Monday, September 12, 2016

A Fantasy Inspired Art Journal Spread (9.12.2016)


 I had the day off of work today, and because of that, I had the time to complete a couple of faces for 29 Faces! I haven't done more than one face since the second day of the challenge, where I did two sketches in a style similar to the one shown above. I later expanded on one of those sketches later.

However, today only one of my faces is a sketch. This was done while sitting and listening to music - I hadn't been doing much of anything except for browsing the internet. The second I started thinking about it, I got the immediate urge to sketch. I had recently uncovered a set of Prismacolor Premier sketching pencils, so I decided to use them instead of my typical Derwent. I'm pretty happy with the results (I used an HB and a 4B).

This little girl feels pretty determined, which was the intention. I also used the opportunity to experiment with the folds of her clothing a little bit.


My second face was actually created for several challenges. It was done in a composition book, and it's mixed media, as pretty much all of my faces tend to be, unless I force myself to stay in one medium. 

The first challenge that inspired this piece was Mixed Media World's "magical/fantasy" challenge. Likely because I had been creating a lot of faces recently, this was the first thing that came to mind. I combined it with the Mix-It-Monthly challenge "inspired by trees". The third and final challenge this was created for was the More Mixed Media Challenge, "anything goes + optional brown".

The result is something that I'm incredibly proud of.


The majority of the time spent on this piece (I think it took several hours, but I wasn't exactly keeping track) was spent on the face itself. I started out with a background on this particular spread (though with my cardboard series, I haven't been doing anything of the kind), and stayed in colors that sort of screamed fantasy to me (deep browns, reds and greens in particular). I'm glad that I spent so so much time on the face itself, since I'm incredibly happy with the way the page as a whole turned out.

  • On the left, you can see some better details of the face. I especially love the way the antlers/tree branches blend into the hair. I also adore the colors. Dark reds mixed with brown is a color palette I'm going to have to explore more often. 
  • I spent a lot of time on this figure's shirt, trying to get it to feel right. Sometimes I've been known to just put a t-shirt on a character and call it a day, but I really needed to get this one right. Anything too modern would just throw off the entire feel of the spread. Also, I've been trying to get better at clothing, so this was a good chance to do just that.
  • In the right hand photo, you can see the quote that I ended up putting on the page. This was a stamp that I hadn't used at all - that's something else I've been attempting to do, pulling things out of my stash that I've never used and actually doing something with them. Plus, I just love this quote.
  • Also in the second photo, you can see one of my favorite tiny little details, done with another stamp I haven't gotten any use out of. I put little leaf clusters on the tree branches, just for an extra little detail. I adore the result.
I don't know why I've been straying towards warmer colors lately (maybe it's just because autumn is coming and I have it subconsciously on the mind!) but I love the results I've been getting out of it.

Thank you all for taking the time to visit, and I hope you enjoyed seeing my work!

17 comments:

  1. Expressive and powerful. Great work!

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    1. Thank you so much! I'm glad that she appears powerful, because that's exactly the look I was going for. I imagined she was a ruler of some sort, and that was the type of air I attempted to give her.

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  2. Lovely fantasy art works. The little girl does look determined and I love the surreal-fantasy of the mixed media lady.

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    1. Thank you, I'm so glad you like them! Fantasy has always been a favorite genre of mine, so it was fun to try to explore it in a mixed media context (so far I've only written fantasy).

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  3. Fantastic spread with a creative face! Lovely quote too.
    Welcome to the blogosphere!
    Mar :)

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    1. I thought the quote fit the fantasy theme well, I'm glad that someone else thought so as well. Thank you for your kind words!

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  4. Fantastic combination of the fantasy with the nature world! I am absolutely in love with the so layered backgrund, but her sweet face makes the spread so sprecial in the end! What a cool idea to use the tree as an antler for her! ♥ Conny http://mix-it-monthly.blogspot.de

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    1. Thank you so much, I'm glad you liked the idea of the tree branches as antlers! To me, there's something very natural about fantasy in general, so the two themes just seemed to blend beautifully and I had a lot of fun creating it!

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  5. Extremely work! Very interesting background and the lady looks like in the next moment she will come out of the picture with her antlers!

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    1. Thank you, this was very nice of you! I'm happy you like her!

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  6. A great fantastic wonderland face! An adorable spread!
    oxo
    Susi
    from

    ART-JOURNAL-JOURNEY-CHALLENGE

    my blog
    FROEBELSTERNCHEN

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    1. This really means a lot to me, thank you! I had a lot of fun painting her, and I'm glad she turned out well.

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  7. fantastic pages,love the fantasyfaces,and all the woods and leaves,just stunning.

    hugs jenny

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    1. This is very kind of you, thank you! This spread was very different from what I typically do, and I think that's part of what made it so fun!

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  8. Lovely work. Thank you for joining the challenge at More Mixed Media. Hope to see you again next time.

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