draw draw draw draw draw

Feels good to draw, man.

Forgive me, Darling Blog

Alas, I've been so busy that I not only missed posting Wednesday, but also yesterday! School has kept me insanely busy--actually, I need to get my ass in gear and get even MORE work done--which means, of course, bending space and time.

There are a lot of projects I'm working on along with getting some thesis work done, so more substantial posts may be coming in the future. But for now, here are some sketches from my Character Design class. We usually have somewhere between 4 minutes and 7 minutes maximum for each pose. I'm really trying to work on my shapes, dynamic and realistic poses, as well as stylizing the human form.

Here's to drawing!

This guy's a renegade. Watch out.

This model chick was pretty badass.

Liking some of the stylizing of the shapes... and look! The hand looks like a hand!

Still working on my men. Trying to find a balance between MANLY and sexy more androgynous man without them entering anywhere near looking like a lady. Not looking for THAT androgynous...

Viking chick! This lady model also had super awesome poses. Unfortunately, I didn't capture some of her epic poses very well.

Nice pose!

And now, just to show you how much I suck still, here is my drawing of Khal Drogo in the style of Bruce Timm:

Pretty bad. Looks like he's about to top over.... and how exactly is he holding that weakass arakh?

Then my instructor, Michael Buffington or Drawaholic, drew over my shitty drawing.

Prepare for epic manliness.

Badass. Right?

Now to keep drawing and get better!

Duh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuh-NUH... BATGIRL!

Last week I had some problems with transferring files from class and thought they were lost to me. Luckily, when I checked the next period they hadn't been deleted! Hurrah!

So I present to you... Batgirl!

I digitally inked one of the drawings from Ch. Design. I think it turned out pretty good, but there are some things about the drawing I may go back and tweak (Arch the back. No, arch it further! Further, damn you!)

Then I decided to place her in Gotham. Of course, I wanted to use reference from the Harold Washington Library in Chicago. If I ever work this through I definitely will share.

Have a great weekend!

In the Style of...

This week my summer semester at AAU started! This is my first semester of directed study (aka, working on mah thesis) so it should be productive. Well, it better be.

Today's post is a peek into one of my first assignments for a Character Design and Drawing for Animator's class. We were to draw 10 heads and 4 figures "in the style of" one of three given artists. I chose Shane Glines, or Cartoon Retro.

This was a pretty fun exercise and even though I don't necessarily think I've gotten his style down enough AT ALL, the observations I've been able to make while drawing in Glines' style have been great. He has beautiful shapes and lines, often put together in a way I don't normally think to do--straight lines into delicious curves? Why, yes!

First I sketched a couple directly from his to warm up and get a sense.

Then away to begin drawing heads!

That's right. I had to draw a man. Super difficult to do in his style, as whenever there are men they're SUPER simple and practically all straight lines. I tried to add some sexiness to my Glines' man in the style of his women. I think I need to re-work that butt-into-thigh a little bit tho... I like my men juicy but damn...

Now to refine and redraw for tomorrow's class!

Also, here are some of my favorite drawings of Cartoon Retro's which I've been staring at for well over four hours...

Sexy devil girl (he does quite a few of these @_@)

Chick sitting

Chick smoking

Now to eat some dinner and draw some more!

Sketching is Good for You

Nothing too intensive to post today, but I did do some sketching last night. I often get bogged down by assignments and painting a lot recently, forgetting to take the time to leisurely sketch. It's very important, I think, and rejuvenates my spirit.

Man tits and nipples. Still elude me. Also still working on drawing more manly men.. believe me, years ago all my dudes looked like ladies.

Trying to remember rules and practice foreshortening--both these sketches without referring to any reference but my mind. It's getting better and it was fun to just sketch whatever... but those boobs are bothering me. Also.. that foremost shoulder should probably overlap more.... aaah! Practice, practice, practice!

Now, without further ado, I must get back to painting! Have a great weekend, everyone!

Drawing Dump

It is as I said... and here, a dump of drawings from the summer.

One of my last from Anatomy... finally starting to get the hang of white charcoal pencil on toned paper.

I really enjoyed drawing this model. She had a lot of energy and beautiful curves (including her lovely hair!)

Loved her hair cut and the look-away.

I now have a thing for drawing backs... mmm, back muscles...

Something about this model (and I've drawn her a few times in varying classes) reminds me of Brienne of Tarth... (yup, still hooked on that crack)

Color! Oh, Color!

The best thing I gained from my Figurative Concepts class this Fall semester was an experimentation with color via pastels. See, color was an elusive she-beast to me and is only now starting to come around. Previously, I worked mostly in a limited color palette, usually even purely monochromatic. This isn't to say that I'm necessarily going to vastly change my color appreciation and I'm still a hardcore sucker for monochromatic illustrations... but the explosion of color I experienced was a nice diversion from my norm.

We each placed our five best drawings on the floor of the classroom the last day and the scope of it all was pretty cool.

Pastels are actually pretty awesome and fun to use. They provide bold, vibrant color and are a relatively flexible medium--at least more so than my usual inks. Here are a few selections of my work with pastels these past months. In the future, I'll be adding some of these to my Etsy shop so if anything strikes your fancy, keep an eye out.

Ah, pastels. How you have worked your way into my heart... and my hand.

Merry Winter's Solstice, everyone!!

Enjoy your holiday festivus winter celebrations!

11 Days and Counting!!!

Eleven days left in Chicago!

Freak Out.... Commence. Mainly since I haven't started packing yet.

Not to leave you completely lacking any visual, here is the nude version of one of my recent assignments. I have to make a few corrections to the final version where they're clothed and placed in a setting....

SUCCUBUS!!!

More updates will be coming and I'll try to post more regularly. Once corrections are made, I'll post some more finished drawings and most likely will update my Etsy shop with more prints and original art in the next month.

Visual Passport

One of my assignments. I had to create a visual passport presenting myself to the class. So here it is! I took a slightly different approach to the illustration in the sense that I posed and directly drew from a reference. Shocking, I know! I do like how the drawing turned out though. I'm also liking the overall look and feel behind the finished illustration with the textures and physical elements (scanned hair). Makes me want to do a series of mythological or fairy tale illustrations in a similar style.

Hmmm...... we shall see.

Clothed Figure Drawing

So my first assignment for my Clothed Figure Drawing class online at AAU's grad program is complete! Woo boy that was a long-winded sentence. It was pretty interesting to already learn some new techniques, such as sharpening the charcoal.



Now, this may be obvious to some of you, but Columbia's Fine Art department was hit or miss. I guess I got through not really being told about this phenomenon. For those who are still in the dark, all you do is take an X-acto knife (or any good knife for that matter) and shave it down to a point. It makes a mess, as you can see, so make sure you're more prepared than I was. I really love the patterns the charcoal makes as it's shaved off though. After cutting it down, you're supposed to smooth it with sand paper but since I am lacking that now, I just worked with it as is.



This was the first drawing I did after some warm-up exercises. I'm also holding the charcoal differently now--against my fingers and held with my thumb so that I can gain more movement and flexibility when drawing.



Also what was different this drawing around was that I started with the eyes and related everything to one another as I went, as opposed to roughing the entire form in all at once. I think it came out ok? lol It was definitely a different experience.

All in all, working with charcoal again was lots of fun--especially with new techniques. However... there was one thing I forgot about charcoal.



The photo doesn't do my face justice as to how ridiculous I looked. It was all along the side of my face and on my chin.. haha...

If anyone happens to still be reading too (I know, crazy right? Of course I'm just talking to myself and the internet), due to my renewed love and interest in charcoal and drawing the clothed human figure, if anyone wants a quick drawing of themselves then by all means, let me know!!!

Send me a few photos of yourself.... CLOTHED. And let's keep it somewhat decent.. at least try. I mean ultimately it's up to you but know there's a chance it'll be going up on this here blog so you may want to keep your privates to yourself. E-mail me at melisa.desrosiers@gmail.com, include a photo or two, tell me a little bit about yourself, and I'll get to drawing. Then I'll e-mail the drawing to you as a high-res file just in case you want to print it out or anything. If I decide to post it on my blog, I'll let you know first before doing so.

Alrighty! I shall await your responses.

::crickets chirp::