Sabrina – steps 1 and 2 (clean-up and ink)

As the client has made her selection of the pose and composition she prefers, I begin cleaning up the thumbnail by placing tracing paper over the initial sketch and overlaying rough perspective lines in blue. I cheat a little on the perspective as it’s not necessary to be 100% accurate for this piece so I don’t bother agonizing over lines being a little off.  I’ve been told that as long as it looks correct, it is correct – at least to the viewer.  Mind you, in something more obvious, I would take more care.

I follow this by outlining the shapes of the character in red so as not to get mixed up with the perspective lines drawn. Something else I learned is that it’s easier to work with perspective on a thumbnail or smaller picture than at full scale and having to break out the extra long rulers!

Once happy with the layout, I outline the cat and bed in pencil and add some light shading.  At this point, I scan it in and bring it into Photoshop for inking which I do on a separate layer above the scanned image.

 

Life drawing at the TCW

I’m making an effort to go life drawing again as it’s one of the things I regret not spending enough time doing. I know it’s a good exercise to keep up with as it trains you to solve problems quickly and, in turn, helps to increase the speed with which you draw. I find life drawing is a lot like working out. The more you do it the better the results. And like working out, it’s hard to get past those first few times.

My first session was no less discouraging as my drawing of the pretty lady turned out looking more like something that was dragged from the pit so I’ll spare you the posting of that. Instead, I’ve posted something from my most recent open life drawing session at the Toronto Cartoonists Workshop.

They had a costume for the latter half of the session which I think added an element of fun plus it’s good to practice drawing drapery. I’ve taken one of the poses and started to add colour and play around with it a bit.  I’m not sure where it will go but sometimes it’s just about the journey.

Sketch at a café

After the TCAF (Toronto Comic Arts Festival) and some art supply shopping, the hubby and I stopped at a gallery/café across from the AGO.  I wanted to try out my new mechanical blue pencil so drew a quick sketch of Victor.  He wanted to try out his new brush pen so inked it.  Here is the result.  I think we make a good team.