Tag Archives: ink

Leonard’s Friends

Leonard 6

As some will know, my current book project is a picture book by Frances Watts to be published next year by HarperCollins. Leonard Doesn’t Dance is the title, and it will feature a cast of feathered friends of many species.

Leonard and his friends have been forming on the page but I’ve yet to definitely decide on the medium that will best suit the book. As a way of exploring options, I’ve begun getting to know this list of species.

Magpies
Ducks
Pigeons / Doves
Rosellas
Galahs
Woodpeckers
Flamingos
Swans
Chickens
Turkeys
Quails
Bluebirds
Finches
Penguins
Puffins

First on the list, penguins. (Yes, I’m not even reliably back-to-front.)

Penguins come in several shapes and sizes and are attired in formal to smart casual. Their posture is generally upright, and they are fond of water sports. Some are tall and imposing. Some are small and wiry. Some are round, cuddly and ridiculously cute. Possibly too cute. (What kind of a kill-joy book illustrator am I? Too cute?)

penguin very first pencil sketch

A warm-up penguin. I liked to think I was channelling William Kentridge with my deft use of the eraser… but really, this is just a warm-up penguin. My eraser was employed in deftless ways.

penguin pencil and wash early 1

A second warm-up penguin. Sometimes the warm-up process temporarily takes one backwards. (Watercolour and brush on smooth watercolour paper.)

the rather dull small fluffy penguin

See what I mean? (Noodler’s ink, watercolour and gouache on watercolour paper.)

the rather dull penguin

A half-warmed up penguin, using a soft pencil and watercolour. I need to bond with penguin feet. They are thick and sturdy and look like lumps of pink putty. These are not right. But I like the head.

A tighter line. Testing the look of a more stylised shape. This penguin is quite athletic. I didn’t realise that some penguins have rather long legs. Even if much of the leg appears to be inside their body. Rather like walking around inside a large pillowcase with your toes in the corners… Or not. I do like the watercolour over the textured pencil.

A tighter outline again with an exaggerated shape. But still with a loose hatching technique. I don’t do tidy hatching. I associate it with things like ironing shirts. A useful skill that I don’t have the patience for.

Looser? Almost the same head. But loose and with added dance steps.

Looser with ink. I think this is a combination of the last two. Or three.

A question arising is the ink. This ink is water soluble. I often enjoy this, because it’s rather scrumptious to see the line dissolve under the watercolour brush to do unexpected things. I mostly like unexpected things. But would I like unexpected things to happen on my final artwork? Maybe not.

Also, it’s hard to lay clean colour over dissolving black ink. I will want some of my colours to be clean. I will have a try with water-fast ink later. But there are other ways around this. I could do the black part with water soluble ink and print out the illustrations onto fresh watercolour paper before adding colour. But all this can get rather complicated and size can become a limitation. There is much to ponder over the next few weeks.

I will share some finches with you soon.

ATTEN….SHUN!!

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ATTEN–SHUN! (Even Lassie came to see me. It must be an emergency.)

I have received a few nudges lately.

Yep. I’ve been lost in a world of moving house; a barrage of bills and boxes; a wilderness of wrapping. I’ve been so pooped, I can’t even alliterate for more than one sentence and ‘moving house’ doesn’t count.

Inane Squirrel Dog running hither and thither. This is not me, you understand. NOT me.

But I’m paying attention now. I’m here. Thank you to the nudgers one and all, for hauling me out of my box… or boxes.

I visited a friend the other day and sat down to do a few harmless blobs over a very nice G&T. To make it even easier, I made them dog blobs. Dog blobs are the easiest blobs, unless you count stay-as-they-are blobs. (Chickens can do those without even trying, so with all due respect to chickens I don’t count them as proper blobs.)

In the spirit of the whole blob thing, where the blob leads the whole story every inch of the way, I promise to include each and every blob in this post, even the ones that are SO WRONG!! All blobs measure around 2-3cm across so it’s really quite impolite to be enlarging them this much. A bit like looking up somebody’s nose.

Okay, I need to get this one out there. It’s hanging over my head and it is SO WRONG!

So so so so wrong!

Phew! All I can say is

THE BLOB MADE ME DO IT!

Irish Terrier x Bull Terrier in a bad mood (from a very nondescript blob.)

Dog breeders would say that this blob is all wrong as well. But I don’t mind him. He has a muscular, hardy look and may be useful carting boxes.

Perplexed Irish Soft-coated Wheaten Terrier born on the wrong side of the breeding box.

Being Blue-with-Brown-Spots has proven challenging for this Wheaten Terrier. It reminds me of studying the theme of ‘between cultures’ when I was at school…

A victim of perspective

Reminding us all that one’s situation in life is all a matter of perspective is this young Springer Spaniel x Staffordshire Bull Terrier. With his back half shown from above in the Stafford position of repose and his front half shown from the side in full Springer Spaniel spring, he could see himself as either getting somewhere or going nowhere.

Reg, the Space Dog

I have never seen a flop-eared dog do this before. His ear defies gravity. But perhaps Reg is in an anti-gravitational chamber and is practising to become a space dog. Luckily these days space dogs get to come down to earth again… I think.

Quite wrong. Pretty wrong. Almost certainly wrong.

This is Graham. Graham is undergoing hypnosis treatment, but not the kind you pay for. The hypnotist is an alien who has landed in the back garden and Graham was in the process of confronting him when an eerie light was switched on and began to swing slowly backwards and forwards… After that it was all up for Graham. I hope the alien is just going to take botanical samples from the garden, and not canine samples.

lickety-split

Lickety-split means fast, pell-mell, gangbusters, like a bat-outa-hell… well maybe not quite as fast as a bat-outa-hell. So I think these two dogs are engaged in a contest to see who can clean themselves more quickly. They are fairly evenly matched for size and white areas, but my money is on the brown and white dog because his tongue is larger. Stands to reason. Also the black and white dog looks like he is losing his cool a bit. He may be trying to wash his tail. If I were he, I’d leave it until last and trust to it’s being black. Nobody’s going to notice.

Emerson, the Blob Dog of Discontent

This blob dog is the smallest of all the blobs. Emerson was squished into the top left corner of the page. Perhaps that accounts partly for his disposition. Or, indeed he may be suffering from worms. (His posture is suggestive). But in fact, I suspect he was born this way and has been inflicting his testiness on everyone around him since puppyhood.

Even a dog biscuit would not help here.

endpapers instead of Endpapers

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I’m working flat out to finish Thunderstorm Dancing before the end of the month, so I haven’t much time to post here. Nor is there much to post, because the illos for the book are under wraps until publication… apart from small snippets.

Yesterday I finished the endpapers for the back of the book. Today I’ll hopefully finish the front endpapers. I suppose it could be okay to post a bit of an endpaper on Endpapers.

Here’s part of the back endpapers.

Cornish Cat called Thunder with seagulls and afternoon tea

And here’s my very hurried 52 Week Illustration Challenge contribution for this week (Under the Sea) which I made with some leftover fish bones drawn for Thunder endpapers. I’m sure leftover fish bones are an under-utilised art material…

This didn’t really work, because I was hurrying so much. Having said that, the imperfect, rough edges on everything are deliberate. I like the rough prickliness of the pasted fish and seaweed drawings, which gives them a fossilised or desiccated look.

Halloween Under the Sea

Both of these works are made using drawings done with Prismacolour Artstick, scanned and coloured in PhotoShop, on top of watercolour and ink background washes.

Oh, and lastly, just this little fragment from one of my illustrations for the book. (The lightning page.) I love the close-up sections of some pages, with none of the action or figures present, making them abstract. This one reminds me of the skin of a whale swimming deep underwater. I feel I should paint a whale eye and put it in one corner. Perhaps later, when all is done.

Thunder lightning sky fragment

Camperdown Sam

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This post is to introduce you to Camperdown Sam. During our school holiday visit to Camperdown, on our first walk into the main street we met with various delightful local animal characters.

One local was Fred (Who belongs to Ted), a dog of strongly suggestive Border Terrierishness x Australian Terrierishness, who came from a rescue centre. (And according to Ted’s wife, I am completely wrong about his breeding.) We have yet to acquire some photos of Fred with ears aloft. They were lovely. More on Fred another time.

Here’s Fred. It was hard to locate the crank handle to get him to lift his ears. These went up periodically to display neat, soft Border Terrier style ears but with tufts flying like pennants from the tips. I am determined to get a photo of those ears by any means necessary!

One was Sam. Sam looked at a distance like a small thundercloud. All furious black fluff, glaring yellow eyes, and very round. (Way too round for his own good.) But as Sam found himself being observed in his driveway, he demonstrated his highly social character by rushing over to introduce himself to us up close.

What with all the weaving, winding, and waving of his tail, Sam didn’t stand still long. At least that is the lame excuse I am giving for my poor photography. I was also stroking at the same time as photographing.

Sam in shadow – Check out that tummy, nearly touching the ground.

Feather boa tail

Alright, so you get the idea.

Well, I’m only just getting started on Sam. I think he’s a lot of fun to paint. He’s so inky. But I’ve other work to do first.

For Ann James’s birthday I did this first Sam sketch. Poor Sam has been scandalously misrepresented in temperament. But it was so much more fun to draw him as a grumpy thundercloud cat. Especially wearing a party hat.

Then I did a couple of other quick ink paintings for the 52 Week Illustration Challenge (theme this week black & white… handy). This first cartoon Sam is ink with digital scribble on top. I don’t think it is a success. It could be, if I re-do the face or even just the eyes, but not at the moment. Anyway, his tail got lost off the edge of the page. Never mind.

This one, I like. And here he is smiling, as Sam did in person. Note: I could have depicted them better, but I have tried to include the cute tufts of fluff that poke up between long-haired cats’ toes. I’ve made them too spiky, not clumpy enough here, so they look more like claws.

And now back to the last illos for Thunderstorm Dancing.

Dog with balloon

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Inspired by one of my greatest illustrator heroes, Tomi Ungerer. Indian ink and watercolour. With digital string as a bit of a cheat. (my last little offering for Week 37: balloons)

Blobs on a moving vehicle (again)

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Another journey on the train to the city. More blobs. People at the moment.

Scanning is too time consuming at present, so here we have quick photos of the two pages. Colouring will come bit by bit. Apologies for the low quality.

For tonight, a coloured threesome. I like the girl journeying in the snow best. I will have to think on her story and add it later.

It’s interesting how this process has slowed down my hand to a more deliberate, less impulsive sort of line. And yet, because of the random blob shapes that form the starting point, the figures seem to retain a little of their energy.

Experiments with Blobs in a Moving Vehicle

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Don’t try this at home.

It must be done on the train or, if you are really brave, in a moving car.

1. Take some freshly painted blobs. (see my earlier tutorial here)

2. Now sit down in a crowded location, preferably with somebody looking over your shoulder.

3. Take a fine point felt tip and turn the blobs into creatures. Do not wibble-wobble!

Page 1. I added the watercolour later. I will give 20 extra points to anyone who can do the watercolour bit on the train as well. (I am stingy with my points.)

Hot Tips:

• Don’t worry too much about the person looking over your shoulder. Jiggle your page sideways until it nearly bumps them in the face. They may lose interest. Probably not.

• Do the fiddly bits when the train is on the straight and not about to pull into a station. This will work best if you know your railway line.

• Make your journey a long one. If you are worried about missing your stop, you will lose concentration. Do you have an auntie who lives a long way away in the country? Go and visit her.

Here are some close-ups, because I don’t really have any more to say.

Inspector Dog. (Giant Schnauzer x Greyhound. Possibly could be categorised as a lurcher. But this one only lurches when the train pulls into a station.)

Ernest. (Maltese x Chihuahua x Pug x Papillon)

Noir Dog. (Beagle x Whippet x Wire-haired Fox Terrier)

Muddy Madge. (Petit Basset Griffon Vendeen. Yes, really.)

This is Finn. It’s always good to have a fish in your repertoire.

This is Foxy. I could have called him Finn too. His friend is Frederica.

This is Dodette. She is uncomfortable with publicity.

This is Herman.

This is Gene.

This is a Woman of Mystery. She has laddered her tights escaping… what? No. No. You’ve got it completely wrong. She carries a pistol in her pocket and is dodging out of the glow of a streetlight while she trails a criminal. You’ll have to imagine the gloomy alleyway.

This is Alberto. He likes pancakes and reading detective novels, but only if he can read them in a boat.

This is Cymbidium Night Angel. She is rescuing a puppy from Gene. Gene was going to feed the puppy to his wife and family. Now Gene and his family will go hungry. But the puppy is very happy.

I did another page of blob dogs, but perhaps I’ll save that for another time. I was on the train to go to the HarperCollins Inaugural Author Workshop Day, which was very good. It’s good to meet some of the other people in the large team who make books, and it’s always great to talk with other book authors and illustrators.

Paper Dolls

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I’m not sure where this paper doll process is going in an artistic context. It’s a bit like heading off for a walk with a lot on your mind, but no actual destination. Some of the thoughts that were in my mind at the time included:

• Children love dressing paper dolls. It’s fun.

• Men have been dressing women for centuries, shaping them into an art-form irresistibly pleasing to their eyes. I can see why.

• Women have also participated. Some Chinese women broke their own daughter’s feet and bound them until well into the 20th century. (How did they feel about that?) Modern woman sometimes chooses to totter on high heels (me too), making herself both physically and psychologically vulnerable.

• People have participated in a similar art-form breeding dogs (and other animals) for a particular look. Sometimes when breeding didn’t perfect the look, they trimmed off bits of the animal.

• Men and women have done the same thing with flowers and fruit trees. Sometimes we have lost some of the original flavours or genetic material altogether.

This may all sound very sombre and didactic. But really I was just playing around on the drawing board for a few minutes, and the thoughts going through my head fed into what I was doing.

I took some inspiration from Swiss fashion of the early 19th century and sketched a woman (very loosely) and began to dress her. Piece by piece.

It’s definitely fun. And as with all my hare-brained wanderings, it’s very messy.

Did she look better before or after she was clothed in bulky layers? She certainly looked different after the clothes were added.

Don’t we change ourselves so much, with what we wear?

blob tone

The natural woman

My lines have made her doll-like. I’m not sure that was deliberate. I was still in continuous line-drawing mode, so this was a big part of it.

a bit of red for a skirt

skirt and tunic added

still looking fairly natural

still a fairly timeless woman

adding the ornamentation that begins to create the look, the shape of a particular time and place

piece by piece she is decked out

ornamented

I haven’t done her shoes yet. I didn’t have any black paper. Perhaps this little bit of freedom I will leave her with. Feet on solid earth.

skirt with blood red wet crepe paper.

wet with glue, weighed down with drapery

Phew. That was fun. Now I’m going to have a shower and get into my soft stretch cotton pyjamas.

Blue Cornish Shadow Dance – a work in progress

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Thunderstorm inking is in progress this afternoon. I stopped to paint a cat on a discarded piece of paper (a piece of paper with two eyes cut out of it for Greyfur the puppet and a great deal of splodgy ink). This is actually a glorified-blob drawing. The blob suggested the Cornish Rex, and then I finished it off and put some shadow play in the background, experimenting with tone and shape in the way that I want to much more in the future. The Greyfur eye holes (bottom right) can be seen but have been filled in with a collaged piece of watercolour paper behind.

But here’s the thing. The original hard copy looks like this (below).

I’m reasonably pleased with this picture as a start. But it needs more tonal contrast and more definition in some areas I think. I shaded those blue areas over the top of this image in PhotoShop, almost without thinking, because I’m using PhotoShop so much to edit and enhance illustration work at the moment. I wanted to see what would happen if I added a further layer of colour and shape.

Now I can go back and add this over the real image if I want to. Or in a different colour and pattern. It’s a handy experiment that I hadn’t thought of before that might be quite helpful with my painting practice sometimes.

Cornish Rex (again)

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The finished head – because he is three dimensional (or at least high relief) he looks different from different angles.

Cornish Wraps…
Cornish Rips…

Whatever, it’s Cornish again. And he’s made with crumpled brown paper sandwich bags. I think this medium could be a lot of fun to pursue in all sorts of directions. This is actually a ‘card’ for Dad’s birthday. A kind of weird card perhaps, but it comes with lots of love.

It wasn’t completely out of the blue. I started using a variation on this method a couple of weeks ago to produce a puppet for the Puppet Challenge. I’ll post on that as well. I love the feel and flexibility of the crumpled paper. It’s soft and flexible but has enough stiffness to have a bit of expression of its own that it contributes to the shapes you make.

So here’s how he was made.

After thoroughly crumpling and squishing a few brown paper bags until they began to soften in my hands, I started folding here and there until a face emerged (a bit like playing with blobs) and then added a daub of glue here and there to hold sections in place.

I started with the head. The corners of the paper lunch bag practically made the cat’s ears on their own.

The flat nose piece is (from memory) a separate piece glued on top of the architecture of the nose and upper jaw. I liked the way the edges of the bag where there is a fine zig-zag cut are reminiscent of the curly coat of the Cornish Rex. So I made use of it on the cat’s wrinkled brow.

He now has a neck, and mouth

A body begins to emerge

legs and tail – not particularly happy with these, but no time for second takes

The application of ink was a little rushed because I was due at Dad’s birthday lunch in a few minutes

I added the eyes. I wanted them to contrast with the rest in their bold blockiness, not crumpled at all. The Cornish has huge glossy eyes.

I added the eyes. I wanted them to contrast with the rest in their bold blockiness, not crumpled at all. A Cornish Rex has huge, glossy eyes. I didn’t quite get the effect I wanted, but it had to do for now. He does look alert, I think.

Lastly, he had a quick toasting in front of the fan heater and then we had to leave for birthday celebrations. The hugs and kisses were added later with the waitresses’ black texta :-)

toasting by the fan heater

Happy (belated) Birthday Dad. xxxx

Judy Watson

author illustrator artist

Tag Archives: ink

Leonard’s Friends

ATTEN….SHUN!!

THE BLOB MADE ME DO IT!

endpapers instead of Endpapers

Camperdown Sam

Dog with balloon

Blobs on a moving vehicle (again)

Experiments with Blobs in a Moving Vehicle

Don’t try this at home.

Paper Dolls

Blue Cornish Shadow Dance – a work in progress

Cornish Rex (again)

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THE BLOB MADE ME DO IT!

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Don’t try this at home.

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