Two Faces + A Canvas Pair (9.2.2016)

At least during September, I want to attempt to be more frequent with my posting - daily if possible. I'm not going to make any promises, because I have been extremely busy lately, but I'll do my best.

I figured I would start this post off strong with some sketches I did for 29 Faces. These are faces 3/29, and they came together fairly easily. I use Derwent Graphic Pencils for the majority of my graphite sketches, and this was no exception. In this case, I used an HB for the base sketches, then added details and shading with a 3B.

• The girl on the left is somewhat of a variation of yesterday's face, but a version that I envision to have orange hair. Honestly, I just loved the hairstyle so much that I felt like I needed to play around with it some more.
• On the right was an idea I started conceptualizing yesterday as well. Underneath yesterday's portrait, there was a failed attempt at an oil pastel face. The texture of the background didn't blend well with the oil pastels (I wasn't thinking), and it ended in disaster. However, the girl I had been playing with ended up with some rather free-flowing lines around her eyes that reminded me of a mask. That was what I was trying to recreate here. Part of me thinks that she could be a superhero.

Now we arrive at the "I don't know what I think" portion of the post. I've been wanting to create a set of canvases for a good long while now, but I sort of think that I rushed these a bit. I'm not a huge fan, and I tried to push myself to use warm colors when I'm more of a cool color kind of person.

These were done for part of the 30 in 30 challenge, which is another one of the main reasons I'm going to be trying to blog more often.

 Part of me just thinks that they're underdeveloped. I started adding details like words and giant ink circles when the background wasn't yet ready for it. However, I took a bit of a different direction than I'm used to and I'm more conflicted about it than anything. I don't hate them, I don't love them, I'm somewhere in the middle.

Who knows, maybe somewhere along the way I'll decide to add more onto them, and I'll fix them up to a point where I love them. If I do, you'll all be the first to know!

Thank you for joining me today, and I look forward to seeing you next time.

Happiness + Raindrops (8.20.2016)

I know it's been a few days since I've posted anything on this blog, and that's mostly because I haven't finished a whole lot. 

I've been working on and off on several different projects, but not many of them were titled or officially donned complete. Thus, today I am going to be sharing a finished page and something that's almost finished but not quite there yet. I hope you enjoy looking!

The first page I'm showing here was something I had started a while back - so long ago at this point that I actually don't even remember when I started it. There was just an unfinished page in one of my art journals (the altered magazine I've used in the video here) that I decided to go back to. In the end, I'm incredibly happy with the results.

• First and foremost, I like the color palette. In the closeups above, you can see that there are many colors that show through in the background, but it is predominantly a soft shade of pink. If I had to guess what I did here, I most likely toned down the layers underneath with a layer of white paint because they were clashing. 
• The turquoise circles were cut out of a piece of ruled paper I had scraped paint over after completing another page. There were a few more layers on it, and the color and faint lines showing through were far too intriguing to not do something with. As a result, I cut them out and collaged them down, adding layers of paint and oil pastel over the top of them.
• Here's a sneak peek of what I started to do with the paper left over after cutting the circles.

Finally, we focus in on the quote. Sometimes I read a quote somewhere, whether it be on the motivational app I have or in a book, and I decide that it is something I need to remember. This was one of those times.

Happiness is a direction, not a destination.

Sometimes I need to remind myself of that.

Now we move onto the page that's not quite finished. 

This was simply done on a folded over piece of printer paper, though I decided to switch things up a bit and not fold it perfectly in half. I actually love the way this looks at this point in time, and the drips of paint remind me vaguely of raindrops, which I adore.

Here you can see a little bit of a close up of some of the layers. I especially love the upper cloud, where the paint has been picked up and reveals the background layers. There is some stamping, some stenciling (the clouds are actually stenciled as well), and a lot of paint.

At this point, all I think it truly needs is a title to finish it off. 

 So, as you can see, I've been doing quite a bit in the past few days (there's more where this came from), so you can expect to see from me at some point in the near future, with all of the pages I wrap up. I'll be looking forward to seeing you then!