Sketchbook #11

[eye_of_toad]

heads-up for anyone reading this Tuesday afternoon: I'm going to post this and then keep editing it until I've got all the photos uploaded. (I don't want to risk putting in all the effort of linking all the photos only for the computer to glitch out or something, so this will be a save-as-i-go process.) Hence you may have stumbled across an incomplete post. Done!

So here it is. Pens for scale.


Only after I was all finished, did it dawn on me that "Sketchbook #11" did not have a single drawing of Eleven in it, so I drew this and taped it onto the cover with packing tape. (People who worry about archival-quality materials are probably cringing right now, but there is nothing in this sketchbook that needs to be saved for posterity. And most of the pages are done with marker which isn't archival either.)

This is a Crescent Rendr sketchbook and I HATED it. I like the paper but the binding was super annoying, made moreso by the false advertising that it was a "lay flat" sketchbook. I only bought a sketchbook this small because of the "lay flat" promise, thinking I would be able to draw across the fold and effectively double the page size. (I can do this with my Talens Art Creation sketchbooks.) So basically every day working with this was a frustration.

Which conversely meant that I felt free to just scribble whatever crap I wanted without that nagging anxiety about "wasting" pages in a good sketchbook. (Sometimes liking a sketchbook too much is also a problem.)

I wouldn't normally post some of these, but the September prompt for drawesome was to finish a work-in-progress and, in the name of completion, I took photos of every page.

Click any image for a larger version:



The right-most drawing is alcohol markers and the rest are cheap water-based markers. I have a fondness for cheap markers because I get sort of cranky about expensive markers (that anxiety about wasting them, so I don't use them, but then they dry out anyway). I'm going to complain about this sketchbook a lot, but the big positive is that they do not bleed-through at all even with alcohol markers and sharpies. (Probably not great paper for watercolor or pencil, very smooth.) I found it did a better job with markers than the Copic sketchbook that was allegedly designed for it.



I think I've posted these before. There was something going around online about a "100 head challenge" that I thought I would do (and is why I kept this sketchbook face-themed) and the first three of these are from that list, but then I gave up on following the list and started doing my own thing. I'm very fond of that alcohol-marker drawing where the woman has a delightfully deranged expression. The photo reference was from line-of-action.com which I find very useful for the days where I want to draw someone, but I can't decide who to draw.



I stubbornly tried to draw across the fold, but was less-than-successful.



I think the blue guy is one of my favorites from the whole sketchbook.



The Padalecki drawing was prep practice for the full head drawing that I did and ... I think I like this practice version better.



This is a good example of how materials and skill often don't matter as much as whether you've had your coffee or not. I started that first drawing, was getting cranky that some of my expensive markers are drying up, had the proportions wrong and it was just coming out ugly. Later the same day, I just re-drew the same photo reference (and then finished it up with some colored pencil shading to smooth out the annoying marker). So much better.

This also demonstrates my conflict with realism. I like my cartoonish version of William Jackson Harper better than the more realistic one and I don't know why. It's not good. The eyes don't match. But I still like it compared to the watercolor which strikes me as dull.



That simple marker drawing with the closed eyes is another of my favorites.

We have another example here of why I hated this sketchbook so much. Because it wouldn't stay open, there are several points where I smeared ink on a page while trying to draw on the next page because the book flopped closed on me while I was trying to work.



I have to say that I recommend drawing non-celebrities. When I draw a random model that I don't know, it doesn't bother me at all if I haven't captured a likeness. I can view the artwork on its own merits. Love that blue drawing. Does it look like the model? Who knows? I don't really remember what she looked like now. But the ones that are supposed to look like actresses I know, those irritate me so much because I can see all the little ways that I've failed.



This is a demonstration of what a bad job I do of drawing what I see versus what I expect to see. I think I draw pretty decent faces, but as soon as it's an unfamiliar angle, it turns into a cubist nightmare. I made two different attempts to draw this woman from a low camera angle and just couldn't get a decent version. I really want to practice this one again. Intellectually, I know the problem is that my brain kept telling me to draw her face like a hundred drawings before from a standard eye-level view even though I know that wasn't right. But I still couldn't override that to draw what the reference photo showed.



Not fond of my experiment with cartoons at all. And I'm not admitting who the colored marker drawings are supposed to be. Feel free to guess if you recognize anyone. (At least one of you would recognize that orange guy if I had drawn him right.) I really like how both of the stylized ink drawings turned out though. Does that look like Lori Petty? Probably not, but it sort of looks like the spirit of Lori Petty. I like it.



Every sketchbook needs a few swatch pages. And despite all my other complaints, none of those markers bleed through to the other side, not even the Sharpie.

I have purchased another Crescent Rendr sketchbook to use in the future, but it's much larger and, from here on out, I am only buying hardcover sketchbooks (though I still have a few softcover sketchbooks to finish using up).

Comments

[amberdreams]

Non bleed paper can't be all bad - that's worth buying again.

Crescent Rendr

[eye_of_toad]

Yup, I really like this paper. I didn't believe it was entirely bleed-proof. I was expecting, at best, bleed-resistant. But I've used everything on it and haven't had anything bleed through even a little. (It *is* more prone to smearing so I have to remind myself to give the ink extra time to dry before I touch the page.) I look forward to moving on to the larger hardcover version. (But I still need to finish sketchbooks #10, #12, and #13 because of course I still have three active sketchbooks going.)

Re: Crescent Rendr

[amberdreams]

Of course! (One might even say - only three? 😂)

Re: Crescent Rendr

[eye_of_toad]

I've been trying so hard to keep things chronological and just fill them up one at a time, but ... yeah.

[mific]

Good going! I never manage to finish sketchbooks. You got the Sandman's pouty mouth just right!

pout

[eye_of_toad]

I'd never finished a sketchbook until a few years ago and now I have so many! I still sometimes go for long periods of time, months even, without drawing a single thing, but when I get in the groove and draw every day I always feel so much better. And a solid percentage of those drawings aren't any good, but I'm still going to end up with more good drawings if I draw all the time.

I'm so pleased with the Sandman drawing. It was a total on a whim "I don't know what to draw, what should I draw?" moment where my roommate suggested Dream and I drew this really quickly... and I love it so much more than drawings that I fussed over for days.

[tally]

Congrats on conquering the troublesome sketchbook! I loved looking through the whole journey~!

Hard to pick favorites, but I especially liked the skulls and also the ear study!

♥

[eye_of_toad]

Thanks! Skulls and ears are both good practice subjects when I can't think of what I want to draw. They're both hard in different ways, but also both satisfying even if the result isn't perfect since there is a lot of variation in the real world too. No two skulls will look exactly alike.

[minoanmiss]

This was a lot of fun to read through! Thank you for linking me!