First Time Drawing a Badger

I drew this badger as an artist trading card gift for Sarah in Canada.  It's been a long time since I made an ATC!  Drawn with archival ink, added color with alcohol markers and gel pen.

Gorgeous Weather to Make Inchies

We started today with a Book Fair at Isabelle's school, they offered muffins with mom.  Books and treats how could a lady resist?  Afterward Aurora and I came home and she played outside.  Armed with pen and markers in hand I played too.  Making these inchies (1" x 1" cardstock) while I was watching her play.  They're intended for a swap that I signed up for yesterday.  I was supposed to make six but anyone who has made inchies knows they're addictive.

Talk for Me Love

This character is a little out of my comfort zone.  I usually do less dark themes but every now and then I like a good voodoo doll or vampire bunny.  This bear is inspired from a member in one of my clubs that was on the hunt for a less cutesy bear image.

Shared with Sunday Sketches

Spectrum of Rose Scents

The picture here is a rose I made the other night I was a little tired so the blending isn't as good as I would have liked but as an exercise I thought it was fair.  The white areas are cut out which gives it this cool real feeling when I hold it.  When I draw roses I think of my Mom.  She loves roses and as a little girl growing up I learned the pleasure of the differing aromas.  She would tell me the name of the rose and insist that I must smell it.  The perfume/soap smell that the stores name "Rose" doesn't capture what naturally occurs in nature.

I spent a portion of today brainstorming a few more alphabet inspired drawings.  Lately my brainstorms are taking place in a lined notebook and usually involve strange little doodles.  Mostly I play around with placement and finding the sweet spots that make the future drawing work best.  I hope to get the final drawings done later this week for letters E, F and G. 

See the earlier Alphabet Inspired art pieces.

* Shirley brought it to my attention that my blog settings were limiting comment ability. I updated the settings and look forward to hearing from visitors who were otherwise unable to comment in the past.

Shared with Paint Party Friday

Foxy Lady

I was asked to draw an anthropomorph (human like animal) character similar to characters from The Fantastic Mr Fox.  I came up with Foxy Lady which is literally a fox.  I've done this once before with a character called HollyAnn which was also a fox.  In hindsight I should have done a red fox with a blue dress and yellow background I think it would have presented better.

See more Artist Trading Cards

So Happy Together

08-14-2012  Sometimes as I draw songs begin to play in my mind.  I'll even hum along.  I don't know if this is a common occurrence for artists or some mental disfunction.  Either way it feel pretty good so I'm going with it.  While drawing these birds a song tip toed into my mind.  "I can't see me loving nobody but you for all my life when you're with me, baby the skies will be blue for all my life."

Tropical Island Temprance

After seeing Face Forward a friend on the artist trading card website requested one too.  It was great since I was planning on working on a few more of these lady faces.  With each face comes a little more clarity of details.  Face Forward was a stern look and she didn't capture what I was feeling on the inside.  One of the art journal faces looked good but she was just a child.  I called this card Temprance,when I look at her I see a mysterious woman from a tropical island.  I really like her skin coupled with the chestnut hair.  She still doesn't have the nose I like but the shadow looks good so I know I'm getting closer to satisfaction.

See some of the other Artist Trading Cards I've created.

Shared at Artists In Blogland

Day and Night

These two drawings are complete day and night.  Both drawn for trusting souls that said make anything and surprise me.  To an artist that can be the most exciting and yet horrifying.  The rush of knowing that I have a subject to draw.  The fear of picking something undesirable.

I was lucky, I was able to narrow down the subject matter by looking at their like profiles.  One liked female faces and one liked goofy birds.  Real life art requests (commissions as I've heard them referred to) don't have that kind of window into the mind, but they should. 

A fellow artist suggested looking up the words associated with the requested subject and also to go for a walk and take in my surroundings for inspiration.  Both wonderful ideas, I love great advice.

See more of my Illustrated Artist Trading Cards

Face Forward

Goofy Bird

Seagull Down by the Seashore

Would you believe it took 16 markers to make this scene?  For the most part it is a relatively simple layout.  A few jetty rocks and some ocean dancing around.  Oh yes and let's not forget the big 'ol seagull standing smack dab in the center of the page.  I wanted the background to be interesting enough that the viewer would have something relaxing to enjoy.  Hence the importance of color depth and the need for sixteen of them. 

I have to tell you before I go, "Seagull feet are a red violet."  I share this with you because it fascinated me.  For some reason my mind told me that beaks and feet should match on birds.  Nope, they don't.  At least this one didn't.  Maybe only in our favorite childhood cartoons did this rule apply.

See more of my Illustrated Artist Trading Cards

Let's Just Have Fun

I was really in the mood to play with colors and patterns.  Sometimes it's nice to sit in a quiet art studio and create random fun.  These are all artist trading card size drawn with Copic markers.

Stan

Opie

Blip

Brenda

Klaus the Rooster

I drew this artist trading card for one of the members of ATCs for All.  It is Klaus the Rooster with a little bling and decoration to spice up his already over confident looks.  Yes that is a sticker it looks much better in person than on the scan and the hat seems to be hovering a bit on his head.

Macro Fruit

This is for a MACRO: Fruit/Vegetable swap at ATCs For All "For this swap, each ATC must have a MACRO fruit or vegetable hand drawn or painted. Any fruit or vegetable is acceptable. You are allowed backgrounds but the MAIN focus of the card should be the fruit or vegetable. Take a piece of fruit or vegetable and cut it up. Look and study it and then go draw it. The drawing can be a piece of whole fruit or vegetable, or a slice of the fruit or vegetable."

Guinea Pig Speculative Zoology

At ATCs for ALL I signed up for the Zoology of the Future swap.  I know you see the post title and you ask yourself what is Speculative Zoology?  It is trying to predict what animals will exist on the earth in the future and the features that they may develop based on environmental changes.  I chose to draw the future of the currently domestic guinea pig if it were to become wild and adapt.

Tropical Bush Adaptation

Tree Living Adaptation

Underwater Adaptation

Present Day Guinea Pig

Folk Art Style Hex Signs

The Folk Art Swap at ATCs for All sounded so appealing to me, "Folk art brings to my mind, rolling hills with houses nestled by weeping willows and barns with stars, fluffy sheep, fat cats, cows with skinny legs and colorful roosters. If you enjoy this rustic syle of art, join me."  The first thing that came to mind for me was Pennsylvania Dutch hex signs.

These birds are called Distelfinks, they and the geometric rosette at the bottom are symbols of good luck and happiness; two birds means double the luck and happiness.    The other elements of the signs include the hearts and tulips, which represent love and faith.  The outer scalloped border is meant to bring smooth sailing throughout life.

Polar Bear, Colorful Mushrooms and Hookah Caterpillar

12-29-2011 Finally I had the time to catch up on three Make Me Happy requests for ATCs for All members tonight.  They took a little longer than I planned but December has slowed me down creatively for some reason.  I've been spending a lot more free time doing mindless things but recently I started craving color again.  Mostly from visiting other artists blogs it's helped keep an ember burning inside myself.  There is always someone every day out there creating something.  Unfortunately when I take short breaks like this I get rusty and the work isn't as good as I would like it to be.  To freshen up I played with three different materials, the polar bear is alcohol markers, the colorful mushrooms are watercolors and the hookah caterpillar is colored pencil.

It’s an Asymmetrical Eye World

12-07-2011 This is what the AFA swap description was "Since I have joined this community, I’ve always been very amused and delighted with the sharing of creativity here and have admired the “characters” posted that sport asymmetrical eyes…..so…….I decided to form a swap for those who share this particular affinity."  Although I can't say that I have an affinity for characters like this I took a stab at it because it sounded like fun.

Perfect Day to Go Riding

Ummm...

Tennis Anyone?

Three in a Tree Artist Trading Cards

12-05-2011 You wouldn't believe how vast this swap theme was to draw.  "A silly little ATC swap.  For this swap, simply create a TREE with THREE of something in it."  I narrowed it down when I decided to make the tree shaped as a similar object to the items that were displayed within it.  I really had a lot of fun coming up with these.  There was definitely more time invested in planning than actual production.

Boat Tree

Martini Tree

Lips Tree

Final Day

11-30-2011 Well I posted when I could for Art Every Day Month.  I don't really know if building puzzles counts as art but we've been doing a lot of them these last few rainy days.  Today I got a chance to upload the swap cards I've been working on.  They are for the AFA Personalities Swap "Hand-drawn or hand-painted cards should focus on three different personality types or the expression of three different moods."  I chose to draw a few funky fishes.  AEDM Day 30

Loving Linda

Scaredy Fred

Pissed Off Percy

God in the Machine

10-27-2011 I signed up for the AFA God in the Machine swap today. "For this swap you will create cards that prominently feature one or more machines. Technology drives our lives and dominates our time. Honor it by paying attention to all the details. These can be simple machines (a can opener) or complex (the inner workings of a wrist watch) or even something abstract."  My daughters and I were baking Pumpkin Spice bread this morning the machines that make our lives easier laid out before us and just like that I knew they needed to be drawn.  This is actually the second time I've drawn this coffee maker, big coffee fan right here folks.  It's funny the coffee maker was the first item I'd ever sketched standing up if you've never done it you should try.  It's an experience I strongly suggest for any serious artist.

Slicing Machine

Mixing Machine

Coffee Machine

Tropical Paradise

10-26-2011 What a great way to deal with a crazy annoying headache than to draw a tropical paradise.  These triptych artist trading cards are for an AFA swap with this theme.

Left

Middle

Right