2017!

Hello! Let me begin by wishing you a happy new year! With the arrival of the new year I have decided to try and be more active on here again. Unfortunately, life got a bit hectic before Christmas with A-levels and university applications so my poor blog was abandoned, but I'm back and with any luck you can expect more frequent posts, as well as on my Instagram. (You can follow me here). 

Before Christmas I attended a workshop at Tate Modern (in-depth post coming soon!), and it's safe to say I had a bit of a eureka moment in terms of my illustration and the direction I want to take it in. Basically, I. Am. Obsessed. With. Texture. This has lead to me working a lot more in collage and coloured pencil and I am loving it! I haven't felt so inspired and driven in so long, or so pleased with what I'm creating.

Here are some more recent drawings from my sketchbook:

This year I hope to really make time to develop my illustration, but also my love of reading. I'm thinking of starting a series of posts where I review and recommend some books and graphic novels - exciting!

I can't wait to see how my art progresses! Thanks for reading!

Stranger Things

I recently had the pleasure of watching Stranger Things on Netflix and have since re-watched it with my family. I think it is a really great show and I hope so much that they make a series 2! So, as always after watching an amazing film or series- a bit of fan art has to follow!  

I decided to draw Nancy. I liked her character a lot, but I liked her outfits even more,  I'll take one of each please!

This is an important drawing for me because it is the first digital illustration that I am truly proud of and happy with, it's such an incredible feeling! I actually got my graphics tablet about a year ago so it  just goes to show what a year of practice can do.

I am also super pleased with the style of this drawing. Style is something I have been feeling really frustrated with at the moment, but , since doing this drawing, I can say that I am happy with the direction mine is heading. I like that the face is incredibly simplified, but I think I was still able to capture a likeness and her expression. I can't wait to see where my style and digital drawing abilities will progress!

Thanks for reading!

Malala

I was in the mood to draw a portrait recently to try and get me out of a bit of a block ( it worked!) and who better to draw than Malala Yousafzai?! For me, she is an incredibly inspiring woman because of her work for female education and equality. Therefore, for this portrait I felt it was important to successfully capture her determined expression to pay tribute to her work and bravery.

I was inspired by the amazing illustrations of Isabelle Arsenault (check out her work here) to try working a lot of texture into the portrait. I did this by using multiple layers of watercolour and coloured pencil. I have really been enjoying this combination recently.

I am really pleased with the finished piece. I think it is probably the strongest portrait I have ever done thanks to the texture, colours and the expression. I hope it does Malala justice!

Thanks for reading!

Rey

I finally watched the new Star Wars film and it was amazing, I loved it so much. As always after watching a film I really like I have to do some fan art, so here is my drawing of Rey:

I used watercolours and coloured pencils for this illustration and I had a lot of fun playing around with the lines in her costume and experimenting with their colour. Overall, I am really pleased with this one!

Thanks for reading!

The Royal Armouries Museum

Recently my family and I visited the Royal Armouries in Leeds which is a free museum specialising in arms and armour. Obviously I took my sketchbook because museum sketching is one of my favourite things to do. Ever. I did a few pages of quick sketches and notes while we were there to use as reference and inspiration for future illustrations and drawings.

Visiting the museum left me feeling super inspired so I went home and drew some more (these are the more detailed sketches towards the end). I really wanted to focus on the clothes that the characters were wearing in these drawings and I enjoyed it so much, it is definitely something I will be doing more of in the future. For the minute these are just conceptual sketches, but I am sure I will incorporate them into some illustrations in the future.

Thanks for reading!

Amy and Rory

One of my goals for this year was to start drawing full-body portraits more often in order to improve at drawing the human figure. This digital painting is just a bit of Doctor Who fan art, but I made an effort to draw Amy and Rory's full bodies.

As usual, I began by drawing some thumb nails so I could figure out the positions that I wanted them to be in and the composition of the piece.

Once I had drawn one I was happy with I then developed it into a bigger, more detailed sketch.

Here's the final illustration:

Overall, I'm pretty pleased with this illustration, especially as an early attempt at illustrating the whole body. I think Amy worked better than Rory because she seems more relaxed and natural and my favourite detail from the painting is Amy's shirt, so I know to include more details in future paintings.

Thanks for reading!

Character Design

Lately I have really been enjoying coming up with characters. I find that when I invent and draw somebody I start to get a feel for what their personality might be. I'm sure it would be interesting to develop these ideas into a detailed back story so maybe I will try that soon.

Anyway, here is my latest:

I really enjoyed doing this drawing as I wanted to give her a really individual style so I had a lot of fun choosing her clothes and hair. I am probably most pleased with the glasses because I LOVE playing around with opacity, I also tried to introduce a lot of texture into this one.

Hope you like it, thanks for reading!