Inktober 2019: day 30 - gel pens

There was also just time enough for one more Sweetpea! He really wants to show you how lovely he tree’s Autumn leaves and acorns are.

Inktober 2019: day 26 - G-pen

Poppet’s friend found a smashed up breakfast bar, and it was far too big to eat alone.

This was much simpler in my head than it was to draw! Poppet and her friends are very easy to draw, but I didn’t factor in having to draw the breakfast bar and figure out how to position them all.

Inktober 2019: day 22 - gel pen

Sweetpea and some of his friends are comparing the Autumn fruits of their trees.

I was trying to keep this one simple because I was starting to get very tired, but I put in too many characters and props! It wasn't hard exactly, but it was time consuming.

Inktober 2019: day 10 - G-pen

Sweetpea is trying on a new hat, but I don’t think it’s going to stay on over his hair. Maybe he’ll have better luck once the other ear frill drops.

I promise I drew this on the day, I just ran out of time and/or energy to scan it! I keep coming up with ideas that I know will take too long, but then I can’t bring myself to go with a weaker idea so I end up having to finish it at night. I know Sweetpea well enough that I didn't have to think too hard about this one, but there is a certain irreducible length of time it takes to do all that cross-hatching.

(If you know your nuts and seeds you can work out how big he is by that hat.)

Inktober 2019: day 2 - gel pens (and a brush pen)

Louise and her foster parents are not the only creatures that live in her house.

My 90-minute time limit fell apart already! I could only get the lineart and the spot black done in that time, so I've been frantically crosshatching in odd moments throughout the day. I'm very pleased with it though!

Mermay 2019

If you follow me on twitter or instagram you'll know I attempted the Mermay challenge this year! The idea is to draw a mermaid every day during the month of May, not unlike Inktober but with the subject chosen for you instead of the medium. Here are all 31 of my completed mermaids!

I tried my best, but I wasn't quite able to finish these inside May. I fell behind a couple of times and had 3 mermaids left to do in June. I also spent more than one day on the last one, since it was already late.

Since the medium isn't restricted in this challenge I did a lot of experimenting with techniques I might not normally use, mostly colouring with a set of cheap novelty pencils (2, 19, 21, 24 and 27) and trying to paint with water-soluble felt tips (8, 13, 14, 23 and 25). I don't know if the felt tips are ever going to look quite the way I want them to, but I was pleasantly surprised by the kind of results I could get out of the cheap pencils with a little patience. (They don't scan very well though, there isn't enough pigment.)

I'll be printing these in a little zine now that they're all done, so please look out for that!

4 Fantasy Eyes

I realised I had just enough pages left in what has become my 'eyeball sketchbook' to do two more sets of four eyes, so here's four fantasy characters for one of them. An angel, a demon and two fairies.

Previous sets include some horrible eye deformations, and four sci-fi characters.

Inktober 2018 : Day 28 - fineliners and grey pen

Here’s a Sweetpea to match Coriander from day 3! I normally try to avoid doing so many dolly style pictures in a row, but I was too tired for anything more complicated. MCM has insane opening hours these days, it even opens at 9am on the Sunday! Opening before 10 o'clock on a Sunday is just unnatural.

Inktober 2018 : Day 26 - fineliners and grey pens

Poppet and her friends have dressed up as koroks for Hallowe'en!

Inktober 2018 : Day 21 - gel pen

The Crow Boy appears in dark corners, by means best known to himself.

I had the idea for this one days ago, but I didn't have enough time to draw it until now. I think it took about 4 hours from start to finish, which I'm quite pleased with considering all the layers of cross-hatching.

Inktober 2018 : Day 20 - G-pen and brush pen

I did two pieces with this composition by accident, so I decided to keep going and make a set. I wonder how many more I can do before I run out of suitable characters?

Inktober 2018 : Day 19 - fountain pentel

Here’s that matching picture I promised! Trispin’s glamour mostly just makes him look cleaner, but it does remove his freckles. Two supposedly-unrelated pupils with the same unnatural freckles at the same small school would probably arouse suspicion.

I finally had a proper day off work this month but I'm still incredibly tired, it's making it hard to spot mistakes.

Inktober 2018 : Day 17 - fountain pentel

Ely looks quite different with and without her glamour.

Another outing for the splatter pen! I’m still learning how to handle shading with this one. I’ll do a matching picture of Trispin later.

Inktober 2018 : Day 3 - fineliners and grey pens

I drew Sweetpea this way last year, so here is his best friend; Coriander! She belongs to a holly tree that grows right next to his oak, so they see each other every day. As an evergreen, her ear frills don't fall off like his do, but she does sometimes grow berries under them.

Winter Weather Spirits

Here are this year's Winter cards! This time it's a set of Winter weather spirits. I painted eight and sent the originals to friends and family last year, but printed a set of six as two of them didn't reproduce well.

I made six little snowflake stickers to go with them, and got colour-splash envelopes to match the Winter theme. They are ready to buy in my shop!