I Want to Do This, That, & the Other!
There are so many things I want to try, start, do—and so many other things that I should do, need to do, must do.
One of the many things calling my name is string quilting on the treadle sewing machine. It’s been a while, and I really want to get back into it again. I have strings—though I’m not sure which colors I’ll use—and I have an old Pinterest board I’ve been browsing, full of interesting ideas. I “just” need to decide and dive in. Maybe tomorrow!
3 Materials Challenge: Day 24
One of the things I’m still doing only because I’m too stubborn to quit is the 3 Materials Challenge. I still think it could be worth doing, but the whole drawing from life thing may not be for me. I don’t know… I just don’t like it much! At least I need to be darn sure I choose a paper that can handle water, if I ever do this again. And maybe have a theme or goal or something to give me more direction, because I’m flailing around without aim, this time around.
Anyway, for today, I decided to try some new pastel highlighters as a couple of my materials, but I wasn’t sure how I wanted to use them. In the end, I decided to work backwards from how I typically would. Instead of sketching in ink pen, then adding color, I’d put in a simple, graphic background of color, then doodle sketch on top of that. For my subject, I took the treadle sewing machine—a Singer model 15.
Materials used:
- Uni-ball Vision Needle micro (black)
- pastel highlighter (violet)
- pastel highlighter (blue)
Endless Art Challenge
I started this one on Monday, but then left it until yesterday to start tinting. You know the routine by now, right?
This time, the three cards I drew were “Movie”, “Cornflower Blue”, and “Include a Character”.
I’m not sure what that last one would mean, ordinarily… Just put a person/animal or other type of “character” in your picture? In any case, it was a perfect fit with “Movie”.
As I seem to always do, I let the color suggestion guide me, so I thought about movie characters who wear or are associated with cornflower blue. I also did a quick search to see what came up. Cinderella was one search result, but the character that came to me first was Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz. Her blue gingham dress… Was that cornflower blue or more sky blue—and really, does it matter?
I decided to just go with it. Oh… and I decided to make her a cat.
Look, I know it’s weird that I keep drawing cats for these things, but what can I say? They’re easier to doodle than a human, and more fun, too, really. Maybe I’ll try to do another species next time, if I remember.
Anyway, I drew Dorothy as a cat. She looked really rigid, and her head was too big, but oh well. This is supposed to be fun, so I let it go. There was still tons of space around her on the page, so even though she is herself “a character”, I decided to include a second character. The Scarecrow is much easier to draw, in my humble opinion, than the Tin Man or the Lion—and besides, he’s obviously the best of the three, so I drew him as a cat because I can’t help myself; it’s an addiction or a crutch or something along those lines. Then I added a few other details to round it out—but forgot to give either of the cats tails, so just pretend they’re hidden behind their bodies, okay?—and it was time to paint it.
You may have noticed that when I use watercolor to tint these kinds of things, I’m basically using it the way you might use crayons. (Except there are some people out there who can make works of art with simple crayons… I’m talking about flat coloring, like I’d do.) I don’t bother trying to make things have dimension or shading or anything fancy. I guess I could try, but that feels like too much effort for something that’s meant to be quick and easy—and honestly, I like it this way. (Who am I defending myself against here? No-one cares, self. Just have fun and stop making excuses.)
And it was fun! I enjoy doing this kind of thing, so let’s keep doing it!
