Dragon drawing

 Alright so I wanted to attempt another "big" drawing - which is how I think of it in my head, but not at all literal since it's exactly the same size paper 😂    But by that I really mean something that will be a challenge and likely take multiple days or weeks to complete.   The first was the bird tutorial...   Then I drew Tucker.   Now I wanted something similar quality, but of a fantastic nature.   hmmmm

My learning to draw journey started with a goal of drawing dragons.  My last "big" dragon I was...  less than proud of ;).  lol well that's not entirely true, I was proud that I drew a dragon that was recognizable as a dragon, but the sketch was way better than what resulted when I added colour.   And, well, a whole lot of other issues that come with being a beginner artist.

So I'm still v much a beginner artist but slightly less so than I was last year so, you know, we'll complicate things even more and do not just a dragon but also a fairy ;).  Now the problem is, I'm still at the level that I need to be looking at something to have a hope of drawing it.  This is a challenge, as I don't happen to have a ton of dragons and fairies hanging around that I can photograph (they're shockingly camera shy!)

This is what I started with...

I do, however, have this picture that Em took of Nick and I a lifetime ago.  To this day, it makes my heart melt.   And, I have AI ;).  So I started w ChatGPT which is usually my AI of choice and asked it to take this photo and replace the woman with a fairy and the horse with a dragon.  It failed atrociously.  Several times with different prompts.  Like not even remotely close to what I was after.   Booo.   So then I tried CoPilot which I'd never used and it NAILED it.  Like brilliantly.   I was so excited.   There were a few minor aspects I didn't like, but it was entirely willing to tweak to my specifications and in the end I had a dragon and fairy in the same pose, that I thought might work.

...and after several edits, this is what I ended with.

So we won't discuss how long it took me to figure out the sketch.  Honestly, the real challenge was the fairy's face.  Everything else was reasonably easy, but it took approximately 382783538 tries to get the face "right".  It was painful.  Really painful.

I didn't take a picture of just the sketch (day 1), but - having learned from last time, figured I'd try doing the background first as is often recommended.  Also, I don't love backgrounds so figured if I did it first and f'd it up, at least I wasn't risking the whole drawing...   Decided I would use Faber Castell for the background and Prismacolor Premier for the foreground.   So day one was FC (oil based, and slightly less vibrant colours -- often used for animal and people drawings).   After a ridiculously long time, I ended day 2 with:

So - it's super tedious doing the background first.  

 

Next day's effort included more detail to the background and first effort at the frame of the wings.   To get to that there may or may not have been some youtube tutorials on how to colour gold 😂 

Actually pleased at how the gold turned out!   Background is slightly better but I still don't love it - ah well, we'll see as we go :).  A little concerned about how the dragon spikes are going to work out with the background already there but that's a future me problem ;)

Day one of wings

The world disappeared while I was doing this one.  Was out back and started early afternoon and suddenly it was 5:45 and the alert that cats were being fed buzzed my watch, which told me I should go feed Sasha too.  I fed her, and went right back to drawing and kept going till I got cold.  This one I actually took the time to do a practice round on spare paper - tested the colours, the flow, how to get the markings in (those will be the next day), and the impact of blending (SO glad I practiced that first cause I would've messed it up for sure).   Still work to be done, but I'm happy with how it's turning out so far...

Took a break between last one and this one due to life

Making this up as I go along lol.   Did more for the wings and while I wanted to do the hair today, I figured I should do the shirt while I still remembered how I did the wings.  This was not actually how I had envisioned it, but I think it still works.   Also continuing to fuss with the background 😂   We'll see next time I look at it :)

OMG is this phase ever creepy 

lol so I got to do the hair today and I'm reasonably happy with it.   Surprisingly happy with the skin - watched a fast-forward tutorial to get colour layering suggestions but definitely no tutorial available for this particular artwork so started with base colour suggestions and made the rest up as I went along.  Quite pleased with how the skin turned out but is it ever creepy having a blank face.   🫣 

I have a practice sheet that I'm investing a lot more time in than I have previously and it's definitely helping the overall success rate.   It does slow the pace, but I think it helps the overall result.   And *why* did I choose to stop there?  Well cause I'm still not thrilled w the sketch of the face so kinda figure I have to sort that out before I add colour.   We shall see...

Oops ;-P

Alright so...  Today I am v disappointed cause I messed up some proportions and turned my lovely fairy into a neanderthal.   Booo.   I also learned a whole lot of lessons about colour theory and blending as I started to do the dragon ;).  I feel like the fairy issue might be too much for me to overlook when this is done, so this one will go down as a learning experience.  And also, my dragon scales feel a little like feathers?!?!  lol.  I may or may not be able to fix that.   BUT - I also really like the concept so current plan is to finish this one, learn everything I can, go away and learn more about drawing faces and people proportions, and maybe a bit more re colour and backgrounds, then come back and do it again.  Maybe.

Follow up:

So I posted my WIP in the forum where I’m learning to draw and asked for help.   Common consensus was that the scales do actually look like scales not feathers (and that scales evolved from feathers so good to go either way 😂 - I kinda like the idea of my dragon being an evolutionary transition) - and also someone directed me to a lesson specifically about drawing scales that is many chapters ahead of where I am now.  Won’t help for this one but likely will for the next iteration.   As for the girl - common consensus is that she looks just fine if you don’t know what she was *supposed* to look like, and one useful suggestion about tilting her eyebrows to make it more obvious she’s looking down.   So I’m going with - maybe not quite as bad as I’d felt?   Always the way w one’s own work though eh?

Today’s learning was that blending colours in a small space has some risks - my light to dark on the smaller spikes all the dark went to the light side!   I have no idea how or why - the physics of that doesn’t make sense to me.  But fortunately I was able to fix it w the next layer, just means they’re slightly more vibrant than I’d originally intended but that might just be okay - it is a dragon after all!

Step in the right direction

So with some advice from the art class forum and some studies of the original sketch, I think I've managed to save my fairy!  😂   A long way from perfect, but she looks a lot less like a Neanderthal now.   And I'm kinda loving my dragon.  Who's not actually done yet,  but getting close.  So much learning and problem solving happening but I"m really enjoying it.

We're calling this one done

I think…. I think it’s done ❤️.  ~35 pencil crayons (coloured pencils to the rest of the world), 9 evenings of work spread over a few weeks.   One “help!  How do I fix…” post in my art class forum ;).  And endless learning and problem solving.

Things that were a challenge:

• Sketch that I was proud of in black and white but didn’t look right when colour applied
• Colour theory aka what colours blend well and which ones don’t ;).  And how do you fix it if you choose wrong.
• I now know all the various shades of orange in my collection ;).  A shame it’s the last day of pumpkin season.
• Figuring out all the details you need for photorealism without a photo - this, clearly, I have a v long way to go.  Shadows / values / etc - all a challenge for a beginner with a realistic starting point - way harder with fiction and honestly AI isn't great at it yet either ;) 

There are parts of this that I love, parts that I really do not, and all of it that I can imagine the next iteration after I go away and up my skills a bit ;).   I did enjoy it though and likely will do it again once I feel I have the skills to make what I see in my head a reality. 

Drawing Tucker

Writing this as I go - we'll see how it turns out.   I'm trying to draw Tucker.   Not shockingly, there are no online tutorials on how to do this :).  I figured I'd document the process for posterity 😂     May the odds be ever in my favour.

So - Day one started with finding a photo - one that was clear enough I could see details; I particularly wanted one that showed his eyes, and ideally with perked ears, which was harder to find than expected.

This was my selection

From there I had to make my sketch - that...  took a while ;).  Esp as I wanted it bigger than the photo actually is.   But I was happy enough w what I ended up with.  This is improvement over the last time I tried to sketch a dragon from an image.  That did not go so well ;).   Alas, at the time I had no intention of documenting this adventure, so there are no pics of the sketch on its own, although of course you can see parts of it in the pics below.

Day 2

So - I spent an awful lot of time with my computer working on both a black and white version of the photo (to understand values and what parts should be darker than others without the complication of colour) and with a colour version to figure out what colours are actually in his fur!  More blues and reds than I would've guessed and lots of parts are far darker than I would've expected.  I know how to manage that with pencil, but not really sure about with colours.  😂 we shall see...   

Things I learned today:

A - partially drawn animals are creepy

B - it takes approximately 1284638274 x longer to do this than I would've expected

C - fabulous mental health win; I was fully oblivious to how many hours had passed and not at all interested in stopping

D - both artists I have paid for tutorials from have said more than once that there's always an ugly phase to coloured pencil drawings.  My only hope is that I will get past that phase at some point ;)

Day 3 - a week later

So I went away to the cottage for a week and poor partial Tucker was left behind.   I was somewhat concerned I wouldn't remember how I got him to where he was in the first place, so I put all the pencil crayons I used in a specific case, and kept notes of at least conceptually which colours I'd used for what.   This was helpful as I was able to add another layer to the part I'd done before that I'm starting to be happy with, and start trying to figure out how to do the light side of his face.  Objectively typing this now looking only at the photo, it's not atrocious.  But in real life, it's pretty dodgy ;). Just trust me on that one.

Day 4 - Starting to think I should make a flip book ;)

The lighter ear is coming along.  Still NQR, but much closer, esp in the pic version.  Same with the lighter side in general really.   Even less sure about how to tackle the collar or the white parts than i was about the brown fur, so I'll be making that up as I go along.   Some very early layers to the collar here because I figure having that in will make it easier to do the white parts of the head.   This is my theory.  We shall see in reality.

Day 5

So it's a week later again since we had our lovely Quebec trip in there :).  Added some basic colour to the body, a little more to the white parts of his fur, and mostly focused on the collar; I had NO idea even where to start with that, and while it's not quite done yet, I'm pleased w how it's going.

Day 6

Next layer of colour on his body, but I think I goofed on his face.   TBC if I can fix that next time ;).  Was trying to make the left side darker (it should be in shadow) but didn't quite get there.   Also really regretting that I didn't do a background cause part's of him just disappear into the paper.   Blah.   Lessons learned!   I LOVE how the collar is looking now.

Day 7

Maybe almost done?   I feel like not quite there yet but getting close.   Right so some things I like - the tail looks right now and the white on his back glows.  I also think the shadow on his forehead is getting closer.   I'm disappointed with the blue.   I'd heard advice previously about do the background first - this I totally understand, and to be fair to me, I wasn't originally planning on a background ;)  So by doing it second, resulted in some rework because all the little hairs that go out over the background needed to b e added back in.  No big deal.   What is a concern is that I really don't love the colour :(.  And I feel like it detracts from his eyes.   I wanted to do green (as though he were on grass) but had heard advice to pick colours already in the drawing or the lighting / tones / etc might not work well.   So all the colours in the background are colours actually in the drawing - mostly in the blacks or darker brown sections.   But it feels too much.   Also the right side of his face doesn't seem dark enough yet but I'm not really sure how to fix that.  Did post in the community for the artist whose lessons I've been learning from.  We'll see if they come up with anything helpful :)

Day 8 - Calling it done :)

There were two people in the art club that gave me really good, useful advice that helped me get this a little farther.  Still a bit disappointed at the background (although it's lighter now), but otherwise pretty pleased.  Had fun w details (whiskers!) and I'm surprisingly proud of the collar.  Leather is not something I had learned to draw before.

So many things learned in this round:

- polarizing the original photo makes it super easy to see values (ie what needs to be darker)

- "white" fur can be surprisingly dark and made up of many colours that are not even vaguely related to white

- to darken coloured pencils, just add more layers of the same colours (you'd think this was obvious but I actually had to ask the question cause for beginner me it was not!).  Many many more layers.   To the point that when I pulled up the masking tape, there was a visible ridge, just like when you take the tape off a newly painted wall.

- going forward, add many more layers before blending.

- do the background first

- in a lot of ways, coloured pencil is surprisingly forgiving.  Wrong colour?  Add another.  Too dark?  Erase.  Too light?  Add more layers.

- something needs to go under the paper while working to protect the other papers in the book.  

I can't even fathom how many hours went into this total, but even though I acknowledge it's a beginner effort, I'm still pretty proud of it.  And the time just flew.  So definitely starting the next project asap :).  The debate is do I do a tutorial I've been interested in to learn about drawing on drafting film, or do I try another pet?   We'll see....

My favourite devil kitten

Gratuitous picture cause I love it and it took me NINE hours so it deserves to be seen.

So super high off my bird drawing, which was done following instructions from a class in slow motion 😂 I decided I wanted to draw Mori.  But the *real* Mori.

Alas, they don’t make classes - anywhere I could find - on how to draw realistic dragon kittens ;).  Shocking that.  And even fewer (than zero - imaginative realism, remember) options about how to do so w pencil crayons!

Now, I’ve been doing a course on sketching (SQUIRREL!  hmm just scrolled back through some of my past posts - I stopped following that artist because I found her "follow alongs" helped me produce some cool stuff (I follow instructions well) but I wasn't actually learning to draw.  I found another artist - Kirsty Partridge - who has a class called "Drawing Decoded" which I purchased last year and have been working through that actually teaches how to draw.   She has several other courses and, of course, a subscription option lol.   I have two courses that I own (the second one is about using colour), and a one year subscription to see how much I use the subscription material.  Since I'm like 6 months into it, I'm going to say courses are a win but the subscription less so.   Which financially is great because the courses are forever. /endsquirrel)  Anyways - the bird drawing, above, was a follow along as well, so it doesn't "count" quite as much BUT I used my new skills from the drawing course to sketch Mori based on a photo I had….   Then just tweaked a few things ;).  Mostly based on books or other people’s interpretations of dragons.   C came in part way through and said he needed a spiky tail - he was right ;).  So now may I introduce:

My favourite devil kitten

For how early I am in my drawing adventure, I’m ridiculously pleased at how this turned out.  Certainly there are things I would do differently next time, and there are things I’d like to do differently but am not sure how yet ;).  But I was still really pleased with the end result.  And, those who know me will appreciate that apparently I was the *first* in the drawing school to share a dragon 😂. Said school is all about realism, so not shocking that.  But there was no rule I could see about NOT posting imaginative realism instead so…

Apparently imaginative realism is welcome here :)

Draw what you see

So coloured pencil week is over and I’m back to my learning to sketch class which is phenomenally well put together BUT also horrendously boring at times.   It really is from scratch so there’s lots of shading circles to turn them into spheres and drawing apples etc.  And while I both 100% see the need and the reason for it, I also sometimes find it tediously boring.   Watched a YouTube the other day about a guy who spent 100 hours learning to draw “from scratch” (wife is a pro artist so he had a custom built program and pro coaching along the way) and I was mildly amused that he was just as bored as I was and had all the same exercises (although he started slightly better than I did - albeit not by much).  AND ended up really decent.  So I have hope.  He said about hour 30 it started to be less painful and about hour 60 it started to be enjoyable 😂 

So maybe there’s hope.  So far I’ve done:

YouTube (and book) Follow Along tutorials.  These were a good start and helped me get a feel for certain things, and, of course, instant gratification.  But they don’t help w actual learning.   Like the skills weren’t highly transferable to my own work.

Also - I want colour!   😂 so I did Coloured Pencil week which was awesome.  And then back down the YouTube rabbit hole cause it turns out there are a ton of artists who just teach colouring?!?!    Who knew?   So when I want “easy” learning I do one of those (I even bought a colouring book?!?) cause it’s helping me expand on coloured pencil week with layering, colour theory (I may or may not have also acquired a book for that), techniques, etc.

That, however, is also frustrating cause I can spend HOURS on something and work really hard on it and be mildly impressed w the outcome and still feel like it’s “just colouring”.  Sigh.  Baby steps.

So today I had gathered all my supplies, sat down, had done one of my drawing class exercises and was pleased w it, then one that was brutal but got better - in which I was pleased I made it less-bad 😂. So overall a pretty good mood.  But for the next section I needed my laptop which was upstairs.  And both Tucker and Nola were sleeping on me, so obviously I couldn’t move (completely trapped by a blanket being held down w a pet on either side).   I wasn’t quite ready to close up for the night but any and all reference material was out of reach :(

Except….  I mean, the whole point of this is to just draw right?   So while it’s fast and basic - I’m pretty happy w this beginner sketch of my sleeping critters from the viewpoint I had, with no how tos, measuring, or anything else.   I’d put it in the “5 min sketch” category (or maybe 10 cause there’s two critters).  Except that most of the sketches I’ve done from my 5 min sketches book take me 20-30 so yeah.  It’s not fast, but I enjoy it, and I’d argue this time both animals are reasonably recognizable :).  I’ll take the wins where I can find them!

When your tiny animals work together,
they can trap you using only a blanket!

Trying to learn two unrelated skills? Why not practice them together? ;-P

Right, so I was flipping through YouTube to find a drawing tutorial for the night (I'm taking a course but it requires more brainpower - YouTube usually delivers that quick hit of "finished product" endorphins ;) and thought I'd go back to the original driver of dragons.   However, I couldn't find any I really liked, but I did find a lion that looked good.  

When I clicked through to the video, the instruction was good, but the person was definitely new-ish to English and I couldn't tell if his accent was Spanish or Italian -- until he happened to mention he had the same video in Spanish.   So I went to his channel and while English videos are a new endeavour for him, he has a TON of Spanish ones.   And one I just LOVED and it was like 20 mins.  Perfect.

Okay so just to put in perspective - 20 min videos even in English usually take me at least an hour.  Sometimes more.  And this drawing...   well, suffice to say it's well beyond my current capabilities.   But I wanted it.   And so down the rabbit hole I jumped.

20 min video - that showed start to finish him drawing the same picture he was teaching, took me about 3h.  Maybe 2.5 given a quick "walk Sasha around the block" and a few other minor things that came up.  And I would've placed it at about 45 min.  I really lose time when I'm drawing, but I kinda love that because it's the ultimate "in the moment".    Now, let's put this in perspective.

1 - the first 3 mins of his drawing took me about 20.  It involved drawing a person.  I have never drawn a person before.  The first effort got scrapped and I started over. All good learning but wow so slow.

2 - It's FULLY possible that he filmed it first and then sped up the drawing with a voice over.  There was no time lapse that some you-tube artists use, but he was SUPER-FAST.  Speaking in Spanish and drawing faster than he spoke.   Which means I feel justified that it was taking me longer ;) 

3 - And it was more of a follow along so the language wasn't super necessary, although it certainly did add extra value it wasn't critical to understand to be able to execute the drawing.  But that also means there was no instruction beyond trying to mirror what he was doing (which conveniently applies the same techniques as in my sketching class - win!).

4 - I can understand Spanish or I can draw.  I cannot do both at the same time.  (I also cannot read out loud in Spanish and understand what I said, or listen in Spanish and write notes at the same time).   So basically I'm at the level where I can follow most things barring extreme speed or accents - both of which pro YouTubers tend to avoid - BUT, it takes 100% of my attention.   So at very least, I had to watch/listen, and then replicate.  Sometimes more than once.

5 - I've drawn some very cool animals (all with the help of YouTube) and some average things either by myself or with books, but I've never done a person, or a landscape...   And this picture?  It was a fairy looking at the sea (or some random body of water at least).  I HAVE at least drawn butterfly wings before -- that was how the teacher recommended thinking of it 😂.  And the landscape part was pretty simple.  And I've done hair before and for some reason disproportionately enjoy it.   So sure, why not?

Tomorrow am is why not.  But for tonight, it's still all good :).  In the end, I'm thrilled with what I did.  I'd like to do it again, with colour (which is not on the video so I'd be all on my own - scary!).  And I'm disproportionately pleased that both I found a channel I like in Spanish AND that it was essentially a non-issue.   All round, it's been a long time since I've had a 3am night for anything other than work or stress, and it's put me solidly in my happy place.

The end result makes me wonder what is she thinking?  What is she watching for?
I want to tell her story, but now it's bedtime.
Credit to the original artist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hn3FVT3PEkw

Coloured Pencil Week

So Coloured Pencil Week with the Bonny Snowdon Academy was an adventure.  I learned more than my little brain could take in and I really enjoyed it.  And I was super proud of my "cumulating" project ;).   The focus of the academy is realistic drawing w coloured pencils.   Their work that group turns out is nothing shy of stunning.  However, they also have a collection of material for us beginners ;)

I knew going in that we would learn to draw a cat's eye, a dog's nose, some fur, and an otter.   One of the things I wasn't expecting though, was the whole focus really was colour.  As in to the point of providing you a sketch to trace.  In all cases I used the sketch provided to make mine occur, but the only one I actually *traced* was the dog's nose, mostly cause I was lazy that day and in a hurry ;).  The otter I would've traced just for the sheer overwhelmingness of the project (a scheduled FOUR hours of drawing?!?!) but I wanted to use the "real" coloured pencil paper (still not the stuff they use, but the one I found at Michaels that was aptly named "coloured pencil paper" 😂) and it is too think to trace through even if I'd wanted to.   My sketchbook, however, is not - so I traced the nose.  The eye I've done several variants before and, let's be honest, cat's eyes are as simple to freehand as it gets.   And the fur was just a few squiggly lines on a paper - I figured I could make that up as I went along ;)

There were 5 days of live drawing classes and two days of pre-recorded miscellaneous videos: one about materials which I watched but had actually learned most of from YouTube already and the other about mindset which I half-watched on fast forward, but isn't really my thing.   The actual drawing ones though were excellent.  Unfortunately these were at 7pm UK time, which meant 2pm our time, which meant I only got to go to one (and was lucky about that one); they were posted a few hours later though so I did DO every one of them.   The wknd ones were slightly earlier, but I wasn't prepared for the first one and it wasn't a convenient time, so I made the executive decision I'd watch those on repeat.  

It's a REALLY good thing I did, because there was a lot of watching closely, pausing, trying to replicate.  And that "long" four hours???   Oh my sweet summer child.   It took me closer to 10.   And I really didn't notice.   Which, I've discovered before, this new hobby is one that I can fall into the zone and not come out of for a very long time - the only thing other than writing I've ever experienced that with.  Which is a mental health and interest win, but a productivity fail ;-P

I did a thing!
Also - I used 17 colours to make this little guy?!?!

I also discovered I have no interest in full realism.   I want to get to the point that I can both draw and colour something that people can identify, but it doesn't need to look indistinguishable from a photograph.  I probably already have the photograph ;-P.  I AM super-impressed that other people can do that with pencil crayons?!?!   Like completely mind-boggling.   But it is not something I'm inclined to do - at least not right now.  Maybe when I retire ;-P

So in the course I learned a lot about layering, drawing what you see, not what you think is there (although for the life of me I still don't know how they see some of the colours in the fur (17 colours - I'm not exaggerating; and the instructor was lamenting that she hadn't added more to the list)  It all works out in the end, but my eye isn't trained that well yet!), different types of pencil marks to achieve different effects, a tiny bit on blending, some colour theory (super important to me cause I never know what colours to pick!), lots about values (light and dark) and they basically drilled home that if your values are right, the colour doesn't particularly matter.

I learned a ton, it was a super experience, but the actual academy is probably not the right fit for me at this particular moment.  The instructor is a lovely human though and if anyone DOES want to learn it, I'd highly recommend.   She's got a strong business going and very much runs it as a business, which was refreshing to see.  

I AM, however, taking a sketching basics course (all prerecorded) to learn to draw (rather than colour) that I'm getting a ton out of.  It's more the level I need right now.   More on that if/when I actually finish it.  It got paused for this one cause this one was only open for a week.

Pencil Crayons vs Coloured Pencils

TIL that while in Canada we say “Pencil Crayons” while the rest of the English-speaking world says “Coloured Pencils”, the same phenomenom exists in Spanish?!?!   Apparently there is one country somewhere in South America that uses the Spanish version of pencil crayons, while everybody else uses the literal translation of coloured pencils.  So random.  And the kind of thing that actually fascinates me.

TIL: Black pencils have a blue base

TIL that black pencil crayons (that’d be coloured pencils to the rest of the world) have a blue base.  And if you use them to darken yellow or orange, you run the risk of ending up w green ;). Suffice to say, I learned this the hard way *sigh* only to have the explanation given shortly after my intended-to-be blond person started sporting greenish hair ;)

#TIL - when colouring, use another colour under black

TIL that if you want something to be truly black and you’re using coloured pencils, put another colour down first.  It adds more depth and realism to the colour.

Living life in colour

So it turns out learning to draw and learning how to use colour are two different and almost unrelated skills.  Shocker.  Plus side, there are ways of separating them lol.   Lots of sketching / drawing / etc learning approaches online.  I've found one I like and am learning from it the basics of drawing.   But, obviously, that's a lot more work and a lot less fun than just following instructions and turning out cool stuff 😂.   The only thing getting me through it is that it asks you to do a "before" drawing that "you wouldn't mind repeating" that will have an after drawing at the end.   I drew Sasha - she's recognizable as a dog (lol significant progress over before starting the follow along videos!), possibly even recognizable as an Aussie.   Not necessarily recognizable as Sasha.   We'll see if that improves ;) 

In the interim though, since this course is working on real basics, it's about as exciting as hours and hours of up-down lessons.   So to not lose interest entirely, I figured in parallel I would learn about colours.   Turns out, people teach this as well.  I found a book that I'm really enjoying for learning about pencil crayons, bought a physical colour wheel, AND - discovered from YouTube - lots of people seem to learn to use colour through adult colouring books.   It takes the stress of "ruining your drawing" out and lets you focus on the colour alone.  

I'm enjoying this one cause it has spaces to test and learn
(aka fuck around and find out)

So I have a lovely dragon colouring book that I bought YEARS ago.  Started two or three - using markers cause I couldn't get good colour with pencil crayons - and quickly got frustrated and annoyed because it didn't look any better than anything I'd done when I was 10.  But it's dragons and other relevant things, so why not give it a try?

Fully expecting to be frustrated again, I dug out the book (the other ones have long since been donated  since colouring, rather than being cathartic, was stress inducing and frustrating), and found one that I had started but only just.  Hey - if I'm going to ruin a page, it may as well be one I've already ruined right?

So - turns out random YouTube videos have taught me stuff as I went along.   I'm super slow and this is literally the first thing I've tried to come up with colours on my own, BUT - I made a solid effort to layer colours, I made an actual colour swath the pencil crayons I own (which are, admittedly, significantly better quality than the ones I had previously lol - one of those cases where good quality can help compensate from lack of skill).   

There may or may not have been a significant amount of googling to figure out how to do things, but - the important part is - I eventually put colour on paper AND I'm pleased with how it's going.

Things I've learned while colouring:

• I would 100% have colour paralysis if I were doing this on a drawing I'd made that I cared about, so definite win on the safety zone of a colouring book ;)
• Conversely, I'm remarkably blasé about fixing errors; I figure this comes from the last few years of stabbing things.  I figured out how to modify on the go a long time ago.
• While I am trying to "colour inside the lines" (just this once, I swear! ;-P), it was a lightbulb moment that that doesn't mean you can't add NEW lines and/or use multiple colours in one outlined area.   I tell you - the last time I coloured I was a little kid and still believed in following rules ;-P. This has made things So. Much. More. Interesting.
• It's a symmetrical drawing, so I'm testing q-tip blending on the left and using a blending solvent on the right so learning + and - to both.   So far what I've learned is I like the look of the solvent more, but I need a *much* thinner brush to use it effectively.
• What a HUGE difference good quality pencils make.  Lol I couldn't get any vibrant colour at ALL when I tried before.  I'm sure a really skilled artist could make beauty out of any tool, but I am not that person so where I can, I'm going for quality *g*. 
• It takes a LOT longer than I would ever have imagined.  I'm not even drawing it, JUST colouring it, yet even the small portion I have complete took me literal hours.  Admittedly got faster once I had an approach in mind and my swatches made but still.
• I learned some of this colour theory in grade school (which tells you the level of it lol) but definitely couldn't have told you what a complementary colour was or how or why to use it if my colour wheel hadn't told me ;)

Anyways - I am super amused at how disproportionately proud I was of my silly mix and match colours.  Esp when I decided that a fantasy drawing does NOT need to reflect reality, and so I wanted leaves that were blue but would still go with the greens.   For she who has no ability to mix and match colours, this was an adventure in itself.

Tonight's WIP, complete w all the notes I made while doing it ;)
The bright orange dragons and their wings were done in marker a lifetime ago.
Drawing came from a book called Mythical Enhancements by Kathryn Marlin

TIL: Even adults can "earn" participation awards ;)

If I can't pat one, maybe I can learn to draw one?

I don't even really know where to begin.  Okay - well I'm definitely chuckling that I got a legit participation award for a free online course.  But hey, I'll take what I can get ;).   And it made me and some of my friends laugh, so obviously it had SOME benefit.   And, to Jael's point - somebody, somewhere, for sure has this participation award on their LinkedIn ;-P

So, as those who follow this blog will know, I've been playing with the idea of learning to draw, and recently discovered that "coloured pencils" isn't as simple a concept as I'd thought.  And while most of the YouTubers tend to use primarily "normal" (in my head) coloured pencils (eg wax or oil based - not that I knew either were a thing until very recently), the pros who do primarily animals seem to like pastel pencils.  Which are, of course, even more expensive ;). 

But I like animals...   I don't remember how exactly I ended up there, but I found the Colin Bradley School of Art -- and he had a free "for complete beginners" class that only needed 6 pastel pencils to create an impressive looking tiger.   Hmmmm potentially I could justify that for a new experience (they're about $3 each!  At least at the only place I could find to buy them individually - which was conveniently less than a 20 min walk from work on a week I had to go to the office anyways).

Well.  The top thing I learned is this is NOT the medium for me.  Ugh.  Sad.   Which is a shame cause I LOVED the class.  And while he does have a handful of classes for coloured pencils, the things I'd really love to draw are all pastels.  Blah.

So - first of all - things I loved about the class.   It is friendly, patient, calm.  It's kinda like sitting with  a storybook grandfather teaching you the basics (if your grandfather happened to sound and teach like  David Attenborough lol).  Patient, relaxed, and once in a while unintentionally made me laugh (eg "you don't have to follow my way."  *pause*  "But I suggest you do.").  They tell you up front what you'll need, including the exact brand and colour of pencils, paper, etc (easier to follow if you have the same materials).  I'll admit, I only got the pencils - mostly cause none of the rest was easily available around here, but I did at least get "pastel paper", if not the specific brand, having learned my lesson about impact of paper before!   I believe the whole site is run by the artist (who my guess would be in his 80s?   Said he didn't start learning to draw until he was in his 30s) and his either son or grandson (I think son, but not 100% sure on that) who seems to take care of the online portion of the business while the artist does the drawing and teaching component.

He provides a sketch to start you out and suggests printing it directly onto the paper (like with an actual printer) which was my first indication of the difference in medium because, of course, you can't erase those lines!   However, A - my pastel paper wouldn't fit in the printer, and B - I also would like to actually learn how to draw so...  I did my best to copy his example and sketch it myself.  I used a grid, so that certainly helped.  It wasn't perfect by any means, but I would argue it was close enough (hey - when I took a pic of my finished work, my phone identified it as a tiger, so I'm deeming that a win!)

Probably kinda hard to see, but my attempt at copying his sketch.
So that I could *start* lol.

Now - this course is 1.4h long.  I know from prev YouTube to double or triple the time depending.   This one...  We're not even going to discuss it.   I was likely an hour in before he started (aka with getting the sketch in place!)  Probably a good life choice to go back to learning some sketching basics first!

I came to learn pretty quickly why pastels wouldn't be for me...  The first thing is, part of learning to draw was a hobby I could do on the couch while C was watching TV.   Pastels kinda need a desk.  I already have lots of "in my office" hobbies - piano, Spanish, handstands...   So that in itself wasn't a strong start, but could certainly be worked around fairly easily if it were the only blocker.   The next was enforced structure.  Because of how smudgy pastels are, you really do have to fully complete one section at a time.   There is no agile to this approach ;).  You can't stop in the middle and have a usable project.  So I'd have part the was amazing and I loved and part that I hadn't even started yet.   I'm not great a lifetime commitment projects ;). I'm here full for the quick wins.  I have a lifetime commitment stabby that I'm working on - one is enough!

Great ears!  But that's a lot of work to still have the rest look like...  Well this ;)

One thing that made this course more of a course than just a follow-along video is the nature of the picture lends itself to repetition.   So he'd teach how to do one ear, and then let you go off and do the other.   Teach how to do one type of fur, and then let you extrapolate that to the rest.  Super frustrating if you just want a pretty picture at the end but actually awesome for teaching you to figure it out.   And after the face, it was pretty much a DIY approach with a "you don't need to watch me do this, I'll meet you back here when you're done". Again - great for learning, less good for successful results 😂    Although I certainly could've replayed the video from before to help refresh that for sure.

I think the above picture is about where I stopped on day 1 (or day 2 actually - day 1 was the sketch, day 2 I started with colours).  I was now a couple hours into a 1.4h video ;)

The eyes were my favourite part by far.   I'm so amazed at them, I loved doing them, and they were totally worth the effort for the results.  It really helped me to pay attention to details of colour and the impact of shading = realism/depth.  And I know that's really 101 level, but come on - I AM 101 level lol.

Even after all was said and done, the eyes remain my favourite part.

They warn about smudging, and keeping a piece of paper over any work you've already done.  What I didn't clue into was the paper itself could cause smudges 🤦‍♀️, so I found that an added degree of stress that wasn't necessary for a complete beginner ;).  Now normal pencil crayons do the same, but nowhere near the same degree.

The layering of colours I still don't entirely understand why it works in areas that you don't need or want to ever see all the colours, but I definitely appreciate that it does ;)

Part way through a technique was introduced that I could *not* replicate.  SO far beyond my skill and capability level it was laughable.  So I gave it a go, but yeah.  A definite miss.  And combine that with a complete inability to get my pencils sharp (apparently the trick is whittling them with a knife - which, thanks to C, I have a knife.  Alas, I have no skills).  And now smudgy paper and colours being flattened, my frustration level was definitely growing.   The smudgy paper was easy enough to manage once I knew about it - so that's simply a newbie mistake.   Skills it's fair not to have on day one, but still sad :( 

And then I had to disappear for basically two weeks for work.   lol so when I came back, I finished off what I could, decided not to include the background mostly cause I didn't have the patience for it today and I wanted it done, and partially cause I'd have to tape the paper and I wasn't sure that would be a good life choice at this point ;)  Whiskers were pretty much a complete fail lol.   I got one or two that I think looked right, but man are they a risky edition - the same skill I had 100% failed throughout the whole drawing, but has to be done fast, in one stroke, with confidence or it doesn't work AND risks a complete redo of significant parts of work (plus side, I now know it's reasonably easy to redo pastels - far more than coloured pencils).  So not sure how I'm feeling about that atm, but I'm calling the tiger done.    

I'm gonna take this as a win for a first effort!

First experience with pastel pencils taught me a LOT, I *loved* this particular school and would 100% sign up for their paid stuff too if it were graphite or coloured pencils.  But likely again some day.  We shall see :).  After all, they did give me a participation award!   Nobody else has done that in decades ;-P.  But I can't imagine how long one of the LONG videos would take me!  lol.  This was pretty close to the shortest option.

I'm not even kidding! ;)

Beginner drawing adventures

As always, I'm forever amazed by the learning curve when I target something really new; especially things that seem so obvious once you know them.  These are some of the things I've discovered in the last few weeks:

- there is a distinct difference between tutorials that aim to teach a drawing skill and tutorials that aim to have you successfully draw an image at the end.   I'm getting much better at following the second type (see pics below ;).  And honestly, still so green I've learned something from literally every one, so Follow-the-Leader it is.  For now.  As to actually learning to do anything on my own - I'm being a little facetious - I do try those too and it IS making a (slow) difference.  But I very much love the "follow along and get results" version for now (yeah endorphins!).  Except there's a sad dearth of dragons, so at some point will need to apply those skills to creating my own.

- there are coloured pencils that are wax based, coloured pencils that are oil based, coloured pencils that are really pastels in disguise, and who knows how many others lol.   And while the online pastel enthusiasts tend to be serious purists about it, the others tend to mix and match intentionally.   All of the above are friggin expensive.  I should go back to a nice affordable hobby.  Like riding.

- Pastels generally, but of course not always, are layered dark to light.  The others go light to dark.  In both cases they need WAY more layers and colours than I would ever have imagined.   And some of those colours are wildly not something that would ever have occurred to me; this is an example of the difference between ability to follow and ability to do it myself ;).

This one theoretically took 22 pencil crayons, of which I had about 15 ;)
By far my favourite in-colour follow-along artist (Bonny Snowdon Academy) so far.

- my thought of learning to draw with pencil first seems to be the right track - all the others seem to start with very light pencil (cause it's erasable) and then build up from there.

This was one of the first, and still a favourite.
Follow-along instructions by my overall favourite YT instructor I've found yet:  Mark Crilley

- many "beginner" tutorials still often assume more skill than I posses.   Also, some of the ones for pencil crayons will share a sketch to trace first for colouring - I tried this a couple times and found it even more confusing since sketches for colouring often don't look much like what I would consider sketches lol.  So now I either take their version and use a grid to try and draw a simpler version myself (this is most reliable although still involves a ton of erasing) or I just do the outline and make up the rest as I go along.  Kinda depends how much patience I have at the time (eg - the kitten was a grid, the flower below was 100% freehand DIY lol - I just can't bring myself to care about the flowers at this point). 

- paper matters.  OMG does paper ever matter.  These two pictures were a day apart (first coloured pencil effort), with no practice in-between, following the exact same instructions, using the exact same materials.   All I changed was the paper.   Unfortunately though, I generally have no idea what paper to use for what and why -- and of course the internet has ALL the opinions ;).  In some cases it makes sense (if you're water painting you prob want something thick enough to handle being wet), theoretically all the pencils need to be layered so something with texture to allow layers is good.  But too MUCH texture gives what happened here.  And then on the flip side - the kitten above would've had whiskers if I'd had thicker paper lol - apparently the trick is to emboss the whiskers into the paper before ever starting anything w colour, except it was just in my little sketch book; there wasn't enough paper depth to emboss anything lol.

The difference the paper can make

- my social media doesn't know what to do w me having another hobby - mildly amusing to see it trying to figure out whether I want drawing, embroidery, handstands, fitness, dance, or something else completely random ;)