Posted Sept. 30, 2006: there was a HUGE gap in the work flow here. Life got in the way. BIGtime <argh>. Anyone who thinks drawing is just a fun little thing you do is wildly mistaken. That only happens when you're a kid. When you're an adult, it's a constant battle to find time to do your thing. At least, that is...if you're trying to keep your art pure by having another way to pay your daily bread bills <rolfmao>. This art is about what I want to make, not what I think will sell quickly <g>. You make choices. That doesn't leave a lot of time for much TV, but no big loss. Really <lol>. Anyway.

Time rolled around and the show I was aiming this artwork at moved their entry deadline up by a month...so I had to finish it. NOW. I took the weekend off and FOCUSED! Wow, it worked :) Now it's up to them to decide if they want this pen & ink in their latest show...

Posted Aug. 12, 2006: no matter what your BEST intentions are...life happens <g>. I am really fighting to make every Sunday my ART day (re: Paul Gauguin)... BUT, things do happen. Transitioning from an old (1999) computer to a new one has taken a lot of time, energy and four letter words. And, THIS weekend I am sick as a dog. Sheesh. So, this update is way belated and I haven't gotten very far recently. But, there has been some drawing here and there since then (below).

Mostly I am working on small (design) problem areas and trying to feel my way through them. AND...my new pens are in! Yeah! Ebay rock 'n rolls baby! A full set of refillable Koh-i-noor pens! I am READY to ink (as soon as I use this last disposable Rotring up <lol>). And this time...I am cleaning my pens as I go so they won't clog up! BIGtime! Click here for a close-up zoom of the artwork to the left.

Posted July 12, 2006: Peg McCreary, friend and fellow artist, recently said to me that mistakes make you take chances with your art that you normally wouldn't dare. She calls this her "Painter's Hail Mary Pass". hehehehe. Funny but true. Mistakes guide you into places you didn't mean to go. For example: I did NOT intend to get so detailed on the large background image. But that pen & the ink dripping fiasco changed things around a tad (see below). Oh well AND cool beanies. It's a LOT more work, but I actually like the more intense detail that has come forth. It reinforces the surreal-ality of the puzzle pieces <g>.

Click here for a close-up zoom of the artwork to the left.

Posted July 03, 2006: the major pieces are starting to show themselves and it is getting interesting indeed :) You never know how a work of art is going to finish. By the end you find all sorts of surprises, twists and turns making themselves known. The characters tend to write their own script, you (the artist) are part creator, part audience <lol>. Ask any author, artist or songwriter.

Down to technical notes. I'm trying to run the pen that dribbled ink on the face out of ink so I can reload a new pen and fix the face... Unfortunately, there is a LOT of ink still in the pen <roflmao>. BUT when I tried to use THAT pen (very fine tip) to color in my crows... it started tearing the paper up, so I had to pull out a new thick tip for THAT part. THAT pen keeps running out of ink <sheesh>. Irony rules. SOOO... even though I KNOW you're supposed to start your drawing in the upper lefthand corner and work your way down... I'm not going that route <g>.

Posted June 20, 2006: I've chosen pointillism to portray the face and I'm trying to be REAL delicate about the whole deal...when my pen drops a great big blob of ink right on the cheekbone! Argh! It's one of my fine tip rotring art pens and I guess that I just wore the nib out because it let go of two great big blobs. Okay. They're not HUGE but they're way bigger than they should be and quite obvious. AND I had so been counting down the hours earlier... so impatient to get back to the drawing. This happened in the first five minutes. AAAaaaargh!

So... I have to pick up a brand new pen and add more detail to the face as a fixit. Pen & ink can be nerve wracking sometimes (if you take it too seriously <lol>). Man. Anyway. I started inking in the clothing to use up the pen and I've put down a nice layer of gray. I'll add details later.

Posted June 13, 2006: Well, I didn't get very far this weekend but it's off to a beautiful start. I am, however, running into a small problem: humidity. I live in Florida -- go figure, eh? My paper is curling and that sucks. I talked to a friend who works in watercolors. Suggestions included: taping the drawing down to a board, stretching the paper using watercolor art stretchers, moving to a thicker grade of paper and piling LOTS of heavy books on it when not working on the drawing. I have LOTS of heavy books <lol>, so that part isn't a problem. I'm not too keen on the taping part and I've just invested too much time to really want to start over with a thicker grade of paper. I'm going to try the "flatten it with books" bit and see how that works. <btw> Thanks Michelle!

Art note: so far this one incorporates pointillism AND cross hatching (normally 2 completely separate fields of inking).

Posted June 04, 2006: the hair kept giving me trouble. One can only erase so many times before the paper wears out, even when using a kneaded eraser <g>. Too much erasing and it's impossible to lay down a crisp line because the ink is bleeding due to the roughness of the paper <argh>. That's where technology comes to the rescue! Grab that digital camera, take a photo of the artwork, put it in the computer, run the image through Photoshop and then print out a bunch of copies <lol>. I think I used about 15 copies of the art before I started to get even a little happy with the results <roflmao>.

Regardless...I am just having a blast. Read the "News" articles on the website and you will hear over and over again, "I am GOING to start drawing again...soon." Years of this, and it's finally happening :) Some things are worth the effort. This is the second artwork (2006) and I am about to have my second work on a gallery wall. Yeah.

Posted June 02, 2006: the holiday was absolutely wonderful, I spent a LOT of time drawing. It has been a LONG time since I've been able to spend days, in a row, drawing without fighting for every inch of time. The last year or two has been one big long fight to get to this point and it was GREAT! Gary made music and I drew. This vacation was a real artistic retreat and it was fantastic <g>.

Artwork details: the hair in the photo was VERY bleach blonde and stringy. It looked exhausted. If I drew that hair in, it would look like a bad hair job (no matter how good you are at drawing <roflmao>). That's kind of what happened with the last drawing. The hair on the model was graying and it came out harshly in B&W. That's where the old artistic license comes in handy. I took some liberties and added some life to that hair :) After all, photos are for photographers and this is MY drawing :)