notecards I used permanent ink and some, I colored them but I prefer black and white as the watercolor hides my lines because I like to paint heavy on the tint. I’ll try to so a softer more transparent wash next time.

Yet.. I still prefer black and white illustration. 

As usual my favorite paper Stillman and Birn notebooks and Higgins permanent ink. The platinum carbon pen is the best for fine lines and it never cloggs. I am becoming very fond of sketching with nibs too.

Here the drawings: 

Some Tutorial Sheets

These handsheets were made for a past workshop for the local sketchers. They illustrate several concepts and tips for sketching

-How to draw gesture

-How to approach simplification of scenes

-The concept of Transitional Space when sketching interiors

These sheets will be available as PDFs at our urbansketchersboston Facebook group

http://www.urbansketchersboston.com

Join us if you live in New England!

Downtown Crossing

Here is an ink drawing from last year that I didn’t publish, I think..but I was happy with it. used the Lamy Safary  on a Stillman and Birn notebook zeta series